BBC Radio Podcasts from More or Less: Behind the Stats

98%: Is misinformation being spread about a review of trans youth medicine?

Investigating claims that the Cass Review ignored valuable evidence

Tackling The Three-Body Problem

Is the physics in Netflix's new show accurate?

Is loneliness as bad for you as smoking?

The connection between being alone and an early death

Remembering Daniel Kahneman

Tim Harford on the great social scientist, who has died at the age of 90

Bonus episode: Daniel Kahneman on Thinking, Fast and Slow

In an episode of More or Less from 2012, Daniel Kahneman explains his big ideas.

What's happening to Arctic ice?

Arctic ice has been in long decline. Do recent fluctuations change the story?

Does the Russian government really spend 40% of its budget on the military?

We investigate how much the Russian state is spending on the war in Ukraine.

Is public speaking really our biggest fear?

Tim Harford investigates the claim that public speaking is people’s number one fear.

Ultramarathons: Are women faster than men?

Is it really true that in extremely long races, women run faster than men?

School spending, excess deaths and billions of animals at Heathrow

Is school funding at record levels? Did 6.5bn creatures come to the UK by plane last year?

NBA basketball: Is height more important than skill?

How much does a man’s height affect his chances of becoming an NBA basketball player?

Per capita GDP, MP claims and the entire EU budget

What does per capita GDP tell us? How much did the EU spend on covid recovery?

The digital ‘robots’ unlocking medical data

Ben Goldacre on OpenSAFELY, protecting patient privacy while analysing health data

Debt, students, shark and chips

What is the government’s rule on debt? Do 90% of chip shops sell shark and chips?

The global gender split in young people’s politics

Tim Harford investigates the growing political divergence between young men and women.

Council tax weirdness: Hartlepool vs Westminster

Council tax comparisons, migration calculations and the carbon footprint of home-grown veg

A pocket-size history of the calculator

Tim Harford explores the history of calculators from clockwork to the Kashio brothers

Measles, Traitors and the cost of Brexit

Is measles spreading? How much is Brexit costing? How good are they at traitor guessing?

Is Oxfam right about the world’s richest and poorest people?

We investigate how Oxfam use wealth stats to illustrate global inequality

Shopping, shipping and wind chill-ing

We investigate the cost of a weekly shop and explore the workings of wind chill

Are there more possible games of chess than atoms in the universe?

We investigate how the vast possibilities in chess compare to the vastness of the universe

Life expectancy, inheritance tax and the NHS vs winter

How long will we live? Who pays inheritance tax? How did the NHS perform this winter?

Do we see 10,000 adverts per day?

We investigate the claim that each of us sees thousands of adverts every single day

Deaths, taxes and missing cats

We investigate claims about gun crime, the UK tax burden, and the number of missing cats

How much money do the ‘Ndrangheta mafia make?

We investigate whether one criminal group could have a turnover of billions of dollars

Numbers of the year 2023

Hand-picked stats that tell you something interesting about the world

Can chocolate be better than salad?

We investigate a nutritional conundrum – can chocolate ever be better for you than salad?

China’s missing numbers

How the Chinese state make inconvenient statistics disappear

Does endurance sport harm your heart?

We investigate the connection between high levels of exercise and arrhythmia

Will there be a billion climate refugees?

We investigate if floods, droughts and storms will cause mass international migration

A boy meets girl meets stats story

A data scientist takes on rom com films to see how women in STEM are represented.

Are women in the UK the biggest binge drinkers in the world?

Checking out stats on boozing Brits and fishing fleets in the South China Sea

Can maths prove the existence of aliens?

We look a famous equation which tries to explain whether life exists in outer space

Do Indian women own 11% of the world’s gold?

The cultural importance of gold is well known – but how much do Indians actually own?

The Overlooked Mathematicians of History

Exploring the global history of mathematics

What do windscreen splats tell us about insect decline?

We ask whether the ‘windscreen phenomenon’ suggests falling numbers of insects

Greedy jobs and the gender pay gap

Tim Harford discusses the work of Nobel Economics prize winner Claudia Goldin

Are half the words in English from French?

We ask whether almost half the words in the English language are of French origin.

Vaccine claims, Alzheimer's treatment and Tim's Parkrun times

We debunk claims about excess deaths and the covid vaccine made by YouTuber John Campbell

Is the UK really ahead in cutting carbon emissions?

As the UK changes course in its path to net zero, how does it compare with other nations?

NHS consultant pay, Net Zero claims and Scotland's ferry woes

Are consultants in England really paid an average of £120,000 a year?

Which city has the longest canals?

We dive into the world of waterways after a listener asked who has the longest canals.

Social housing, NHS workforce and Liz Truss debt claims

Have the Tories really built a record number of social rent homes since 2010?

How to approach the world through numbers

Professor David Sumpter talks to Tim Harford about his new book

Skin cancer, London rents and your great great great granddaughter

Is it true that 1 in 4 men and 1 in 5 women in the UK will get skin cancer?

Did 35,000 Americans die building the Panama Canal?

We fact check a claim made by Donald Trump about the world famous canal

Covid deaths, North Sea gas and Chloe Kelly's World Cup penalty

Covid related deaths are rising in England and Wales - we investigate the figures

What percentage of our brain do we actually use?

Do we have access to some or all of our brain-power?

HS2 and electric cars, UK vs China emissions & massive maths errors

Can you really buy an electric car for everybody in the UK for the cost of HS2?

How safe is the release of Fukushima nuclear plant water?

We ask whether there are any risks posed by the release into the Pacific Ocean.

How many butterflies are there in the world?

The world’s butterfly population doesn’t seem to be online – so what is it?

Why is it so hard to predict the outcome of competitions like the Premier League?

What variables do we look at when we try to predict the outcome of a sports competition?

Are the media exaggerating how hot it is in the Mediterranean?

A look at how accurately media report on the weather – especially recent heatwaves.

Data, extreme weather and climate change

The role data plays in climate attribution - and why we don’t always have it

Ukraine war: A new way of calculating Russian deaths

How Russian journalists are using probate records to estimate fatalities

Are more adult nappies sold in Japan than baby ones?

We examine a claim related to the perception of Japan as an ageing society.

Does it take 10,000 litres of water to make a pair of jeans?

The numbers behind water use and denim production.

Immigration: A More or Less Special Programme

Who is coming to the UK - and how do we count them?

Will there be just 6 grandchildren for every 100 South Koreans?

We look at the numbers around South Korea’s birth rate and the reasons why it’s so low.

Halving inflation, Scottish tidal power and have 1 in 3 women had an abortion?

Will Rishi Sunak’s pledge to halve inflation happen?

US National Debt: is $32 trillion a big number?

How concerned should we be about how much the US government borrows?

Mortgages, birth rates and does space contribute 18% to UK GDP?

Who will be most affected by mortgage rate increases?

Is breastfeeding the key to exam success?

We look at a new UK study that links being breastfed as a baby with academic achievement.

Electric vehicles, 600 million bottles and does oral sex cause cancer?

Is the weight of electric vehicles a risk to infrastructure?

Counting Hunger in India

Is it true that hunger has worsened in India?

Lib Dem ambulance claims, affordable rent and goat meat

Did 120 people a day in England die last year whilst waiting for an ambulance?

A short history of data

How the evolution of data over centuries has shaped today’s world

Food prices, net migration and beef about beef

Does Britain really have the most affordable food in Europe?

Are young people more single than ever before?

How to define and measure being single – and are dating apps to blame?

NHS waiting lists, Voter ID and measuring divorce

Why a fall in those waiting longest for treatment in England isn't telling the whole story

Detecting Bad Science with Data

Uncovering fraud, malpractice and incompetence in science

Do 94% of marriages in Portugal really end in divorce?

We examine a social media post that claims to outline rates of divorce across the world.

Why is life expectancy falling in the USA?

We ask why average life expectancy in America is falling so quickly.

How much is the Coronation crown worth?

King Charles will be anointed with St Edward’s Crown – but what’s its true value?

The Pentagon Leaks and Fox News

Why did Tucker Carlson say far more Ukrainian troops than Russian are dying in the war?

How accurate is baby's due date?

This week we investigate how a baby's due date is calculated

How to better understand and explain numbers

Professor Oliver Johnson discusses the use of statistics in the pandemic and in life.

A groundbreaking new proof for Pythagoras’ Theorem?

Two high school students say they’ve discovered a new trigonometric proof for the theorem

Covid vaccines and false claims about miscarriage

We debunk viral claims that incorrectly link covid-19 vaccines with a risk of miscarriage

Silicon Valley Bank: a very modern bank run

How do bank runs happen?

Do fungi kill three times as many people as malaria?

We investigate the claim that fungal infections are a much bigger killer than malaria.

Does your jewellery contain stolen Brink’s-Mat gold?

We ask what happened to the 3 tonnes of pure gold after the infamous robbery of 1983

UK vs European energy prices, falling excess deaths and is 5 grams of cocaine a lot?

We debunk a claim that the UK has by far the highest energy prices in Europe

Do 29,000 coffee pods really go to landfill every minute?

We explore the environmental consequences of our thirst for coffee

Reoffending rates, Welsh taxes and the menopause

Tim Harford and team fact check a government claim about falling reoffending rates

Florence Nightingale and how she visualised data

Tim Harford discusses the power of the nurse statistician’s groundbreaking diagrams

Nurses' pay, ambulance times and forgotten female economists

We look at how much nurses in the UK are paid compared with those in Europe.

Spreadsheet disasters

The long and costly history of spreadsheet mistakes

The IMF and the UK economy, NHS staff shortages and British vs English

How much should we trust the IMF’s forecasts for the UK?

Hannah Fry on using shopping data to detect ovarian cancer

The mathematician discusses a study that suggests loyalty card data could signal cancer.

Brexit and trade, pensioner millionaires and Hannah Fry on loyalty cards and cancer

We examine a claim that the UK’s trade with the EU has increased since Brexit

Are wild mammals only 4% of the mammal population?

Are wild mammals only 4% of the mammal population?

Coffee with the Chancellor, inflation measures, GP numbers and toilet paper

We fact check Jeremy Hunt’s pledge to halve inflation

Does toilet paper cause 15% of global deforestation?

We investigate the impact of our use of toilet paper on the world’s forests.

Ambulance response times, teacher pay and Irish pubs

How long are people really waiting when they call 999 for an ambulance?

How we shook the world of very large numbers

How an edition of More or Less influenced the naming of enormous numbers

A&E delays and deaths, religious identity in N Ireland and naming the monster numbers

How many people may be dying because of treatment delays in the NHS?

Can China's data on covid deaths be trusted?

Is China under-reporting data on Covid related deaths?

Irish pubs - a global numbers game

Are there more Irish pubs in Ireland than in all other countries combined?

Numbers of the Year 2022

Tim Harford and guests on the numbers that help tell the big stories of the year.

Qatar World Cup: the pressure of penalties

We analyse World Cup penalty data to ask what boosts the chance of scoring from the spot

Why are data so important in determining how we live?

How good policies depend on the availability of reliable statistics

The World Cup: how many migrant workers have died?

Examining the wildly varying estimates of deaths in the run-up to the tournament in Qatar

When do food shortages become a famine?

With Somalia in crisis, we ask how data is used to officially declare a famine

A $220 billion World Cup?

Has hosting the FIFA football World Cup really cost Qatar $220bn?

Bonus Episode: Understand the Economy

Tim Harford brings you the first episode of his new podcast and explains inflation

Improving the numbers in the news

Tim Harford discusses the role statistics should play in the reporting of the news

Lula’s “zero deforestation” plan for the Amazon

How much of the rainforest has been lost? And can Brazil’s new president save it?

Can China’s GDP data be trusted?

Are China’s most recent figures for economic growth wrong?

Do half of new books really sell fewer than twelve copies?

We look into a claim that 50% of new books in the US sell just a handful of copies.

Ben Bernanke and the magic of banking

Tim Harford explains the work of this year’s Nobel Economics Prize winners

Catching Chess Cheats with Data

A cheating scandal is rocking the world of chess - and data is at its heart

Teens and antidepressants, stamp duty savings and earthquake probabilities

We debunk a claim that a third of British teenagers have been prescribed antidepressants

NASA’s asteroid collision: how many asteroids are really out there?

As NASA rams an asteroid to try and alter its course, how many are yet to be discovered?

Falling pound, the Queen’s funeral and is 0.5 on the Richter scale a big number?

