One of the greatest challenges for educated people is determining the relative weight of polls, statistics, and the like.
We strongly believe that statistical studies shouldn't stand or fall because of funding sources, or the particular beliefs of their authors. Stats are stats. If the methodology is right, then funding and intentions are immaterial.
But when a study is deeply flawed, it's tempting to take a second look at its funders.
According to the Chronicle of Philanthropy, the notoriously inflated number of Iraq casualties, published in The Lancet, stemmed from a study underwritten by George Soros:
A controversial 2006 study that estimated 650,000 people had died as a result of the Iraq war was partially paid for by a donation from George Soros’s charitable foundation, reports The Sunday Times, in London. The study, appearing in the medical journal The Lancet, received almost half of its financing from the antiwar billionaire.
The 650,000-casualty figure was substantially higher than other estimates; recent research in The New England Journal of Medicine, for instance, estimates that 151,000 people have died since the invasion. The Lancet study, commissioned by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been cited by the antiwar movement and denounced by the Bush Administration.
While The Lancet did not break any rules in accepting the donation from Mr. Soros’s Open Society Institute, the study’s lead researcher, Les Roberts, remarked, “In retrospect, it was probably unwise to have taken money that could have looked like it would result in a political slant. I am adamant this could not have affected the outcome of the research.”
We have no reason to think that Soros' funding had anything to do with the study's inflated numbers. But this case should make organizations think twice before accepting money that could ultimately do them more harm than good.
In our media-saturated world, perception is everything.
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