In an article that seems like a joke, the UK's Daily Mail reports on a study published in the journal Death Studies, which suggests that the first initial of a child's name might affect their longevity by as much as ten years.
"This child-naming nonsense is only interesting because it shows how statistics can be manipulated to show trends, and they don't necessarily imply causation," says ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross. "There was an analysis between certain illnesses and how they correlated to astrological signs published in the New England Journal of Medicine that demonstrated several statistically significant relationships between diseases and Zodiac sign. The author was trying to make the point that statistical correlation does not imply causation."
"If you are going to click on one article in today's Dispatch, I recommend this one," says the advantageously named ACSH's Jeff Stier.