How worried should we be about the steep falls in the pound?

Ukraine’s progress in numbers

We ask how much progress Ukraine has really made in recapturing territory from Russia.

Ukraine offensive, weak pound & how much do women really exercise

We ask how much progress Ukraine has really made in recapturing territory from Russia

How bad is fashion for the environment?

Does fashion really account for 10% of greenhouse gas emissions?

Energy crisis plan, imperial measures survey, gardens v national parks

How much will the UK government’s plan to limit energy price rises end up costing?

Is a third of Pakistan really under water?

We investigate a widely reported claim as Pakistan deals with devastating flooding

Pakistan flooding, UK power prices and Boris’s broadband claim

The scale of the disaster is huge, but is a third of Pakistan really under water?

Can we use maths to beat the robots?

Why improving how we teach and think about maths could help us keep an edge over machines

Energy prices, excess deaths and the race to count to 200

Is there an easy way to cut soaring energy bills?

Kenya’s Election Rounding Error

Official figures didn’t add up - but due to rounding, not fraud.

The numbers behind “natural” birth control

We examine online claims about the effectiveness of “natural” birth control methods

Is opinion polling broken?

Following some high profile slip-ups in recent US elections, is opinion polling broken?

Debunking the Liverpool FC Conspiracy Theory

We debunk spurious rumours that Liverpool FC use asthma medication to enhance performance

How our world measures up

From ancient tally bones to a jar of peanut butter, a look at the history of measurement

Does the World Athletics Championships have a false start problem?

We examine the rules and tech of false starts after the disqualification of Devon Allen.

Is Uganda about to become a middle income country?

We assess President Museveni’s claim that Uganda is nearing a higher economic status.

Does it take 10,000 litres of water to make a pair of jeans?

The numbers behind water use and denim production

How many American women will have an abortion in their lifetime?

In the wake of the historic overturning of Roe vs Wade, we look at the statistics.

Covid climb, childcare costs and why can’t the French count properly?

How accurately are official figures picking up the new covid wave?

Ed Sheeran and the mathematics of musical coincidences

Ed Sheeran thinks that musical coincidences will always happen… but do the numbers agree?

Rail strikes, tyre pollution and sex statistics

Do rail workers really earn £13,000 a year more than nurses?

How often do people have sex?

Looking at sex and statistics in Japan and America.

Maternity litigation, stars, bees and windowless planes

Are damages for maternity mistakes now more than wages for maternity nurses and doctors?

Hannah Fry: Understanding the numbers of cancer

The maths professor on the choices she and others have faced after a cancer diagnosis

Employment puzzle, pyramids and triplets

The UK has a low unemployment rate but lots of people not working – how come?

Are girls starting puberty earlier?

We look into a claim that the age of girls’ puberty is falling rapidly

Jubilee costs, fuel poverty and imperial measures

We debunk a claim the government is spending £38,000 per household on the Jubilee

Noisy Decisions

The world’s most famous psychologist on how 'noise' impacts our decision making

Germany’s excess deaths, Eurovision and teacher shortages

Did Germany really fare worse than the UK in the pandemic?

Are just 100 companies responsible for 71% of global emissions and how stressed are South Africans?

Looking at numbers on green house gas emissions and stress

Did the WHO get some of its excess death estimates wrong?

We look at the World Health Organisation’s latest estimates of the pandemic’s death toll

Have the oceans become 30% more acidic?

Tim Harford asks how we measure the health of our oceans

Sweden’s polarising pandemic response

Has Sweden’s pandemic response been a triumph or a disaster…or something in-between?

Understanding India through Data

What can data tell us about a country of 1.4 billion people?

Subitising and simplifying: how to better explain numbers

How can we clearly explain complex numbers to the public without losing their meaning?

Did tea-drinking cut deaths in the Industrial Revolution?

How tea became an accidental lifesaver in 18th Century England.

Will the war in Ukraine cause a global wheat shortage?

How much of the worlds wheat comes from Ukraine and Russia

Pizza and Nuclear War

How good negotiation can help us split pizzas fairly and also avoid Nuclear War

Does the UK take in more refugees than other European countries?

Fact checking Boris Johnson’s claim.

Numbers in Ukraine and low seas in Chagos

Troop and casualty numbers in Ukraine

Troop and Casualty Numbers in Ukraine

How reliable are the figures coming out of the conflict in Ukraine?

Did lockdowns save any lives?

Did lockdowns actually save any lives?

Vaccinating children, lockdowns, and ebikes

Jabs for five to 11-year-olds, lockdown effectiveness, and being green on two wheels

Hospitalisation rates for children with Covid

Do 1 in 100 children who catch Covid end up hospitalised?

Questioning claims about Covid and children

How likely are children to end up in hospital because of Covid? And how many have died?

Testosterone and sport

Trans women’s participation in elite sport

The prime minister in statistical bother

Boris Johnson has been ticked off for misleading Parliament on jobs and on crime.

Can you fool your brain?

Looking at the power of expectations

Does the UK have the fastest growing economy in the G7?

How fast is our economy growing? And what is happening with Omicron reinfections?

Fertility rates: baby boom or bust?

Fertility rates around the world

Should you follow the 5 second rule? And does inflation hit the poorest harder?

Does inflation hit poor households harder and how many people have died of Covid?

Are female patients more likely to die if the surgeon is male?

Should women be worried about having a male surgeon?

Are women 32% more likely to die after operation by a male surgeon?

Surgery death risks, Test and Trace costs in the UK and Germany, and podcast plans

QAnon: Did 365,348 children go missing in the US in 2020?

Fact checking a QAnon claim

Omicron, pandemic birth rates and boosters

An Omicron update, pandemic birth rates and the booster drive.

How much plastic is in the Ocean and can Mr Beast make a difference?

Looking at Mark Rober and Mr Beast’s plastics pledge.

Will the population of Nigeria be larger than Europe’s?

Will Nigeria’s population really reach 600million?

Numbers of 2021

The most significant numbers of the year

The psychological economics of gift giving

How to buy gifts people actually want.

Does catching covid give you more immunity than being vaccinated?

Infection vs injection: Could prior infection provide 27 times more protection?

Does wearing a mask halve your chances of getting Covid-19?

Is it true wearing a mask reduces Covid-19 incidence by 53%?

Simpson’s Paradox: How to make vaccinated death figures misleading

A tricky statistical phenomenon at play.

A TikTok tale

How a well-meaning TikTok disrupted 4,600 studies

The carbon cost of breakfast at COP26

Can a vegan croissant really be worse for the environment than a bacon roll?

Same data, opposite results. Can we trust research?

Why the same data can produce different conclusions.

The art of counting

Tim Harford talks to author Deborah Stone about her book which explores counting.

The numbers behind Squid Game

Could you survive a round in Squid Game, and how many have watched it?

The prize-winning economics of migration and the minimum wage

A look at the work of this year’s winners of the most prestigious prize in economics.

Bonus episode: the first ever More or Less

A chat with More or Less's founding producer and presenter plus the first episode in full

Twenty years of More or Less

A look back at our origins, plus the usual mix of numerical nous and statistical savvy.

The Gender Pay Gap

Can Machiavelli help women get a better deal in the workplace?

Is it easy being green?

Expensive electricity, inadequate insulation, and a tale of tumbling trees.

Covid trends, face mask use, and the universal credit cut

A coronavirus check-in, our daily mask use measured, and the universal credit cut.

How many holes are there in a drinking straw?

Tim Harford talks to Jordan Ellenberg about the pandemic, geometry and drinking straws.

Death, Tax and Dishwashers

Why is estimating the number of unvaccinated people so tricky? And how deadly is 2021?

Vaccine waning, hot dogs and Afghanistan

How worried should we be about antibodies? Plus food that shortens life.

The Bill for Afghanistan

Did the war in Afghanistan cost the US $2 trillion?

Covid, HGV driver shortages and protest costs

Has Brexit caused a fall in lorry drivers? Plus policing Extinction Rebellion

Reason, numbers and Mr Spock

What role do numbers play in helping us think more rationally?

The extraordinary life of Robert Moses

The life of mathematics educator and civil rights organiser, Dr Robert Moses

How good were the performances at the Tokyo Olympics?

What can the data tell us about the quality of the Covid hit games?

Jab fears explained: a base rate fallacy

Why increasing Covid infections amongst the vaccinated isn’t necessarily bad news

Breaking Climate Records

The odds and probability behind record-breaking temperatures

The Rise of Delta

Where’s this new Variant spreading and what can be done to stop it?

The Freedom Day Gamble

Tim Harford and the team try to work out how long Covid cases will continue to rise.

Are there 40 million Nigerians on Twitter?

Recent reports have claimed that Nigeria has 40 million Twitter users – but is this true?

Is Ivermectin a Covid ‘wonder drug’?

What do we know about the efficacy of Ivermectin as a treatment for Covid-19?

Scotland cases, flood risk and taxing the poor

Covid 19 cases are on the rise in Scotland, plus will your town be under water by 2030?

Maths and the Mayflower

Are there really 35 million descendants of the Mayflower alive today?

Delta cases, blue tits and that one-in-two cancer claim

Should we worry about the Delta variant? Plus how much do blue tits eat?

The origins of Covid

How similar are the Covid strains?

Covid deaths, outdoor swimming and care homes

The global death toll has reached a grim milestone. Plus the UK’s low ranking waters.

The doubling of life-expectancy

The story of how data helped extend our lives

Third wave fears, smart motorways and bra sizes

Should we worry about Covid cases rising? Plus are smart motorways safe?

Bolton vaccines, Yorkshire versus Scotland and the average gamer

Were tens of thousands of people getting their jab in Bolton every single day?

The Seaspiracy “virtually empty ocean” claim

Why it’s unlikely our oceans will be virtually empty by 2048.

Wales jab success, Eurovision and living with your parents

How to vaccinate a country quickly, plus the UK’s singing contest woes.

The medical trial that proved Trump wrong

The Recovery Trial identified drugs that did and did not help save lives.

Explaining maths without Numbers

Tim Harford speaks to mathematician Milo Beckman about the beauty of maths.

Finding Mexico City’s real death toll

How two amateur data detectives revealed the pandemic’s impact.

Bayes: the clergyman whose maths changed the world

How an obscure theory came into fashion.

Will 2021 have more Covid deaths than 2020?

We ask if this year’s global death toll will surpass 1.8 million.

How many swimming pools full of vaccine do we need?

Adding together the doses for everyone on the planet.

Clot risks: The Pill versus the vaccine

AstraZeneca’s clot controversy turns attention on the contraceptive pill.

Too fast for Minecraft?

Gamers raise suspicions over speed run times - are they right?

In praise of Covid Data

How we came to expect dashboards full of statistics.

Deciding when to suspend a vaccine

Weighing up the risk of unproven side effects with stopping Covid 19.

The truth about obesity and Covid 19

Are countries with higher obesity rates suffering from more deaths?

Sainthood and Cup draws

Your chances of becoming a saint, plus football odds.

Why are US Covid cases falling?

From herd immunity to the weather, Tim Harford explores the theories.

Covid 19 death count: which countries are faring worst?

Tim Harford finds out if we can trust international comparisons with the available data.

Comparing death counts, Lock Down drinking and Long Covid

Is the UK’s Covid 19 death count among the worst in the world? Plus are we drinking more?

How much Covid in the World?

Counting all the virus particles in every human on the planet.

Brexit exports, cladding and are 1 in 5 disabled?

Are exports to the EU down since Brexit? Plus removing flammable building cladding.

Glasgow vs Rwanda

Could life expectancy in some parts of Glasgow be worse than in Rwanda?

Teachers, Test & Trace and Butterflies

Are teachers more at risk from Covid-19?

The Rapid Test Row

The huge row among scientists about rapid coronavirus tests.

Deaths at Home, Supermarket Infections and the Cobra Effect

Where are people catching Covid-19?

Deaths at home, supermarket infections and the Cobra effect

Where are people catching Covid-19?

Counting Covid’s impact on GDP

Does GDP tell us whose economies have suffered most during Covid?

Will the vaccine bring back normal life? GDP and Fishing

If we vaccinate the top four priority groups by February, how much will things change?

How effective is one dose of the vaccine?

Is the first dose of the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine 52% or 90% effective?

