Steve Kass

Thanks to Edward Tufte, millions of people have seen Charles Minard’s remarkable chart of the French Army’s losses during its Russian campaign in the winter of 1812-13. Minard’s chart is a joy to behold. It’s the acme of data presentation — magnificent, spectacular, inspiring. So it kills me that Gene Zelazny, who wrote the you-know-from-the-title-it’s-bad book “Say it with Charts” FUCKING SHAT ALL OVER MINARD’S LEGACY.

I learned about Zelazny’s desecration here, though Andrew Abela, who reported it, failed to call it that. “Zelazny notes that the graphic is difficult to read, and proposes that there might be better ways to convey the same information.”

Sure, there might be, just like there might be better ways to decorate the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, but what Zelazny offers is an epic numerical fail, because IT NOT ONLY DEPICTS DIFFERENT (AS IN WRONG) INFORMATION, IT ALSO DEPICTS THE WRONG INFORMATION BADLY (as in we can’t even tell what wrong numbers he wants us to find and what they are supposed to quantify).

Zelazny might as well propose that “there might be better ways to clean up the Gulf of Mexico,” trot out a broken doorknob and a bent bicycle tire, and ask us to wonder with him. Ugh, ugh, ugh. And ugh.

Here are a few of the gory details (of which there can be but few, given how little actual stuff there is in Zelazny’s chart).

Ok, so the spirit levels in the cutesy clipart thermometers don’t match the numbers, only their absolute values (sort of).  But the numbers are wrong, too. Five of Zelazny’s six data points are wrong — misread from Minard’s original. Five out of six. That’s almost all wrong, for those of you who aren’t counting. Badly, differently, and horrifyingly wrong.

Minard reports that there was rain on October 24, and that the temperature was about zero*. Zelazny misread the day of the month (24) as a temperature, then used the only other written figure at that spot on Minard’s chart (8^bre, for octobre) for both the month and the day. No explanation short of “Who gives a fuck?” works for this slop.

*Minard’s figures give the Réaumur scale temperature, which detail Minard, lest future readers misconstrue his chart, tells us. Minard cared deeply about communicating. (Zelazny’s figures are wrong in every known temperature scale. He cares less. Much less, like not at all.)

Remarkably or not, almost nothing is correct in Zelazny’s “presentation.” The border between Poland and Russia is misplaced, and all the graphical scales are wrong. I’m no PowerPoint guru, but I assume you have to work very hard to incorporate numbers into a slide this wrongly (as was famously done here, and better).

Even Zelazny’s title is wrong.

Things got bad on the retreat from Moscow. And it’s not clear how many died. Minard charted the number of troops, not deaths. Some who didn’t return were captured. Others may have deserted. And the overall message isn’t “the colder … the more.” The biggest declines were early in the campaign, when the temperatures aren’t given. So the title is all wrong, but hell, IT FIT ON TWO LINES. Shit like this matters. It’s our planet’s fucking history.

Sure, Minard’s correct title (Carte figurative des pertes successives en hommes de l’ Armée Française…, and penned more beautifully than any web typography can be rendered) won’t work projected at WXGA resolution or on your favorite eReader or phone.

THIS IS WHY WE PRINT STUFF ON PAPER. If you don’t have a copy of Minard’s chart, buy yourself one. Fuck, if you’re one of the first five people to ask me, I’ll buy you one.

Now turn off your computer and pick up a beautiful book. Or go to the library. Or write. On paper. Thanks for listening.

Early Wednesday, a new monument slowly rose over St. Petersburg in northern Russia, and tourists and residents alike have flocked to see it. The Moscow Times provided this poetic description of the new attraction:

Measuring 65 meters long and 27 meters across, the light-colored phallus rises and glistens against the imperial-era capital’s elegant skyline when the bridge is drawn up to let ships pass in the twilit northern summer nights.

More at english.pravda.ru: Giant Penis Erects Literally in St. Petersburg Center. Additional photos at Xaxor.com.

Note: This is not the first time a giant penis has aroused attention in one or another St. Petersburg. In 2008, police in St. Petersburg, Florida, responded to a “complaint about a giant penis statue.” The incident ended in the arrest of an art gallery owner for violating a city ordinance that prohibits places that serve alcohol from allowing the public display of genitals. (The genitals of a person found by investigating officers, not the aforementioned statue, prompted the arrest.) According to its owner, the Florida giant penis statue stood “eight” feet tall.

Thanks to Lucinda for passing this on from Sue Katz.

Yesterday, Neil Patrick Harris retweeted David Blaine‘s funny observation that "one of these things is not like the others."

My AOL data (see #836. How to be a sex goddess) was a little thin on "why is he" queries, but a broader "why is" search didn’t fail to disappoint. Here are a few; the full list in alphabetical order (not safe for work, as you might guess) is after the jump.

• why is the earth so important
• why is renaissance art emotional
• why is pi irrational
• why is a frog difficult to hold
• why is there dirt in my air
• why is the tympanum located in the abdomen of the grasshopper
• why is scary movie2 rated r

(more…)

Yesterday, the New York Times published “Why Do Educated People Use Bad Words?” on the Opinion page as part of its series Room For Debate: A Running Commentary on the News. The Times piece was dull, but it gave me an excuse to visit and play at the never-dull Google News archives.

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