Statistics

Net run rate tables from the ICC add up only when overs are counted in balls

Net run rate is a cricket side's runs per over minus the runs per over scored against it, across every match with a result. Counting overs in balls, we reproduced all 13 figures the ICC published for three groups of the 2026 Men's T20 World Cup.

14 Oct 2026 · 6 min read

Statistics

One study's medium Cohen's d is compatible with effects from below small to large

Cohen's d, Hedges' g and Glass's Δ all divide a difference between two means by a standard deviation, and differ in which spread they use and how they treat small samples. A single study's d usually sits inside a confidence interval that crosses more than one of Cohen's labels.

14 Oct 2026 · 6 min read

Science

Medieval Teeth Show Children in England's Peak District Were Heavily Exposed to Lead From the 600s

Enamel from 17 burials dates the revival of the region's lead industry to the mid-seventh century, and hints that exposure depended on gender and status.

14 Oct 2026 · 4 min read

Statistics

Readability formulas fitted to the same readers still disagree by about a grade and a half

Flesch-Kincaid, SMOG and other readability formulas give one text different grade levels because each counts a different feature of the writing. Three formulas fitted to the same Navy readers in 1975 still disagree by a median of 1.5 grades.

12 Oct 2026 · 6 min read

Science

Homebrew ABV formulas part ways once original gravity reaches 1.070

Homebrewers turn original and final gravity readings into alcohol by volume with one of two formulas, which agree closely for beer of ordinary strength. On our grid they sit more than 0.3 percentage points apart from an original gravity of 1.070, while the factor table HMRC publishes stays close to the simpler rule.

12 Oct 2026 · 6 min read

Science

Rare blood-group variants allow most of the child blood types a chart forbids

The textbook ABO rule forbids at least one child blood type for every pairing of parent types except A with B. Rare inherited variants, chiefly the Bombay phenotype and cis-AB, reach most of those forbidden combinations, at population rates of a few children in a thousand even where they cluster.

8 Oct 2026 · 6 min read

Statistics

Generation charts disagree on a third of post-war birth years

Pew, McCrindle, the US Census Bureau and Indonesia's statistics office give different generation labels, or none, for 27 of the 81 birth years from 1946 to 2026. Singapore draws its own Pioneer and Merdeka Generation lines by birth date and citizenship date, and none of them falls on a Pew boundary.

7 Oct 2026 · 6 min read

Science

Animals Probably Arose 800 to 700 Million Years Ago, Long Before Their Oldest Fossils

Scientists have long disagreed over when the first animals appeared. A new study argues that a key fossil site was misread, pushing the likely start back to around the Snowball Earth ice ages.

7 Oct 2026 · 4 min read

Science

People Bend the Facts to Suit Their Choices, and the Selfish Version Spreads Faster

In nine experiments with 8,769 adults, those who kept more for themselves played down the cost to others. When shown such estimates, other participants became more selfish too.

3 Oct 2026 · 4 min read

Statistics

Division codes from China's Ministry of Civil Affairs survive renames and change with a place's type

China's Ministry of Civil Affairs gives province-, prefecture- and county-level units six-digit codes, and all but one of the prefecture- and county-level codes in its 2023 list sit in the number band its rules set for that kind of unit. When a code changes, why an older ID number can begin with a retired code, and where the official list is published now.

3 Oct 2026 · 6 min read