Ants and Algorithms

David Sumpter describes the algorithms ruling the world

Numbers of the year: Part two

Tim Harford showcases statistics from 2020

Numbers of the year: Part one

Tim Harford showcases statistics from 2020

The economics of a Covid Christmas

What to consider when buying presents this year

QAnon: Child runaways and trafficking numbers debunked

Tackling statistics spread by conspiracy theorists.

Vaccines: how safe and who gets it?

Is it too soon to approve a vaccine for use? Plus choosing who goes first.

Tracking Covid 19

Which countries are doing well at keeping track of the virus? And which are not?

Inviting Covid for Dinner

If you go to a gathering of 25 people, what are the chances one of you has coronavirus?

Vaccine numbers

How much protection will a new Covid 19 vaccine give?

How deadly is Covid 19?

Why there isn’t one single death rate.

Asymptomatic Covid19 Cases

How many Covid19 cases are truly asymptomatic?

US election: facts or fiction

Tim Harford hears about the sheer volume of false claims made in the campaign.

Auction Theory - Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson

This year’s Nobel memorial prize winners for economics and their work on auction theory.

A short history of probability

Gamblers, millionaires and annuities

Spreadsheet snafu, ‘Long Covid’ quantified, and the birth of probability

Missing coronavirus case data, long-term symptoms, and a big mathematical moment.

“Record” Covid cases, Trump on the death count, and ant pheromones

Case counts in perspective, a suspect stat from the US, and life lessons from insects.

Covid curve queried, false positives, and the Queen’s head

How fast are coronavirus cases doubling? Plus testing confusion and a royal face-off.

The magical maths of pool testing

Could pool testing hold the key to ramping up Covid-19 testing?

Covid testing capacity, refugee numbers, and mascara

Confusing claims on lab capacity, the UK’s record on asylum, and the volume of eyelashes.

Covid cases rising, a guide to life’s risks, and racing jelly-fish

How worrying is the UK’s jump in cases? Plus balancing risks and the speed of jelly-fish.

Schools and coronavirus, test and trace, maths and reality

Evidence on Covid-19 risks in schools, data on contact tracing, and a philosophical query.

Covid plasma therapy

Claims about a Covid-19 treatment, breast cancer screening, and 18th century sex workers.

A-level algorithms, poker and buses

We unpick the A-level algoshambles and discover what poker teaches us about statistics.

Belarus’ contested election

Tim Harford looks at the numbers behind the widely questioned election result

Hawaiian Pizza, obesity and a second wave?

Covid-19 cases are rising in the UK - is it a sign of a second wave of the virus?

Melting Antarctic ice

If all the ice in Antarctica melted, would global sea levels rise by 70 metres?

Covid in Africa

Do we have enough data to know what’s happening on the continent?

Data in the time of cholera

A journey back to the birth of epidemiology

Covid misconceptions and US deaths

How many of us believe the myths about coronavirus?

Sweden’s lockdown lite

Sweden stayed open during the pandemic – how well did it work?

Why Trump is wrong about the USA’s coronavirus case comeback

Are cases really rising in the US or are they just testing more? Tim digs into the data.

Why did the UK have such a bad Covid-19 epidemic?

Was it bad decision-making, bad advice, or bad luck?

A new Covid-19 drug and a second wave

Tim Harford looks into why protests haven’t led to a spike in Covid-19 cases

Child Poverty, School Inequality and a Second Wave

As lockdown eases, why hasn't there been a spike in infections?

Who Should be Quarantined?

Tim Harford finds out which countries have the highest rate of Covid-19 infection.

Quarantine, Test and Trace and BODMAS

Is it true that Covid-19 mostly kills people who would die soon anyway?

Antibody tests, early lockdown advice and European deaths

Are more people are dying of Covid-19 in the UK than all the EU countries put together?

Keep your distance

Tim Harford examines how can we avoid infection spreading, while getting on with life.

False negatives, testing capacity and pheasants

How accurate are the swab tests used to diagnose Covid-19?

Obeying lockdown, flight arrivals and is this wave of the epidemic waning?

What does the data show about whether this wave of the epidemic is waning in the UK?

60 Harvests and statistically savvy parrots

Can there really only be 60 harvests left in Earth's soil?

School re-opening, Germany’s Covid-19 success and statistically savvy parrots

Will re-opening some schools put children or their teachers at risk?

Social Distancing and Government Borrowing

Where do the different social distancing measurements come from?

Vitamin D, explaining R and the 2 metre rule

Is Vitamin D an under-appreciated weapon in the fight against Covid-19?

Covid-19 fatality rate

Why don't we know how dangerous Covid -19 really is?

Testing truth, fatality rates, obesity risk and trampolines.

Did the UK really carry out 100,000 coronavirus tests in one day?

Climate change and birdsong

With factories closed and flights grounded, what impact will this have on climate change?

Ethnic minority deaths, climate change and lockdown

Are doctors from ethnic minority backgrounds disproportionately affected by Covid-19?

Comparing countries' coronavirus performance

Is it helpful to ask which countries are faring better in tackling the coronavirus?

Bonus Podcast: Professor John Horton Conway

Mathematician John Conway died in April as a result of Covid-19.

Comparing countries, the risk to NHS staff, and birdsong

We compare Covid-19 rates around the world. When is the UK going to be past the worst?

Superforecasting the Coronavirus

Can professional predictors help us understand the course of the coronavirus pandemic?

Should you wear a face mask?

Tim Harford looks at the debate over making your own Covid-19 protection.

Coronavirus deaths, face masks and a potential baby boom

Is the coronavirus death count misleading because of delays in reporting?

Are more men dying from coronavirus?

Tim Harford and Ruth Alexander examine the statistics around the world.

Supermarket stockpiling, A-level results and Covid-19 gender disparity

Is the coronavirus pandemic having a different impact on men and women?

The Risk

Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter puts the risks of Covid-19 into perspective.

Coronavirus Special

The risks of Covid-19 for different age groups and what restrictions mean for the economy

Mitigation or Suppression: What’s best to tackle Coronavirus?

How statistical modelling can help us respond to the Coronavirus pandemic

The mystery of Iran’s coronavirus numbers

Does Iran have a lot more covid-19 cases that its figures suggest?

How much heat do you lose from your head?

Is it true that 40% of your body's heat loss comes from your head?

Netflix vs the environment

Does watching 30 minutes of Netflix have the same carbon footprint as driving four miles?

More or Less: Superforecasting, wood burning stoves and the real story of Hidden Figures

Dipping into the archive for stories on the art of prediction and wood burner pollution

Artificial (not so) Intelligence

Is the problem with AI its lack of intelligence?

WS More or Less: Coronavirus - The Numbers

An update on Covid-19 statistics, with Tim Harford.

Coronavirus, jam, AI and tomatoes

Covid-19 stats, spreading jam far and wide, cooking with AI, and James Wong on vegetables

WS More or Less: How fast are Alligators and Hippos?

Can alligators run at 50kmph? Join us in clocking alligators’ gaits.

Tracking terror suspects

Costing counter-terrorism, interrogating tomatoes, the UK's reading age, politics and GDP

WS More or Less: Coronavirus

Fact checking claims about the spread of Coronavirus

Coronavirus, emotions and guns.

Fact checking claims about coronavirus and whether more guns equal fewer homicides.

WS More or Less: Dozy Science

How much sleep do we really need?

Netflix and Chill

The carbon consequence of streaming, stats on sepsis and stretching Bill Bryson to Pluto.

WS More or Less: Japan’s 99% Conviction Rate

Quantifying justice in Japan with Tim Harford.

Weighing the Cost of Brexit

The cost of Brexit, alligator speed and Liverpool FC's luck

WS More or Less: Bushfire mystery

Have a billion animals died in Australia’s fires? And which ones are likely to survive?

Australian Animal Deaths, Carbon Emissions, Election Mystery

How many animals have died in Australia and how many Labour voters went Conservative?

C-sections and sharks

Hospital births in China and whether it’s true 50% are delivered by caesarean section

Presidential candidates and dementia

The health risks some of the frontrunners in the US presidential race face

The Simpsons and maths

We explore the maths secrets of The Simpsons on their 30th anniversary.

Koalas

Have bushfires destroyed 80% of the koala habitat in Australia?

Election Special (2/2)

Labour's spending plans, Conservatives claims on homelessness, the SNP's education record

Tree Planting Pledges

Planting trees by numbers: UK style.

Election Special 1/2

50,000 nurses? 40 hospitals? Corporate tax rises? Tim Harford looks at Election pledges.

Testing tomatoes

Have these saucy fruits become less healthy over time?

The world’s busiest shipping lanes

Which is the busiest shipping lane in the world?

Bolivia: Can statistics help detect electoral fraud?

We look at the numbers and statistics from Bolivia’s disputed presidential election.

Reducing your risk of death

Can running and owning a dog reduce your risk of an early death?

Unbelievable: The forgotten rape data

How shelved data from rape cases in America is helping the police catch criminals now.

Edith Abbott and crime statistics

Social worker and economist Edith Abbott and her contribution to crime statistics.

Esther Duflo and women in economics

Discussing Esther Duflo, Abhijit Banerjee and Michael Kremer’s economics Nobel Prize.

The Extra Episode: Minimum wage, drinking in Scotland and identical twins.

Exploring how long one identical twin lives after the other twin dies.

WS More or Less: Does San Francisco have more rough sleepers than Britain?

Are the shocking statistics true? and how do you count people who don't wish to be found?

New hospitals promised, aid to Ukraine, and bacon sandwiches

Dissecting the government’s hospitals announcement and President Trump’s Ukraine claims.

WS More or Less: Who fought in World War 1?

Were a third of those that fought for Britain in WW1 black or Asian?

Austerity Deaths, C-Sections and being struck by lightning

Has Austerity caused 120 thousand deaths in the UK and does God hate men?

WS More or Less: Peaty v. Bolt: Which is the greatest world record?

Using statistics to compare world records in athletics and swimming.

Dementia, inflation and shark deaths

Health risks for Presidential hopefuls, falling inflation, shark deaths and salary claims

WS More or Less: Cape Town murders

Are eight people a day murdered in Cape Town and is that number unusually high?

Maternal deaths, taxi driver earnings and statistical pop music

Are black women five times more likely to die in childbirth? Plus making pop music.

WS More or Less: Deforestation in Brazil

Has it increased significantly since President Bolsonaro took office in January?

Climate deaths, austerity and pet food

Challenging the idea of six billion deaths due to climate change; plus what pets eat.

WS More or Less: Amazon forest fires

Are they really 85 percent worse than last year?

Amazon fires, state pension and American burgers

Are forest fires in Brazil the worst in recent times? What is the state pension worth?

WS More or Less: Ethiopia’s 350m trees in a day

Were millions of trees planted in just one day in Ethiopia?

Exam grades, Chernobyl and Ethiopian trees

Was your A Level grade correct? Plus were 350m trees planted in one day in Ethiopia?

Mice and mind blowing maths

Re-inserting a caveat and discussing a really cool numbers trick.

Immigrant Crime Rate in the US

Do immigrants commit more crime than native-born Americans in the United States?

The spread of fact-checking in Africa

With misinformation so easy to spread, how can it be stopped or challenged?

Pregnancy prohibitions – the evidence

Taking a statistical look at what expectant mothers should avoid.

Missing women from drug trials

How medical testing on just men causes problems.

Zimbabwe’s economy: Are sanctions to blame?

We look at politicians’ claims that sanctions are to blame for Zimbabwe’s difficulties.

Two World Cups: Football and Cricket

We look at numbers involved with the two World Cups going on right now.

Is nuclear power actually safer than you think?

We compare how deadly different forms of power generation are.

Questioning the Chernobyl disaster death count

We fact check the recent TV drama Chernobyl

WS More or Less: Dealing with the Numbers of Cancer

How one woman used statistics to help cope with cancer.

WS More or Less: The things we fail to see

The hidden influences that a make a big difference to the way the world works.

Are married women flipping miserable?

Measuring happiness, university access in Scotland, plus will one in two get cancer?

WS More or Less: Volcanoes versus humans

Does Mount Etna produce more carbon emissions than humans? We check the numbers.

Hay Festival Special

What does it mean to say that the UK is the fifth largest economy in the world?

WS More or Less: Florence Nightingale – recognising the nurse statistician

How collecting data about the dead led the famous nurse to promote better sanitation.

Eurovision and fact-checking Naomi Wolf

The stats behind making a successful song, plus misunderstanding Victorian court records.

Making music out of Money

A musical interpretation of a chart depicting the yield-curve of American bonds.

