# Spurious Correlations

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/books/spurious-correlations/
- Published: 2021-08-20T08:28:00+01:00
- Author: Howard Lake

**Military intelligence analyst and Harvard Law student Tyler Vigen illustrates 
the golden rule that “correlation does not equal causation” through hilarious graphs
inspired by his popular website.**

This book is a handy reminder to fundraisers to be wary of claiming achievements
that do not in fact stack up.

Whether that is the results of a new or different approach to a fundraising campaign
or even the impact of a charity, it is essential to understand that “correlation
does not equal causation”.

Is there a correlation between Nic Cage films and swimming pool accidents? What 
about beef consumption and people getting struck by lightning? Absolutely not. But
that hasn’t stopped millions of people from going to tylervigen.com and asking, “
Wait, what?”

Vigen has designed software that scours enormous data sets to find unlikely statistical
correlations. He began pulling the funniest ones for his website and has since gained
millions of views, hundreds of thousands of likes, and extensive media coverage.