In February, prompted by the Newtown tragedy, Periscopic released an emotionally powerful tool to visualize U.S. gun murders.
Alberto Cairo discusses that tool and the merger of objective data with subjective emotion:
The words “emotion” and “data” aren’t paired very often. That’s unfortunate, albeit understandable. For historical reasons, we assume that quantitative data are as objective as emotions are messy. In the simplest narratives of how the human mind operates, emotions are the source of the most prevalent cognitive biases¹, whereas the proper handling of data—gathering, experimenting, testing—is the most reliable antidote to them. There is grandeur in this view of knowledge; after all, it’s the foundation of the scientific method. But there may be exceptions sometimes.
Cairo notes several shortcomings in Periscopic’s data model, but notes:
In the meantime, I guess that it would be appropriate to just enjoy the creativity and beauty of projects like this, to quietly mourn the people behind the data, and to think about what the future of gun legislation should be.
This follows my thoughts at the time:
Resist the urge for the data to act as self-confirming toward your particular political leanings or views toward gun safety and control. Instead, help accomplish Periscopic’s goal by connecting to the data in a humanistic manner. Their Stolen Years metric should not be divisive, rather it should be as it is, horrific and deeply saddening.
(via: Dr. James Correia, Jr.)