Heart deaths, Organised crime and Gender data gaps

Are more people dying from coronary disease? Plus how we need more economic data on women

Sex Every Seven Seconds

We revisit some classic topics from past years

Sex, coal, missing people and mice

Are we having less sex? And what happened to coal? (These items are unrelated.)

Avengers - Should we reverse the snap?

Exploring the economic impact of losing half the world’s population

Nurses, flatmates and cats

We look into sobering statistics about nurses and some curious claims about house-sharing

Bernie Sanders and the cost of having a baby

Did Bernie Sanders get the cost of giving birth right?

Hottest Easter, Insects, Scottish villages

Should we be surprised Easter Monday was the hottest recorded?

The economic impact of mega sporting events

Major sports events and the benefits to the local economy.

Where is Scotland’s highest village?

A battle is brewing in the Southern Scottish uplands between two rival villages.

Rounding up the weed killer cancer conundrum

We examine the cancer-causing potential of the weed killer glyphosate

Chess cheats and the GOAT

What a statistical analysis of chess moves can teach us about this ancient game.

Is Mansa Musa the richest person of all time?

Is the West African king, Mansa Musa, the richest person who ever lived?

Day light saving time and heart attacks

Does the sudden loss of an hour of sleep raise the risk of having a heart attack?

The gender gap in tech

Are women really less likely than men to be hired for jobs in tech?

Insectageddon

Could insects go extinct in one hundred years?

How To Make Your Art Work More Valuable

Die, sell on a sunny day, place your work a third of the way through the auction.

WS More or Less: When maths mistakes really matter

Tim Harford talks to Matt Parker on how simple maths mistakes can cause big problems.

Climate Change, Victorian Diseases, Alcohol

Tim Harford on climate change, Victorian diseases, maths mistakes and alcohol consumption

WS More or Less: From the archives: Groundhogs and Kings

Assessing the accuracy of a Groundhog; How many English people have right royal relatives?

Teen Suicide; Brexit Business Moves; Wood-Burner Pollution

Tim Harford finds untrue a recent report that there is a 'suicidal generation' of teens.

WS More or Less: You have 15,000 likes!

A listener doubts her popularity on the dating app Tinder. We investigate the numbers.

Holocaust Deniers; Venezuelan Hyperinflation; Tinder Likes

Tim Harford on Holocaust deniers; food prices in Venezuela, and dating app statistics

WS More or Less: Is Suicide Seasonal?

Tim Harford asks which times of the year are riskiest for suicide.

Domestic Violence, Jobs, Easter Snowfall

Tim Harford on domestic violence, employment numbers, and the chance of a white Easter.

WS More or Less: Close Encounters of a Planetary Kind

Which planet is closest to Earth?

Intersex Numbers, Fact-Checking Facebook, Jack Bogle

Tim Harford asks whether 1.7% of people are intersex, and examines false claims about MPs

WS More or Less: The Mathematics of Fever

We look at the numbers behind body temperature – what is normal?

Sugar, Outdoors Play and Planets

Tim Harford on sugar, train fares, children's outdoors play and Earth's closest neighbour

WS More or Less: Numbers of the Year Part 2

Helena Merriman with numbers about water shortage, plastic recycling and American jobs.

WS More or Less: Numbers of the Year Part 1

The numbers that made 2018.

WS More or Less: Mission Impossible - Quantifiying Santa

What to look out for on Christmas Eve.

WS More or Less: Dam Lies and Statistics

Are mega-dams really sustainable?

WS More or Less: Sex and Heart Attacks

Are women more likely to die from a heart attack than men?

WS More or Less: Are 90% of War Fatalities Civilians?

Xavier Zapata examines what the data tells us about the deadly impact of war on civilians

WS More or Less: When’s a Kilogram Not a Kilogram?

Updating the kilogram.

WS More or Less: Do Assassinations Work?

How likely are assassination attempts on heads of state to succeed?

WS More or Less: Vaccines - The importance of the herd and social media

What proportion of a population needs to be vaccinated to stop a disease spreading?

WS More or Less: Foreign Aid: Who’s the most generous?

In foreign aid terms what’s the best way of measuring how generous a country is?

WS More or Less: Paul Romer and William Nordhaus’ Big Ideas

The economists tackling climate change and growth.

Loneliness, School Funding, Same-Sex Divorce

A BBC loneliness survey, school funding, same-sex divorce and the loyalty of listeners.

WS More or Less: Why are Lesbians More Likely to Divorce than Gay Men?

Tim Harford talks to economist Marina Ashdade about same-sex divorce statistics.

Loneliness; School Funding; Same-Sex Divorce.

Tim Harford on a BBC loneliness survey; school funding; same-sex divorce; loyal listeners

WS More of Less: Surviving the Battle of Britain

Were Spitfire pilots killed after an average of four weeks in the World War Two battle?

Surviving the Battle of Britain; the World Cup and Domestic Violence; Buckfast and Arrests in Scotland

Tim Harford on Spitfire pilots, and whether football triggers violence in the home.

WS More or Less: Trump and the Puerto Rico Death Toll

How can we calculate excess mortality after a natural disaster?

How Many Schoolchildren are Carers? Shareholder Income, and Museum Visitors Vs Football Fans

Tim Harford on child carers, shareholder income, football vs museums and dangerous sports

WS More or Less: DNA - Are You More Chimp or Neanderthal?

What is the difference between 96% similarity or sharing 20% of our DNA?

Male suicide, school ratings, are female tennis players treated unfairly by umpires?

Tim Harford with statistics on suicide, good schools and sexism in tennis. Plus goats

WS More or Less: The Safest Car in the World?

A listener asks whether his Volvo is the safest car on the road?

Heart Age Calculator; Danish Sperm Imports; Counting Goats

Tim Harford questions the usefulness of a popular heart age calculator.

WS: More or Less - How well do you understand your world?

Tim Harford talks to Bobby Duffy about why we are often wrong about a lot of basic facts

African Trade Tariffs; Alcohol Safe Limits; President Trump's Popularity

Tim Harford fact checks EU trade deals with Africa, and whether one drink is one too many

BONUS PODCAST: Economics with Subtitles - Coffins Full of Car Keys

Why we have interest rates, how we misunderstand them - and a curious coffin connection.

WS: More or Less - Automated fact-checking

Computer programmes are being developed to combat fake news.

A no-frills life, automated fact-checking and Lord-of-the-Rings maths

What would have been the most efficient way to get to Mordor?

BONUS PODCAST: Economics with Subtitles - How Condoms Can Cost a Week’s Wages

Inflation can change your sex life – and pretty much everything else.

WS More or Less: Are Wildfires Really Burning More Land?

Are Wildfires in the United States and Southern Europe burning more land than before?

BONUS PODCAST: Economics with Subtitles - Bracelets for Bullets

Why an Essex mum wanted her jewellery melted down and what it says about government debt

Numbers Behind a Tweetstorm

How do you get a hashtag to trend around the world?

BONUS PODCAST: Economics with Subtitles - How Buying Cocaine Helps the Government

The surprising story of GDP and whether it's time to change how we measure our economy

Carbs, Sugar and the Truth

Does a baked potato contain the equivalent of 19 cubes of sugar?

Getting Creative with Statistics

How big are your testicles and what does that mean?

Should we have smaller families to save the planet?

Having one fewer child could be the biggest thing you do to reduce your carbon footprint

How to Cycle Really Fast

How much better are the pros than the rest of us and how effective is slipstreaming?

Are there more stars than grains of beach sand?

Stars vs Sand. We work out who wins the ultimate cosmic battle.

Running at the World Cup

Is it strange that Russian football players have run such big distances?

How many words do you need to speak a language?

How many words do you need to speak a language and how many do native speakers use?

FIFA World Cup Extravaganza

How the ‘beautiful game’ has changed…through numbers.

WS More or Less: How Many Animals are Born Every Day?

From penguins to nematodes - is it possible to count how many animals are born every day?

Infant Mortality, How to Reduce Exam Revision With Maths, London’s Murder Rate

Tim Harford explains how maths can help lazy students can reduce their revision workload

Counting Rough Sleepers

How do you count the number of people sleeping rough?

The High Street, Home Births and Harry Potter Wizardry

Is WH Smith really the worst shop on the High Street?

WS More or Less: Australia Calling

Do one in seven businessmen throw out their underwear after wearing them once?

Forecasting rain, teabags and voter ID trials

How to read the weather forecast, plus measuring the amount of tea we drink.

WS More or Less: James Comey - Basketball Superstar?

Does being very tall improve your chances of becoming a professional basketball player?

Poverty, Progress 8 and how green is grass?

Are more working families in poverty? Plus exploring the new school league tables.

WS More or Less: Tulipmania mythology

What is the truth behind the 17th Century Dutch craze for Tulips?

Abortion, modern slavery, math versus maths

The British abortion statistics gaining attention in Ireland's referendum debate

WS More or Less: Exposing the biases we have of the world

Statistician Hans Rosling’s family talk about the book they co-wrote about preconceptions

Cancer screening, the Windrush Generation, Audiograms

Calculating the benefits and risks of breast screening. Plus, patchy citizenship data.

WS More or Less: Puerto Rico - statistics versus politics

Why some fear the statistics authority is about to lose its independence

Straws, women on boards, plus animals born each day

Measuring plastic pollution, female FTSE directors and counting animal offspring.

WS More or Less: How Should We Think About Spending?

Tim Harford talks to economist Dan Ariely about the psychology of money.

WS More More or Less: Are We Breathing Unsafe Air?

The W.H.O. say 95% of people in cities breathe unsafe air, but what does 'unsafe' mean?

WS More or Less: Why London’s Murder Rate is Being Compared to New York’s

Finding out if London is now more deadly than New York.

WS More or Less: How Deadly Was 1920s Melbourne?

We investigate the murder rate in popular crime series Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries.

Were ‘extra’ votes counted in Russia’s presidential election?

We look at voting data to investigate allegations of election fraud in Russia

Factchecking Trump on Trade

The US President regularly talks about America's trade deficit - do his figures stack up?

WS More or Less: Sir Roger Bannister

Did Sir Roger Bannister make the ‘impossible’ possible?

WS More or Less: Women, the Oscars and the Bechdel Test

Ninety years’ worth of Best Picture winning films under the spotlight

WS More or Less: The Winter Olympics

Which is the most successful country? Plus the chances of a dead heat.

WS More or Less: Debunking guide – on a postcard

How to question dubious statistics in just a few short steps.

UN rape claims, Stalin and Mr Darcy

Back of the envelope calculations on rape, and how many died under Stalin?

WS More or Less: Has Russian Drinking Fallen by 80% in five years?

Alcohol consumption has fallen sharply according to Russia’s health ministry

The Dow, Tampons, Parkrun part II

Why the biggest ever fall in the Dow wasn't, and how much do women spend on tampons?

WS More or Less: Is China On Track to End Poverty by 2020?

We investigate whether the Chinese government can really achieve its extraordinary pledge

Transgender Numbers, Parkrun and Snooker

How many transgender people are there in the UK? Plus a statistical take on parkruns.

Is the US Census Under Threat?

The survey question that could affect the accuracy of its results.

A Girl's First Time, Shark's Stomachs, Prime numbers

First sexual experience - checking the facts.

WS More or Less: Real Lives Behind the Numbers

How individuals manage their money - the personal stories behind economic data.

Gender Pay Gaps and How to Learn a Language

Why are women paid less than men in specific industries and occupations?

WS More or Less: How Louis Bachelier Scooped Economists by Half a Century

A forgotten French mathematician’s unusual approach to the stock market.

Missed appointments, graduate pay, plus cocaine on bank notes

Do missed appointments cost the NHS £1 billion? And do you always earn more with a degree?

WS More or Less: Just how rare is a hole-in-one?

Why it isn’t as simple to work out as you think.

More or Less: Statistics of the Year 2017

Phones, lawn mowers and how Kim Kardashian helped the public understanding of risk.

WS More or Less: Will Bitcoin use more electricity than the United States?

Measuring the energy used to keep the cryptocurrency secure.

WS More or Less: Diet Coke Habit; 'Contained' Wildfires

Could the US President’s Diet Coke habit affect his health? and 'contained' wildfires

WS More or Less: Does Eating Chocolate Make Your Brain Younger?

Are research findings misrepresented by funders, PR machines and the media?

WS More or Less: Just how lucky are regular lottery winners?

Are some people just very lucky? The maths suggest that is unlikely.

