What is the relationship between ice cream and shark attacks?

Correlation is not causation. Remember to check for the hidden data.

Hello guys,

Hope you are doing well. I’m okay, Alhamdulillah.

I write this as 8:08 am on a Sunday morning, a fairly typical time. There have been days of starting right after Fajr, or even much earlier in the week depending on previous commitments. And there have been days of starting at 2pm, 7pm, or even 9pm, I guess depending on how intense my weekend is and playing to time zone differences.

I had a fairly stressful week, working back-to-back-to-back and feeling simultaneously exhausted and anxious for just how much work was oustanding. But Alhamdulillah, the weekend has been calm.

I am out of ideas today lol.

Q: How do I typically get ideas for what to write about?

A: I consume a lot of content.

In a typical week, I spend a significant amount of time reading, watching YouTube videos, listening to podcasts, and in interesting conversations with some of my favourite people.

Whenever something stands out, I ensure to note it somewhere, as I’m 98.763% sure I have the worst memory in the world. When I am fortunate, this ‘idea’ spends a few days marinating in my head, and by Sunday, I have one or two examples through which to think out loud in writing.

And in weeks like this, where I barely had the time to do anything interesting, I am both short on ideas and have not gotten the opportunity to have them marinate. Scrolling through my recent notes, they were mostly meh and not interesting enough to expand further upon.

But as I scrolled further and further into the past, I found something I was thinking about some two months ago.

Leggo.

** side note: I took a break from writing at this point to read Inner Ring, a speech C. S. Lewis gave to students at King’s College London in 1944. It is a fine speech packed with tons of life advice. You should read it after this newsletter.

Correlation is not Causality

If someone asked you to plot a graph of the distribution of ice cream sales and shark attacks over a calendar year, you would find something interesting.

Image by Candela Iglesias

Both of them are really low in the beginning of the year, slowly ramp up until sometime in May, and increase sharply for the next two months. After peaking in July, there is a sharp descent until September, then they fall to very low levels for November and December.

Looking at this data, one might think, ‘Wow! I didn’t know ice cream sales and shark attacks were related like this! A more curious mind might even propose some ideas as to the nature of their relationship.

Maybe sharks like ice cream and they come out when more ice cream is available? 😂

Or maybe the stress and trauma from shark attacks leads more people to buy ice cream? 😅

Upon further inspection, none of this holds up.

So what is their relationship?

It turns out both of them peak in the summer. When the weather is hot, more people buy ice cream to cool off. And more people go to the beaches, significantly increasing the likelihood of a shark attack.

This is a fairly common analogy, and I would not be surprised if many of you have read about this previously. But it is an important reminder that A’s close correlation with B does not mean A causes B, or vice versa.

Something related to this happened in my life as well.

When I told a friend that I didn’t get a job offer from a company I interviewed with early in the year, he could not believe it.

‘How can they not hire you? You’re everything they look for! And they basically hire everyone from your school!’

Well, he was right on one thing. I am indeed everything they look for, and it was very much their loss. 😄

But he was missing something. While it is true that company X hires very actively from the school I went to, they do not hire everyone. I found out from another friend (which I have not bothered to confirm) that company X interviews 10 to 12 people per annum from my school for this location, and averagely hire only 2.

Looking from the outside (especially on LinkedIn), it appears that there is a very strong correlation between company X and school Y. And that would be true. But if you go to company X just because you want to get into school Y (or the other way around), then you would be making a big mistake.

Correlation is not causation. Always remember to check for the hidden data.

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If you found this newsletter useful, please share it with your friends. Have them read it and subscribe. I like to share personal stories and life lessons as I learn. They will be super random, but common themes will include business, personal development, human relationships, and Islam.

Gracias, and see you around.

Hameed

** jara content:

فَتَبَسَّمَ ضَاحِكًا مِّن قَوْلِهَا وَقَالَ رَبِّ أَوْزِعْنِي أَنْ أَشْكُرَ نِعْمَتَكَ الَّتِي أَنْعَمْتَ عَلَيَّ وَعَلَى وَالِدَيَّ وَأَنْ أَعْمَلَ صَالِحًا تَرْضَاهُ وَأَدْخِلْنِي بِرَحْمَتِكَ فِي عِبَادِكَ الصَّالِحِينَ 

So [Solomon] smiled, amused at her speech, and said,

“My Lord, enable me to be grateful for Your favor which You have bestowed upon me and upon my parents and to do righteousness of which You approve.

And admit me by Your mercy into [the ranks of] Your righteous servants.”

- 27:19, Sahih International

Have a great week. 💫