Data Analysis Quotes

“If you torture the data long enough, it will confess.”
― Ronald H. Coase, Essays on Economics and Economists

“Data is a form of capital. And as is the case with all capital - it has to be efficient utilized.”
― Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr, CEO of Mayflower-Plymouth

“Data is one of the most valuable resources of a bank.”
― Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr, CEO of Mayflower-Plymouth

“We've passed through the era of data accumulation. We're entering now into the era of data amalgamation - data combined and directed in service of a greater purpose.”
― Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr, CEO of Mayflower-Plymouth

“Use the data from the clients you already have to help you find new clients just like them.”
― Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr, CEO of Mayflower-Plymouth

“Use the data from the clients you already have to help you find new clients just like them. Eventually you'll be tapped into a whole market segment.”
― Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr, CEO of Mayflower-Plymouth

“Individual data points are of miniscule value. In the first twenty years of this century, data has become a common commodity. But the next level is amalgamation - bringing hundreds or thousands or millions of data points together and then making of them something greater than the sum of the parts.”
― Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr, CEO of Mayflower-Plymouth

“All good decisions are Data dependent. To make good decisions, you need good data. And you need that good data to be organized according to it's applicable use value. So every business should be mining data and organizing data to enable business leaders to make good decisions on behalf of the business.”
― Hendrith Vanlon Smith Jr, CEO of Mayflower-Plymouth

“Heightened data competence can therefore ensure data is used to improve the lives and experiences of LGBTQ people rather than only serve the interests of, what Catherine D’Ignazio and Lauren F. Klein described as, the three S's: science (universities), surveillance (governments), and selling (corporations).”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Abby Day’s research on how people answered the question on religion in the 2001 English and Welsh census shines further light on the interplay between identity characteristics and the use of data collection methods. Day describes how interviewees and her study were initially ambivalent about their religious identities. However, when presented with a list of options, this crystallized their identity ‘in a way that seemed to suggest not that they were for example, Christian but -- perhaps more importantly -- that they were not one of the “others.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Visibility is a trap’... If the burden of proof is higher for LGBTQ people than the general public, and it remains unclear whether the collection of evidence actually initiates meaningful change, the utility of a data-based response to fighting injustice is called into question.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Hacking described his research interest ‘in classifications of people, in how they affect the people classified, and how the affects on the people in turn change the classifications.’ Hacking labeled the subjects of these studies ‘moving targets’ because researchers’ investigatory efforts change them in ways so ‘they are not quite the same kind of people as before.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Over time, EDI work has transformed so that the purpose becomes to ‘fix the data’ rather than the problems the data was originally intended to represent.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“The cleaning of data can remove its queerness: paper surveys where respondents score out the response options ‘female’ and ‘male’ and write their own answer, interview recordings were participants flip the focus and ask questions of the researcher, census returns where LGBTQ couples identify themselves as ‘married’ even when governments do not recognize same sex marriage. These examples demonstrate how collection methods can fail to restrict how participants share data about their lives and experiences. … cleaning, which involves the removal of data that breaks established rules”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“What is your end goal?
The collection and analysis of gender, sex and sexuality data is not an objective in itself, nor is the ambition to gather ‘good data’ or fix the numbers. While paying attention to the potential for methods to misrepresent or exclude, such as strategic essentialism, ensure that data about LGBTQ people is ultimately used to construct a social world that values and improves LGBTQ lives.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Do your methods present an authentic account of LGBTQ lives?
Rather than adopt methods that promise a tidy dataset, recognize that data about identity characteristics is leaky, pluralistic and can change over time. A queer approach involves the use of innovative collection and analysis methods, such as multiple response options and the provision of open-text boxes, to produce a more authentic reflection of lives and experiences.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Who makes decisions about data that impact LGBTQ people?
Decisions that disproportionately affect LGBTQ communities should be made by LGBTQ people. Where this is not practical, or there is a risk of overburdening a small number of people, decision-makers need queer data competence and the ability to recuse themselves when deliberations stretch beyond their capabilities. Use these instances to make space for people with knowledge and experience of the issues under discussion.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Does your project create more good than harm? And for whom?
Assess what your project intends to achieve and its potential to cause harm; only continue when the potential benefits outweigh the potential dangers. Disaggregate the differential impacts among LGBTQ people to ensure that the project does not only benefit the least marginalized individuals, for whom sexual orientation is the only characteristics that excludes them from full inclusion.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Do you need more data?
Do not assume the need for more data -- enough evidence of a problem might already exist to justify the need for action. Also explore who is already engaged in data practices on the topic to see if resources could support existing initiatives rather than create something afresh. The collection, analysis and use of data are resource-intensive. Before work begins, you therefore need to ask if this is the best use of time, resources and energy to address injustices that face LGBTQ people.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Do you elevate LGBTQ lives and critically examine the invisibility of majority characteristics?
One of data’s strengths is its power to tell stories, which can shifts hearts and minds and encourage others to take action. However, increased visibility alone is not enough. A queer approach also problematizes the distinction between the center and the margins so the invisibility of majority identity characteristics, such as cis and heterosexual, are brought into focus and critically examined.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Are your ways of working open, accessible and transparent?
Traditional approaches to quantitative data collection and analysis are misunderstood as an objective account of reality; an assumption that masks decisions made throughout the design process. A queer approach to data is also influenced by biases and assumptions; those engaged in queer data practices therefore need to describe how decisions are made, in accessible language, and its effect on the results presented. Openness about the limitations of data helps ensure that an undercount or misrepresentation of data about LGBTQ people is not used undermine political and social advances.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Are damaging data practices and systems capable of reform?
Re-evaluate your relationship to data and assess whether existing practices and systems are capable of reform. If reform seems possible, question who is best placed undertake this work. When reform fails, or efforts to reform risk keeping a damaging system alive for longer, consider if an abolitionist approach might put data in the hands of those most in need.”
― Kevin Guyan, Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action

“Modern data analysis techniques should embed human rights principles in algorithms making decisions for humans to ensure transparency and accountability.”
― Arzak Khan

“DATA means Determined Action of Transformative Awareness.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Rowdy Scientist: Handbook of Humanitarian Science

“In the era of Industry 4.0 and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), data takes center stage as the lifeblood of modern manufacturing. The significance of data cannot be overstated, as it serves as the foundation for driving innovation, efficiency, and competitiveness in the digital age.”
― Umair Iftikhar, Industrial IoT 101

“Consuming data with no sense of context, gives you, not awareness, but only ulcers.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Brit Actually: Nursery Rhymes of Reparations

“Human mind seeks understanding,
AI seeks data - lots and lots of data.
AI's hunger for data is matched only
by the billionaire's hunger for power.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Azad Earth Army: When The World Cries Blood

“Data is power.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Azad Earth Army: When The World Cries Blood

“How much power is enough power,
particularly now when data is power!
What's the point of power and data,
if they just empower criminal behavior!”
― Abhijit Naskar, Azad Earth Army: When The World Cries Blood

“For REX, he thought that Death by HANGING or SHOOTING can actually makes him a STAR”
― Okeji Izuchukwu David