WS More or Less: How Rich was Jane Austen’s Mr Darcy?

What the Pride and Prejudice character would have earned in today’s money.

How expensive is Italy's World Cup failure?

How much will Italy's surprise failure to make it to the world cup cost FIFA?

WS More or Less: Why Albums are Getting Longer

More or less finds out the numbers that are changing modern music.

WS More or Less: Do Nigerian lawmakers get $1.7m and do Yams cause twins?

Finding out if Nigerian politicians really get paid more than the American President.

WS More or Less: Novelists in numbers

Counting the favourite words of well-known authors: Stephen King, Hemingway and others

WS More or Less: Are US millennials more politically engaged online?

Did the 2016 US election galvanise young people to become more engaged in politics?

How Richard Thaler changed Economics

The behavioural economist who has inspired governments around the world.

WS More or Less: Kilobyte to Brontobyte

Naming the monster numbers - how the names of digital storage files evolved.

WS More or Less: Big polluters - ships versus cars

Do the largest ships emit as much pollution as all the cars in the world?

Uber; EU passports; counting domestic violence

Is Uber safe? The post Brexit dual nationality surge and measuring partner abuse.

WS More or Less: Sperm - Are we going extinct?

How much of a problem is falling sperm count?

Statistics abuse, tuition fees and beer in 1887

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is accused of mis-using official statistics.

WS More or Less: How to measure a Hurricane

What’s the best way to measure a hurricane?

Are Natural Disasters on the Rise?

Has the number of natural disasters really quadrupled in the last forty years?

WS More or Less: More Horses than Tanks?

Is the UK the only country with more horses than tanks in its army?

Electric cars, school-ready and feedback

Will we need more power stations? Plus, are children in Manchester ready for school?

One in 500 Year Storm

Experts say that Houston just suffered a one in 500 year storm but what does that mean?

Grenfell Tower's Death Toll

The difficulties of finding the true number of people who died in the fire.

Fantasy Football - How to win

Figuring out the best strategy as a wannabe team manager.

A-levels, drowning and dress sizes

Are boys getting more top A Level grades than girls? Plus why are dress sizes so weird?

The Trump Bump

President Trump has taken credit for a booming economy. But is that fair?

Are there 15,000 transgender people serving in the US military?

President Trump says transgender individuals cannot serve, but how many do already?

Why is Kenya’s election so expensive?

Why the cost of running the vote will be $25 a person.

More boys than girls in Sweden?

Exploring if an influx of teenage boys claiming asylum skewed the population’s sex ratio

Maryam Mirzakhani – A Genius of Maths

Celebrating the only woman to win the biggest prize in mathematics.

Calling the shots at Wimbledon

Using statistics to prove or disprove the wisdom of tennis.

Is Steph Curry cheap and how random is random?

Evaluating the biggest basketball contract in NBA history, plus Ryanair’s seat allocation

In Search of Woodall Primes

Stand-up mathematician Matt Parker explains the obscure Woodall prime numbers

How rare are deadly tower block fires?

How statistics can help us understand the tragic fire at London’s Grenfell Tower.

Trumpton Extra

Tribute to the Voice of 1960s British children’s TV series 'Trumpton', Brian Cant

Post-Election Special

The results of the general election are in - but what do they mean?

WS More or Less: Are African football players more likely to die on the field?

After the death of Cheick Tiote, are African footballers more prone to heart attacks?

UK Election extra

This podcast is a compilation of interviews with Eddie Mair from Radio 4’s PM programme.

WS More or Less: Samba, strings and the story of HIV

Can medical statistics be transformed into a jazzy night out?

Election Special: Tax, borders and climate

Who pays income tax, cutting migration and where in the UK is cold?

WS More or Less: Have 65% of future jobs not yet been invented?

Education is failing our kids, claim experts. We go sleuthing around the world.

Spies, care homes, and ending sneak peeks

Can security services follow everyone known to them?

WS More or Less: Uganda’s refugees

Has Uganda accepted more refugees, daily than some European countries in an entire year?

Tax, speed dating and sea ice

Exploring the Labour manifesto's tax plans for high earners.

Nurses' pay, Scottish seats, Penalty shootouts

Are nurses paid more than the national average? We take a look.

WS More or Less: Is my Baby a Giant?

Tim Harford explains the numbers and statistics in the news and in life.

WS More or Less: An urban maze

Why some parts of town are hard to navigate.

Is Crime Rising?

It looks like homicides are on the rise - but better check the footnotes

WS More or Less: The Maths of Dating

How to use mathematics to find your partner. And, how reliable are pregnancy due dates?

Fact-checking Boris Johnson

Giant bombs, a war hero and the foreign secretary's stats.

WS More or Less: The death rate of white Americans – What’s going on?

Are middle-aged white Americans dying younger than other groups?

Living standards and Kate Bush maths

Are people's incomes falling? Plus singing Pi like Kate Bush

WS More or Less: The Ignorance Test

How much do you know about the world?

Economics of Overbooking

Why airlines bet that not everybody will turn up for a flight.

WS More or Less: Could North Korea Wipe out 90% of Americans?

Experts warn that North Korea could wipe out most Americans in one go.

WS More or Less: Will one in four people develop a mental health problem?

Is there evidence that one in four people will develop a mental health problem?

WS More Or Less: Baby Boxes – are they really saving infant’s lives?

They’ve become a bit of a phenomenon but what’s the evidence that they work?

More or Less: The concrete facts about Trump’s wall and China

Did China use more concrete in three years than the US in the 20th Century?

WS More or Less: The Attention Span of a Goldfish

Are our attention spans now shorter than a goldfish's?

WS More or Less: Why are Hollywood actresses paid less than men?

Top Hollywood actresses have complained that they are paid less than their male co-stars

WS More or Less: What happened last night in Sweden?

What happened last night in Sweden?

Hidden Figures: The Real Story

.African American women's part in the space race of the '50s and '60s

WS More or Less: Hans Rosling - the extraordinary life of a statistical guru

A tribute to Hans Rosling, a master communicator with a passion for global development.

WS More or Less: Is democracy failing in America?

Does North Carolina really rank alongside North Korea if you measure electoral integrity

WS More or Less: Counting Crowds

How many went to celebrate – and how many to protest – the Trump inauguration?

WS More or Less: Why January makes us want to scream

Blue Monday and Oxfam's wealth of billionaires- the stories that come around every year

WS More or Less: Christian Martyrs

Were 90,000 Christians killed because of their faith in 2016?

WS More or Less: Should we really be drinking eight glasses of water a day?

How much water do we need and how much is too much?

WS More or Less: Does Sweden Really Have a Six Hour Day?

Can you reduce working hours without affecting productivity?

The Haber-Bosch Process

Saving lives with thin air - by taking nitrogen from the air to make fertiliser

WS More or Less: Life, death and data

Improving data to target help to the poorest people

Christmas Quiz

Tim Harford poses a tough statistical challenge

WS More or Less: Yellow cards for Christmas

Are footballers trying to get suspended for Christmas?

Have more famous people died this year?

Notable deaths, Rule Britannia and creating your own Christmas speech

WS More or Less: How risky is the contraceptive pill?

We look at the numbers behind the scary headlines about birth control.

How wrong were the Brexit forecasts?

The economic doom that never was; childhood cancer figures and Ed Balls

WS More or Less: How not to test public opinion

The survey by the Indian PM that broke all the polling rules and started a mass protest

Are you related to Edward III - and Danny Dyer?

What are the odds of being related to a medieval king? and how many cows for a fiver?

WS More or Less: Good news on renewables?

Renewable capacity has surpassed that of coal–is this good news? Plus an asteroid update.

Pensioners aren't poor anymore

High-rolling pensioners? predicting Norovirus, air pollution deaths and lost or found?

WS More or Less: Avoiding Asteroids

We’re getting better at spotting Earth-bound space rocks – but how safe are we?

Is dementia the number one killer?

Is dementia on the rise? Plus immigration, incomplete contacts and chocolate muffins

WS More or Less: Liberia’s Rape Statistic Debunked

Is the claim that three out of four women were raped during Liberia's civil war true?

US election, stray cats and puzzles

Who voted in the US elections? Plus are there nine million stray cats in the UK?

WS More or Less: Ice Cream versus aid

Does the world really spend three times as much on ice cream than on humanitarian aid?

Trump tells the Truth

How the presidential hopeful has used statistics

WS More or Less: Child Marriage, Dangerous Algorithms

Is a girl under 15 married every seven seconds? And beware dangerous algorithms

WS More or Less: Escobar’s Cocaine Deaths

How many people die for every kilo of cocaine?

WS More or Less: Algorithms, Crime and Punishment

When maths can get you locked up.

WS More or Less: The Sustainable Development Goals – are there just too many?

Is there a better way of looking at the Sustainable Development Goals?

WS More or Less: Who Won the US Presidential Debate?

Polling on the Clinton-Trump TV showdown – and why not all polls are equal.

WS More or Less: Trump’s crime claims

Are some US inner cities more dangerous than Afghanistan?

WS More or Less: Wedding gift economics

How much should spend when a couple get married?

WS More or Less: Drug deaths in the Philippines

How many people have died during President Duterte’s drug crackdown?

WS More or Less: Menstrual Syncing

Do women’s periods start to synchronise if they spend time together?

Irish Passports

Do one in four Brits claim Irish ancestry?

Death Penalty abolition

The story behind the countries that have not executed anyone for 10 years

Gender Pay Gap

Making sense of the difference between men's and women's pay

WS More or Less: Counting Terror Deaths

Has 2016 been a particularly bad year for terrorism in Europe?

Counting Terror Deaths

Is 2016 an unusually deadly year for terrorism?

WS More or Less: Swimming World Records

Why are swimming world records frequently being broken?

Grammar Schools

Do selective schools improve grades and improve social mobility?

WS More or Less: Predicting Olympic Medals

What makes a country successful at winning gold, silver and bronze?

Plastic Bags

Has a 5p charge caused a drop in the use of carrier bags?

WS More or Less: Odd Socks and Algorithms

How can the techniques of computer science help us in everyday life?

The Supermarket Effect

Tim Harford returns with Brexit, Trumpton, the Antiques Roadshow and some good news.

WS More or Less: Ireland’s Shock GDP figures

Does Ireland have the fastest growing economy in the world?

WS More or Less: Violence, shootings and the police in the US

Tim Harford investigates the numbers surrounding police shootings in the USA.

WS More or Less: Sleeping: the 8-hour myth

Could having a lie-in lead to an early death?

Ranking Iceland’s Football Team

Are they the best in the world per capita?

WS More or Less: Brexit Economics

What will happen to trade and business in the UK after leaving the EU?

WS More or Less: When Companies Track Your Life

How are companies using our personal data?

The Referendum by Numbers: Trade

Tim Harford asks if the UK would be better off in or out of the EU when it comes to trade

The Referendum by Numbers: Regulation

Tim Harford on how much red tape from the EU costs and what might happen if the UK leaves

The Referendum by Numbers: Law

Tim Harford looks at how much of Britain's law comes from the EU.

The Referendum by Numbers: Immigration

Tim Harford on costs and benefits of EU migrants and what might happen if Britain left.

The Referendum by Numbers: The Cost of EU Membership

Tim Harford asks how much would be saved and what would be lost if Britain left the EU?

WS More or Less: Sexist Data Crisis

Are we collecting enough data about women?

WS More or Less: HIV in Africa

Are 74% of African girls aged 15-24 HIV positive?

WS More or Less: Refugee Camp Statistics

Is it true that the average stay in a refugee camp is 17 years?

WS More or Less: The World's Most Profitable Product

Is the iPhone the most profitable product in history? What are the other contenders?

WS More or Less: The world’s most diverse city

Is it true that London is the most diverse city in the world?

WS More or Less: Leicester City football fluke?

The statistics behind the English Premier League’s surprise winners

The most profitable product in history

Can the iPhone claim this accolade? Plus, the statistics behind Leicester City's success

WS More or Less: Simpson’s Paradox

We explore how statistics can support two seemingly contradictory results.

EU Migration

What will happen to migration if the UK leaves the EU?

WS More or Less: Most Expensive Building

How much to build The Great Pyramid, a nuclear power station, or an airport?

Brexit numbers

Do the Treasury's Brexit numbers add up?

WS More or Less: The life expectancy of a Pope

Statistics show that the Head of the Catholic Church can expect to live to an old age

Celebrity deaths

Have more famous people died this year than usual?

