The Numbers Don’t Lie. But That Doesn’t Mean We Understand Them.

I just finished The Math of Life and Death by Kit Yates. Yates walks the reader through stories where a misunderstanding of math led to bad decisions, dangerous outcomes, or even tragedy. It’s not a book about how to do math. It’s a book about how math already shapes our lives, whether we realize it or not.

Yates points out over and over that: “Numbers, in and of themselves, are neither good nor bad. It’s how we interpret and apply them that gives them their power—for better or worse.”

In education, numbers are everywhere. Test scores. Attendance rates. Graduation percentages. College and Career Readiness Indicators. These figures can be helpful, but they can also take on a life of their own. They start to drive decisions and shape narratives, even when the whole picture is far more complicated.

Yates argues that math is not merely a tool for solving problems. It is also a language for asking better questions. In courtrooms, hospitals, election offices, and yes, classrooms, people make huge decisions based on statistics and probabilities they don’t fully understand. The cost of that confusion is often invisible, until it isn’t.

Reading this book made me more aware of how often I treat numbers as facts rather than as representations. It reminded me that even the cleanest data sets need context, and that clear thinking often starts with healthy skepticism.

There is real power in math. But only if we use it carefully.