WS More or Less: The story of average

How astronomers introduced the world to the average.

Fathers and babies

Have only 1% of men taken the option of shared parental leave?

WS More or Less: The Great EU Cabbage Myth

Does the European Union dedicate 26,911 words to cabbage regulation?

The Great EU Cabbage Myth

Does the European Union dedicate 26,911 words to cabbage regulation?

WSMoreOrLess: Safe drinking

UK Alcohol guidelines recommend drinking less – but do the numbers support them?

WSMoreOrLess: Mobiles or lightbulbs

Are there more mobile phones than lightbulbs in Uganda? And thyroid cancer in Fukushima.

WSMoreOrLess: Can we trust food surveys?

The pitfalls of nutrition science - how do really know what people are eating?

WSMoreOrLess: Fact checking The Big Short

Is it true that “every one percent unemployment goes up, 40,000 people die"?

WSMoreOrLess: Antibiotics and the problem of the broken market

The world needs new antibiotics so how do we entice big pharma back in to the market?

WSMoreOrLess: When £10,000 isn’t a good incentive

Could no prize have been a better way to motivate snooker player Ronnie O’Sullivan?

WSMoreOrLess: Fishy numbers?

Will there be more plastic than fish in the sea by 2050?

Selfies, sugar daddies and dodgy surveys

Women taking selfies for more than five hours a day and other junk adverstising surveys.

WSMoreOrLess: Do e-cigarettes really harm your chances of quitting smoking?

Should research described as "misleading" and "not scientific" have been published?

E-cigarettes: Can They Help People Quit?

Do e-cigarettes harm your chances of quitting smoking? Tim Harford looks at the evidence.

Swedish refugees

Have refugees caused a gender imbalance in Sweden? Tim Harford finds out.

How harmful is alcohol?

Are there problems with the way we judge the harms from alcohol? Tim Harford finds out.

WSMoreOrLess: Oxfam and Wealth Inequality

Were Oxfam right to compare the wealth of the rich with that of the poor?

Billionaires versus the world

Does it matter that 62 people now own as much wealth as half of the world’s population?

WS MoreOrLess: Gravitational Waves

In search of a previously unobserved part of Einstein’s theory.

Weekend Stroke Deaths

Jeremy Hunt says if you have a stroke at the weekend, you're 20% more likely to die .

WS MoreOrLess: Numbers of the Year 2015: Part Three

Tim Harford looks back at some of the most interesting numbers making the news in 2015.

Flood Defence Spending

Is there a north-south divide in the amount of money spent on flood defences in England?

WSMoreOrLess: Numbers of the Year 2015 Part 2

Tim Harford looks back at some of the most interesting numbers of 2015.

Numbers of the Year 2015

A look back at some of the numbers behind the news in 2015 with Tim Harford.

WS MoreOrLess: Numbers of the Year 2015 Part 1

Tim Harford looks back at some of the most interesting numbers of 2015.

WS MoreOrLess: How Many Stormtroopers are there?

Are Star Wars’ Stormtroopers the biggest secret army on Earth?

WS MoreOrLess:100 Year Floods?

Do so-called ‘100 year floods’ only happen once a century?

WS MoreOrLess: Climate Change

Did climate change contribute to the war in Syria?

WS MoreOrLess: '‘Sympathy’ for jihadis

Are claims that one in five British Muslims ‘sympathise with jihadis’ correct?

WS MoreOrLess: Has Islamic State been Losing Territory?

Has so-called Islamic State been losing territory? Ruth Alexander investigates.

WS MoreOrLess: Creativity and Mental Illness

Are creative people more likely to be mentally ill, and has Cuba wiped out child hunger?

WS MoreOrLess: China's One Child Policy

As China ends its one child policy what has been its impact? Ruth Alexander investigates.

WS MoreOrLess: Processed Meat and Cancer

Are processed meats as cancer-causing as cigarettes? Ruth Alexander investigates.

WS MoreOrLess: Oil

Are a million barrels of Nigeria’s oil stolen per day? Ruth Alexander finds out.

WS MoreOrLess: Foreign Aid: More Harm Than Good?

Nobel Prize winning economist professor Angus Deaton on a lifetime measuring inequality.

WS MoreOrLess: Are Tall People More Likely to Get Cancer?

Are tall people really more likely to get cancer? Ruth Alexander looks at a new study.

WS MoreOrLess: Football’s Red Card Cliché

Is it harder to play football against ten men? Tim Harford finds out.

WS MoreOrLess: How Reliable is Psychology Science?

How reliable are psychological science studies? Tim Harford finds out.

Alzheimers, Psychology science, John Conway, Red cards, Decimate

Tim Harford asks whether one in three people born in the UK this year will get Alzheimer's

WS MoreOrLess: The Rise of the Giants?

Are rugby players getting bigger and bigger?

Striking Numbers

Tim Harford asks are strikes on the rise, rugby players bigger and sea life in decline?

WS MoreOrLess: How Many is Too Many Bananas?

Should population density affect refugee movements? How many bananas are too many?

Is it worth targetting non-voters?

Can the left rely on non-voters to get them into power? Tim Harford looks at the numbers.

Queuing Backwards

Would life be better if we served the last person to join a queue not the first.

Fit for work or at deaths door?

Are thousands dying after being declared 'fit for work' by the government? Is sugar bad?

WS MoreOrLess: China Stock Market Crash

The Chinese stock market may have crashed but was it really ‘Black Monday’?

China Stock Market Crash

The Chinese markets may have crashed but was it really Black Monday? with Tim Harford

WS MoreOrLess: The Elliptical Pool Table

Tim Harford tests the geometric properties of an elliptical pool table.

Soaring diabetes - is there some good news?

Diabetes cases are soaring, but is this down to new diagnoses? Tim Harford investigates.

WS More or Less: Worm wars

Are mass deworming projects a good idea?

Migrant Crisis

A "swarm" of migrants heading for Europe? Are the numbers really up?

WS More or Less: Wrestlers - dying too young?

Are WWE stars more likely to die sooner than their non-wrestling peers?

WSMoreOrLess: Counting Foreign Fighters

How many foreigners have joined militants in Iraq and Syria, and where do they come from?

WS MoreOrLess: Life Expectancy

How long might you live?

WS MoreOrLess: Live 8, The G8 and Making Poverty History

What has been achieved in the ten years since Live 8 sought to Make Poverty History?

Greece Special

Tim Harford and the More or Less team look at the numbers behind the Greek crisis.

Biggest Movies

Jurassic World took $511m in its first weekend. Why have recent films done so well?

WS MoreOrLess: Horoscope Health

Can your horoscope predict which diseases you’ll develop?

WS MoreOrLess: Global Footprint

Do we need one and a half planets worth of resources? Tim Harford investigates.

Obesity Projections, Global Footprint, Street Value of Drugs

Tim Harford looks at how recent obesity projections were calculated.

WS MoreOrLess: Qatar migrant worker deaths

Tim Harford asks if the World Cup is really responsible for migrant deaths in Qatar.

World Cup Migrant Deaths

Tim Harford asks if the World Cup is really responsible for migrant deaths in Qatar.

WS MoreOrLess: John Nash

The life and achievements of the mathematician John Nash

Seven-day NHS

Tim Harford asks if people admitted to hospital at weekends are more likely to die.

WS MoreOrLess: Death Penalty

Death Row exoneration statistics. Recently it’s been claimed that for every nine in...

Female Drink Drivers

The Police Federation says female drivers aren’t heeding the drink drive warnings.

WS MoreOrLess: Big Numbers

How computers are fooled by big numbers. Chris Baraniuk, technology journalist, talks...

Strokes, Teachers, Confused Computers 15 May15

Are stroke numbers on the rise? This was according to recent headlines.

WS MoreOrLess: Princess Charlotte

The birth of Princess Charlotte could contribute £1 billion to the British economy,...

Election and Adultery Special

Tim Harford and a panel of experts discuss pre-election polls and election fact checking.

UK election podcast 4

Why don’t all the opinion polls give the same results? Plus, would Labour’s plan a...

WS MoreOrLess: Nuns on the rise

It was recently reported that the number of women training to become Catholic nuns in...

Polls, nuns and life partners

On the eve of the UK's general election, Tim Harford takes a look at what polling data...

WS MoreOrLess: Xenophobia in South Africa

Are migrants ‘stealing’ jobs; does South Africa have more asylum seekers than any...

UK Election Podcast 3

Are we witnessing a jobs ‘miracle’? Also under scrutiny - Scotland’s deficit; a...

WS MoreOrLess: Liver Transplant.

A young listener who needs a liver transplant has received an offer from his brother a...

UK election podcast 2

Fact-checking the politicians during the election campaign on NHS funding; rail fares...

UK election podcast 1

Can you trust the figures given to you by the political parties during the UK's We and...

WS MoreOrLess: The Ignorance Test

Professor Hans Rosling - perhaps best-described as a kind of international development...

WS MoreOrLess: Maths and Chess

Is it really true that ability in mathematics and chess are somehow linked? Tim pits a...

WS MoreOrLess: How safe is flying?

The Germanwings A320 tragedy, in which 150 people died, is the latest in a series of...

Does Breastfeeding Increase IQ?

A major 30-year study claims to show breastfed babies become more intelligent, higher...

WS MoreOrLess: Measuring World Health

Babies born in Rwanda are likely to live healthier lives than those in the most 10% of...

WS MoreOrLess: The future of food

"In the next 40 years, humans will need to produce more food that they did in the a of...

WS MoreOrLess: Black prisoners in the US

Oscar-winner John Legend said that there are more black men "under correctional in the...

WS MoreOrLess: Sleeping: the 8-hour myth

It’s often said that we should all be aiming to get eight hours of sleep a night but...

The mathematical secrets to relationships

How maths can help you find love, and hold on to it. Plus, we hear a collection of our...

WS MoreOrLess: Is strenuous jogging bad for you?

Tim Harford asks whether claims that keen runners might be damaging their health are...

Is strenuous jogging bad for you?

Tim Harford on claims that keen runners might be damaging their health.

WS MoreOrLess: The maths of dating

How to use mathematics to find your life partner. Plus: what are the chances that two...

Cameron’s 1000 jobs

Fact-checking the Conservatives' employment claims; the price of milk; unhappy how to...

WS MoreOrLess: Global Wealth

Who is in the world's wealthiest elite, and where do they live? Which are the world's...

Is anti-Semitism widespread in the UK?

Are the majority of hate crimes in the UK directed against Jewish people? Plus: who 1%...

WS MoreOrLess: Are 95% of Terrorism Victims Muslim?

In the wake of the Paris killings, an imam in Paris told the BBC that most terrorism...

How big are the Conservatives' planned cuts?

The Conservatives' plans to achieve a budget surplus by 2019-20 have led to near that...

WS MoreOrLess: Bad Luck and Cancer

Most cancers are caused by "bad luck" according to reports of a new study.

A&E waiting times

The NHS in England has missed its four-hour A&E waiting time target with performance a...

WS MoreOrLess: Numbers of the Year part 3.

What is the most important number in the world? Robert Peston tells us and Helen Joyce...

Numbers of the Year 2014.

Tim Harford and guests look back at some of the weird and wonderful numbers of 2014.

WS MoreOrLess: Numbers of the Year part 2.

How optimistic are people about the future? The BBC's Evan Davis tells More or Less as...

WS MoreOrLess: Numbers of the Year part 1.

What is so special about 39,222 Mexican teachers? In the first of three episodes back...

WS MoreOrLess: Soviet World War Deaths

Did almost 80% of the males born in the Soviet Union in 1923 not survive World War as...

WS MoreOrLess: Zimbabwe's Economy

Zimbabwe’s budget provided a fascinating insight into the country’s economy last week.

Teenage Pregnancy

"About one-third of American girls become pregnant as teenagers” a recent article...

WS MoreOrLess: Caps off to Rooney

England captain Wayne Rooney made his 100th appearance last weekend but former England...

WS MoreOrLess: Pregnancy and Homicide

The movie Gone Girl claims homicide is a leading cause of death for pregnant women.

Tracking and Tackling Ebola

Hans Rosling, global health expert and data visionary, has just arrived in Liberia.

WS MoreOrLess: Kidney Donation

The chance of a successful kidney match between two unrelated people has increased in...

Screening for Ebola

Are airport screenings for Ebola really an effective way of stopping transmission of a...

WS MoreOrLess: Big Data

Big data has been enjoying a lot of hype, with promises it will help deliver from to...

Species in Decline?

The coverage of the Living Planet Index and its claim that species populations have in...

WS MoreOrLess: Will Berlin see a sub-two-hour marathon?

Why is Berlin the place to break the marathon world record and how long will it be we...

WS MoreOrLess: How do we calculate the distance to the sun?

Two young listeners emailed the programme to ask how we calculate the distance to the sun.

The Barnett Formula

This week Tim explains the Barnett Formula with a bit of help from Money Box's Paul Lewis.

WS MoreOrLess: The UK vs Mississippi

Is Britain poorer than every US state, except for Mississippi? Journalist Fraser the...

Kidney donation: the chance of finding a match

The chance of a successful kidney match between two unrelated people has increased in...

Shakespeare vs Rappers

It's a 'fact' beloved of English teachers around the world: that Shakespeare, the in...

Scottish referendum polls

Tim Harford talks to pollsters about how they are trying to gauge the political mood...

WS MoreOrLess: To ice or not to ice?

The ALS ice bucket challenge has become a viral phenomenon. People around the world in...

To ice or not to ice?

The ALS ice bucket challenge viral phenomenon has raised over $100m. Is this good for...

WS MoreOrLess: Do We Use Only 10% of Our Brains?

Is it true that humans use just 10% of their brains? It’s the premise of the new...

How Deadly Is Ebola?

Media reports are suggesting that as many as 12,000 people may have Ebola in West but...

WS MoreOrLess: Deaths in Gaza

As the Gaza conflict continues, the fact that there are estimated to be nearly three...

Troubled families?

"Revealed: half a million problem families" reported The Sunday Times.

WS MoreOrLess: Anti-Semitism

Is anti-semitism on the rise? Ruth Alexander and James Fletcher look at the numbers, a...

Student Loans

The cost of the government's new student loan system is rising according to a recent...

WS MoreOrLess: Ebola

What do we know about how deadly the Ebola virus is, and how likely is it that there...

WS MoreOrLess: Fear of Flying

After three tragic airline incidents in eight days, is flying becoming more dangerous?...

WS MoreOrLess: The prevalence of paedophilia?

The Pope was reported to have said that 2% of Catholic clergy were paedophiles.

WS MoreOrLess: The Tour de France

The Tour de France has reached the mountains, but what does it take to be a good and...

WS MoreOrLess: Golden Ticket

In Roald Dahl’s novel "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", Charlie Bucket wins a to...

Will we die before our parents?

Obesity may mean children have a shorter lifespan than their parents, it has been but...

WS MoreOrLess: Is this the greatest world cup ever?

As we reach the end of the group stage are we really witnessing the greatest world cup...

WS MoreOrLess: Money for nothing?

When it comes to aid, what works best – giving people food, shelter, medicine, or it...

WS MoreOrLess: Heads Or Tails?

Freakonomics guru Steven Levitt joins us to talk about an unusual experiment – to to...

Faith and Charity?

"Religion Makes People More Generous"- according to The Daily Telegraph's of a new BBC...

WS MoreOrLess: 'Spurious Correlations'

Is the divorce rate in the US state of Maine linked to margarine consumption? It's one...

What's Scottish Independence Worth?

Scottish independence - yes or no? Which will line your pocket more? The Scottish says...

WS MoreOrLess: The Piketty Affair

Did 'rock-star' French economist Thomas Piketty get his numbers wrong? His theories of...

The Piketty Affair

Did 'rock-star' French economist Thomas Piketty get his numbers wrong? His theories of...

WS MoreOrLess: Risk Savvy

A famous probability puzzle is discussed involving goats and game shows with German...

Romanian Crime

Are the statistics put forward by UKIP accurate, and are Romanians responsible for on...

WS MoreOrLess: Did global poverty halve overnight?

Did the number of people around the world living in extreme poverty fall by half a few...

Tax Dodgers and Benefits Cheats

Does the government have lots of people chasing the relatively small amounts lost to a...

WS MoreOrLess: Brazil’s Maths Superstar

The Man Who Counted, a book of 'Arabic' mathematical tales written by Middle Eastern...

Food Bank Britain

Food banks are being used by a million people in Britain according to recent newspaper...

Sir Roger Bannister's ‘impossible’ feat

Sir Roger Bannister became the first man to run a mile in under four minutes 60 ago.

British Law - Made in Brussels?

How much British law is made in Brussels - 75% as UKIP say, or 7% as Nick Clegg says?...

Killed for being female?

Are 100 million women missing from the world? A listener asks More or Less to explore...

Magic Numbers

Do you have a favourite number - one you love, one you think stands out from all the...

Nigeria - rich or poor?

Nigeria's bureau of statistics has overhauled the way it calculates the country's GDP...

Freedom in Numbers

How many people in the world live in freedom? The BBC's Freedom 2014 season got Tim or...

Is London France’s sixth largest city?

Are there really be 300,000 French people in London and would they really want to for...

Missing planes

Could Bayesian statistics find Flight MH370 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing? This niche...

Mailbox edition

Your questions answered - Do the Maasai in Africa number one million? Is it true that...

WS MoreOrLess: Modern Slavery

Are there 21 million slaves in the world today? Director of 12 Years a Slave, Steve at...

The 10,000 hours rule

Becoming a pro on practice alone – is that possible? Or do you need innate talent? a...

WS MoreOrLess: Neknomination Outbreak

The rise and fall of an online epidemic: How studying the spread of infectious the out...

Love by numbers

Can economics help you find love? Tim Harford and the team look at the maths behind...

Rising drug overdose deaths

In the US, more people are dying from drug overdoses than from road traffic accidents...

WS MoreOrLess: Immigration

How much do migrants cost or benefit a nation? Plus, planning a wedding - when you and...

The 50p tax rate

Chancellor George Osborne says a 50p tax rate does not bring in much revenue; Shadow...

WS MoreOrLess: Alcohol risk

Do two large glasses of wine triple your risk of mouth cancer, as claimed on a health...

Immigration

What does a detailed look at immigration statistics tell us about the benefits, or of...

WS MoreOrLess: An apple-a-day

An apple-a-day will actually keep the doctors away, according to a study in the of the...

Obesity crisis?

Tim Harford discovers that health statistics contradict a report which says obesity is...

WS MoreOrLess: Counting the Dead in Iraq

In Iraq, estimates of the death count since the war started 2003 range from 100,000 to...

The week that kills

Most deaths occur in this week of the year - Tim Harford asks why. He also asks: are...

WS MoreOrLess: The numbers of 2013 - part 2

A guide to 2013 in numbers - the most informative, interesting and idiosyncratic of by...

Pension Charges

When the government announced that fees charged by pension providers could be capped,...

WS MoreOrLess: The numbers of 2013 - part 1

A guide to 2013 in numbers - the most informative, interesting and idiosyncratic of by...

Numbers of the year

A guide to 2013 in numbers - the most informative, interesting and idiosyncratic of by...

WS MoreOrLess: Wine shortage?

It has been reported that global wine supplies are running low. But shops still seem...

Britain's 80,000 homeless children

About 80,000 children will wake up homeless on Christmas Day, according to the charity...

WS MoreOrLess: Genocide in South Africa?

It is claimed white South Africans are being systematically killed because of the of...

WS MoreOrLess: Testing the PISA test

The publication of the latest international education league table has created waves...

Football Ranking Mysteries Explained

Ahead of the 2014 World Cup draw next Friday, we look at world football rankings.

WS MoreOrLess: Could statistics cure cancer?

Ruth Alexander speaks to a statistician at the forefront of cancer research, Professor...

WS MoreOrLess: Sachin Tendulkar - best batsman of all time?

Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar has amassed 15,847 test runs, which is 2,500 more runs than...

WS MoreOrLess: Does politics make us get our sums wrong?

To what degree do our personal opinions cloud our judgement? Yale University have to...

100,000 Christian martyrs?

It is claimed an average of 100,000 Christians have died because of their faith every...

WS MoreOrLess: Fertility - when is too late?

Women in their late thirties shouldn’t be as anxious about their prospects of having...

WS MoreOrLess: Nobel Prize puzzle

Tim Harford tells the story of how two economists who disagree with each other have...

The Hawthorne Effect

Tim Harford tells the story of the Hawthorne Experiments, one of the most famous of...

WS MoreOrLess: Mosquitoes and elephants

Has the mosquito killed half the people who have ever lived? Tim Harford assesses the...

Underage drinking

Are hundreds of young children visiting A&E because of alcohol? Plus, an update on the...

WS MoreOrLess: Population explosion?

"We just shut our eyes to the fact that the world's population is increasing out of...

NHS hospital deaths

Tim Harford examines the claim that NHS hospital patients are 45% more likely to die...

Formula 1 racing risk

'I accept every time I get in my car, there's a 20% chance I could die'.

Do free school meals work?

All pupils at infant schools in England are to get free school lunches from next but I...

Sexual violence statistics in Asia

Almost a quarter of men in some Asian countries admit rape, it has been reported.

Fertility: when is too late?

Psychologist Jean Twenge argues that women in their late thirties shouldn’t be as of...

The death toll in Syria

As global leaders remain divided on whether to carry out a military strike against in...

The Death Toll in Syria

Tim Harford looks at the different claims made about how many people have been killed...

Counting climate migrants

Is it true that environmental problems will create 200 million migrants? Some and warn...

What price the life of a badger?

Has the government taken into account the worth of a badger's life in any cost-benefit...

Is coffee bad for you?

People who drink more than 4 cups of coffee increase their chances of dying by 50%, it...

The magic of maths

Tim Harford speaks to Persi Diaconis, top professor of maths and statistics and...

Where could we fit the entire world’s population?

If all the world’s population crowded together, where could we all fit? London? More...

What is the most visited country in the world?

This week we find out what the most visited country in the world is and ask why they...

Chris Froome's Tour de France victory

The winner of this year's Tour de France, British rider Chris Froome, faced numerous...

Egypt: Biggest protest in history?

It’s claimed that Egyptians have taken part in the biggest uprising the world has...

Sex and the world wide web

The world of porn is often exaggerated but does it really make up 37% of the web? And...

How long will you live?

Life expectancy at birth around the world has increased by six years in the past two...

Will 40% of the world's workforce really be in Africa by 2050?

Ruth Alexander examines US Secretary of State, John Kerry’s claim that 40% of the be...

Is a child dying of hunger every 15 seconds?

Ruth Alexander examines the claim that every 15 seconds a child dies of hunger.

Sex on the Brain?

Parents take note – what can numbers reveal about bringing up children? Plus, Tim if...

A&E, and the chances of having twins

A&E waiting times have been making the headlines - Tim Harford takes a look at some of...

The maths of spies and terrorists

In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing and the killing of a British soldier on the...

The maths of spies and terrorists

After the killing of a British soldier on the streets of Woolwich in London, it that...

Ryanair punctuality; mistakes in academic papers

Tim Harford examines Ryanair’s claim that more than 90% of its flights land on time;...

The economics of Scottish independence

Tim Harford inspects the claims the UK Treasury and the Scottish government make about...

Angelina Jolie’s 87% cancer risk

As Angelina Jolie announces that an 87% cancer risk has prompted her to have a double...

Angelina Jolie’s 87% cancer risk

As Angelina Jolie announces that an 87% cancer risk has prompted her to have a double...

How old is your dog?

It's often said that one dog year equals seven human years. But is it true? Tim and or...

How much does the EU cost the UK? Plus, dog years

Tim Harford makes sense of the numbers being used in the political battle about the UK...

The Maths of Mozart and Birds

Birds + windows =? The BBC Quiz show The Unbelievable Truth reckons that more than 2...

Birds, Mozart, austerity, Thatcher

Birds + windows =? The BBC Quiz show The Unbelievable Truth reckons that more than 2...

Are Man Utd a one-man team?

More or Less creates the Alternative Premier League, with lead scorer goals chalked to...

Austerity: a spreadsheet error?

Tim Harford tells the story of the student who uncovered a mistake in a famous paper...

Thatcher in numbers

Baroness Margaret Thatcher, who has died aged 87, was Britain’s first female prime...

Communicating Risk

It’s the fourth anniversary of the earthquake which devastated the city of in Italy...

That's not much gold

What if a super-villain took control of the world's gold a melted it in to a cube? How...

Can big data save lives?

With an avalanche of 2. 5 quintillion bytes of data generated daily, could this be used...

Are there more black men in college or prison in the US?

Only last week Ivory Toldson heard the speaker say there are more black men in prison...

HIV in numbers

With the news that a baby has been ‘cured’ of HIV what do the numbers tell us the...

Is the Kenyan election already decided?

Kenya votes for its next President on 4th March. The opinion polls show that it is the...

Counting Catholics

This week Tim Harford asks how the figure of 1. 2 billion Catholics world-wide is...

How many people support Manchester United?

This week Ruth Alexander looks at Manchester United versus Real Madrid in the last 16...

The end of the Penny

Canada has stopped distributing its smallest coin –the one cent or the penny.

A case of statistical significance in Greece

This week Ruth Alexander looks at the extraordinary case of Andreas Georgiou the head...

Fat or Fiction

A ‘new’ BMI calculation has been proposed by Oxford Mathematician Professor Nick a...

WS MoreOrLess: Indian Farmer Suicides

This week Ruth Alexander is looking at farmer suicides in India. But is it any more in...

Pop up economics

Episode 1 of Tim Harford's new series, Pop Up Economics, in which he tells a live and...

Food waste and Scrabble

Reports this week suggest that we are wasting 50 per cent of our food globally.

The Parable of the Ox

What does a 'guess the weight of the ox' competition tells us about a bloated and We...

The Parable of the Ox

What does a 'guess the weight of the ox' competition tells us about a bloated and We...

Numbers of 2012

A special review of the year through the interesting, informative and idiosyncratic of...

Numbers of 2012

A guide to 2012 in numbers - the most informative, interesting and idiosyncratic of by...

Gun Statistics

Tim Harford investigates the numbers in the debate on firearms deaths, and discovers...

Fact-checking US gun crime statistics

Tim Harford investigates gun crime statistics in the US. Plus, why death is not always...

WS MoreOrLess: What is "rare"?

This week: What is ‘rare’? When we say something is rare what do we mean? strikes...

The Census and what does 'rare' mean?

Why was the estimate, in 2003, for Eastern Europeans coming to the UK so wrong? Which...

World Service: Africa GDP & Royal twins

Where does Nigeria’s plan to revise its GDP leave our understanding of growth in And...

Radio 4: Royal Twins & Autumn Statement

In light of the Royal pregnancy Tim Harford asks what severe morning sickness tells us...

More or Less: How reliable is Kevin Pietersen?

Kevin Pietersen has been widely praised as one of the best England batsmen of the era...

More or Less: Opinion polling, Kevin Pietersen, and stacking Lego

On More or Less this week Tim Harford looks at three polls carried out to gauge the on...

Fergie Time

This is the first in the new series of the programme. There’s a well-established get...

Ash Die Back and Fergie Time

This is the first in the new series of the programme. Tim Harford has been busy some...

Brain Food and Bacteria

There's not an obvious link between chocolate and Nobel prizes, but this did not stop...

Voodoo polling? Predicting the US election

This week Ruth Alexander looks at the other winner the US elections. Blogger and of of...

Is America’s conviction rate really 99.5%?

Conrad Black has claimed that 99.5% of prosecution cases in America end up in convictions.

Predicting L'Aquila Earthquake: is it right to blame the scientists?

This week six scientists and one ex-government official were sentenced to prison for...

Life-saving economics

Professor Al Roth tells Tim Harford about the work for which he has just been awarded...

Predicting the global population

Predicting the global population: does anyone really know what’s going to happen?

Predicting the Presidency

Nate Silver tells us who will win the 2012 US election - and how he knows.

Plenty more fish in the sea?

Only 100 cod are left in the North Sea according to newspapers. Is this the most wrong...

Factchecking America

US Presidential Election factchecked. Is Mitt Romney right to say that 47% of pay no...

Investigating crime statistics

Ruth Alexander investigates Sweden's high rape rate, and finds out which countries are...

Where are the Paralympics Medals?

Why did the USA top the gold medals league in the Olympics, but not the Paralympics?...

How to explain infinity to a 4-year-old

‘What’s the number before infinity?’ asks Claudia, aged 4. We challenge Johnny...

Are African leaders more likely to die in office?

The Prime Minister of Ethiopia is the fourth African premier to die this year alone.

Levelling the statistical playing field

Given that some countries are richer than others, and some have larger populations, us...

The great playing field sell off?

Given that some countries are richer than others, and some have larger populations, us...

How to lose money - fast!

Last week Knight Capital lost a lot of money very quickly. It was the latest chapter...

How to lose money - fast!

Last week Knight Capital lost a lot of money very quickly. It was the latest chapter...

How extraordinary is Ye Shiwen? WS

There was controversy this week after Ye Shiwen, a young Chinese swimmer, won the 400...

How extraordinary is Ye Shiwen?

There was controversy this week after Ye Shiwen, a young Chinese swimmer, won the 400...

Gun laws and gold medals (WS)

Last week's mass-shooting at a cinema in Colorado has - not surprisingly - intensified...

Gun laws and gold medals

Last week's mass-shooting at a cinema in Colorado has - not suprisingly - intensified...

Has clamping down on drugs made the Tour de France slower? (WS)

The Tour de France, we are told, has finally cleaned up its act and clamped down on of...

Has clamping down on drugs made the Tour de France slower?

The Tour de France, we are told, has finally cleaned up its act and clamped down on of...

Who are the Libor losers?

How much damage did messing with Libor really do to the financial system? And we the a...

More or Less: Who are the Libor losers? (WS)

How much damage did messing with Libor really do to the financial system? After all, a...

Drinks and drugs capital of the world? (WS)

Do residents of the tiny micronesian island of Palau really smoke more cannabis, and...

Hit movies and killer birthdays (WS)

What is the highest-earning film ever if you adjust for inflation? And are birthdays...

(WS) Weight of the world

How fat could the global population become? Plus, Angela Saini considers whether could...

(WS) Chance encounters

Is the likelihood of bumping into your boss on holiday greater than you think? Angela...

Interview with Daniel Kahneman

Tim Harford interviews Daniel Kahneman, a psychologist who won the Nobel Prize in...

Counting images of The Queen. (WS)

How many images of Queen Elizabeth II have ever been created? And is Facebook really...

Would firing staff 'at will' work? (R4)

Is there any evidence to support the Beecroft Review's recommended changes to law? and...

The maths of infidelity (WS)

It’s a very commonly-held belief that men are less faithful than women But it takes...

Where are the world hardest workers? (WS)

Earlier in the year we found out that Greeks put in more working hours than Germans.

Troubled families and unneutered cats. (R4)

Troubled families, nursing numbers and the mathematical consequences of unneutered cats.

Trouble on the Greek railways (WS)

Would it be cheaper to send every Greek rail passenger by taxi instead? This programme...

Are CEOs worth it? (R4)

Executive pay, chess and trouble on the Greek railway.

A grand economic experiment? (WS)

Are we witnessing a grand economic experiment being played out between Europe, trying...

Austerity, border queues and bank holidays (R4)

Are we witnessing a grand economic experiment playing out between Britain and the How...

The formula that changed the world

The Midas Formula - In this week's More or Less: The story of Black-Scholes, the that...

The formula that changed the world

Rain and drought in numbers, the formula which changed Wall Street and then the world...

20 Apr 12

Is the rate of species extinction exaggerated - or even unknowable? Producer: Richard...

20 Apr 12

We investigate the height of North Koreans, the width of police officers and rate of...

Eurostats - True or False?

Are there really more Porsche Cayenne owners in Greece than taxpayers earning over Can...

Stamp prices and the first maths book

The Royal Mail says UK stamp prices are still among the best value in Europe, despite...

Do big football clubs win more penalties?

Do Manchester United and other leading clubs like Real Madrid and Barcelona benefit in...

What is the world average salary?

If there were perfect income equality worldwide, and everybody earned the same amount...

Red meat death risk?

Eating an extra portion of red meat every day is associated with an increased risk of...

Is Apple worth more than Poland?

Tim Harford explains why the technology giant Apple is not bigger than Poland, as have...

Less than a dollar a day

Tim Harford assesses how global poverty is measured, as the World Bank releases the on...

Syria poll and Europe’s work hours

Fifty-five per cent of Syrians do not think their leader President Assad should to of...

Cybermetrics and Groundhog Day

Can you measure your popularity – or that of anyone or anything – by the number of...

Measuring famine

How do you measure a famine? Following the UN’s recent announcement that famine have...

More alive than dead?

Tim Harford investigates one of the most popular questions from More or Less “Are It...

Sizing up cities

Which are the world’s biggest cities, and what are their populations? Two simple we...

Climate bet; Africa Cup of Nations

A four-year bet about global warming between two scientists is settled.

Chavez's cancer claims

President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela thinks the US may have developed a secret to give...

High speed rail

High Speed rail - Tim Harford speaks to railway consultant Chris Stokes and Alison HS2...

Using statistics in court

Tim Harford tackles the use of statistics in court, the average rise in rail fares,...

2011 in numbers

A guide to interesting, informative or just plain idiosyncratic numbers of the year.

Who are the 1% and the 99%?

Tim Harford on income inequality in the UK, and elsewhere. He speaks to Professor Sir...

Higgs boson statistics

In the week scientists at the Large Hadron Collider announced that the most coveted in...

Supermarket price wars

Tim Harford on National Literacy Trust figures and the maths of supermarket price wars.

Pensions, and the Eurozone crisis.

In the week of a nationwide strike over pension changes, Tim Harford explains how the...

Brain Culture Part 3

In a change to our usual format, we are podcasting Matthew Taylor's "Brain Culture"...

Brain Culture Part 2

In a change to the usual format, we are podcasting Matthew Taylor's "Brain Culture"...

Brain Culture Part 1

In a change to the usual format, we are podcasting Matthew Taylor’s series “Brain...

Government waste

In More or Less this week: Government waste, a logic puzzle, the statistics of spying,...

A Euro Debt Odyssey

In this week's More or Less: a Euro debt odyssey, the placebo effect and 70 years of...

Scottish Independence

On this week's More or Less: Scottish independence, mobile phones and cancer, and is...

Is salt bad for you?

More or Less has the latest on salt, 'zero tolerance' policing, and how to predict the...

The maths of rioting

In More or Less this week: riots, debt, disability benefit and when to buy a lotto ticket.

US debt

Tim Harford and the More or Less team unpick more numbers in the news.

Public Sector Pay

Investigating the public sector pay premium, statins and the 'decline effect'.

Climate Refugees

More or Less looks at child poverty, climate refugees and Sir Henry Cooper's greatest...

Wedding Stats

In More or Less this week: a cornucopia of wedding-related numbers. And AV explained.

How useful is GDP?

Tim Harford and team look at GDP, school standards and the results of 'The Other Census'.

Tuition fees

Tim Harford and the team examine examine tuition fees, drugs testing and inflation.

Youth Unemployment

In More or Less this week: youth unemployment, Trumpton and social mobility.

Small spending cuts?

Tim Harford is back with a new series of More or Less, and the numbers behind the news.

The Story of Economics 'Monsters'

In this three-part series Michael Blastland lays out the history of economic ideas to...

The Story of Economics 'Cogs'

'More or Less' creator Michael Blastland goes to Chicago to explore a machine-like of...

The Story of Economics 'Gods'

More or Less creator Michael Blastland lays out the history of economic ideas to why...

Health check

The Government says Britain's health care standards have fallen behind those of our...

Street grooming

We look at street grooming, examine the new bank taxes, revisit Ambridge in the wake...

Big numbers

More or Less examines this week's claims and counter-claims about VAT, exposes some -...

2010 in numbers

Tim Harford and the More or Less team explore 2010 in numbers. Happy New Year to all...

What the Dickens?

Boom. Bust. Bah humbug. Tim Harford narrates 'A More or Less Christmas Carol' in which...

Council of despair

Local government budgets are being cut. More or Less looks at how the pie is sliced on...

Degrees of Debt

We look at the numbers behind the increase in the cap on undergraduate tuition fees in...

Gay Britain

Tim Harford and the More or Less team examine the micromort measure of risk and on...

How welfare works

Tim Harford and the More or Less team examine more numbers in the news. Fast.

Who earns more?

Who earns more: private or public employees? And are your trousers flattering you?

Back to school

More or Less looks at how maths is taught in schools today and it asks what the of the...

03 Sep 2010

How reliable are life expectancy figures? Can cycling ever be safer than driving? And,...