Raspberries and Nuclear Warheads
October 20, 2013 4:44 PM   Subscribe

 
So I guess either quite a few countries do not lead the world in anything in particular, or else "a whole bunch of countries" is the same as "each country." Also, when the map indicates that Lesotho leads the world in mortality, does the mean it is higher than the 1 per 1 elsewhere?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 4:50 PM on October 20, 2013 [3 favorites]


So the US has Noble Prize Laureates, but we all manage to kill ourselves with lawnmowers. Sounds about right.
posted by lineofsight at 4:54 PM on October 20, 2013 [1 favorite]


I assume Burma changed its name to Myanmar just so that achievement wouldn't look quite so half-assed.
posted by ckape at 5:34 PM on October 20, 2013 [1 favorite]


So, business idea. An airline and associated dating website connecting Estonia with the United Arab Emirates. Cannot fail.
posted by Wordshore at 5:47 PM on October 20, 2013


Well, they've certainly got themselves into the news a lot lately.
posted by Artw at 6:03 PM on October 20, 2013


Richochet biscuit, yeah, no. Adult mortality is expressed as annual deaths per 1000 adults. WHO uses a more specific definition (probability of dying between ages 15 and 60 per 1000 population), under which Lesotho is #1 with a probability of 552/1000. WHO's interactive map here. WHO's overall age-standardized death rate (per 100,000 population) puts Sierra Leone at number one (2,644/100K) and Lesotho second (1987/100K).
Sierra Leone also leads for under-5 mortality (number of deaths before age 5 years/1000 live births) at 182/1000. (Data here.) (They're doing better than they were in 1990, though. 257/1000.) Longest life expectancy is Japan, at 83 years, and shortest is - as you would expect from a country that loses nearly a fifth of its population in early childhood - Sierra Leone again at 47 years.
Maternal mortality? Sierra Leone gets a break, finally, losing "only" 890 mothers per 100,000 live births, and Chad leads with 1,100/100,000 (why the cartographer didn't go with that instead of "conserving electricity", I can't imagine).
posted by gingerest at 6:16 PM on October 20, 2013 [2 favorites]


For instance, the claim that the UK leads the world in fascist movements is based on the number (not size, influence, power, popularity etc.) of UK fascist movement organizations that are on this Wikipedia list page, which goes from the 1920s to present day. This might be the result of a high degree of fragmentation amongst British fascist groups (the success of the Nazi party in 1930s Germany meant that there was *much less* fragmentation on the German far right because the Nazis aimed to have a dominant monopoly of power including vs. other fascist groups) , or it might just mean a particularly dedicated UK Wikipedia editor specializing in this area.

Keresaspa.

These kinds of maps either rest on unsound statistics or unbound prejudice. The latter is far uglier, thankfully for this example.
posted by Thing at 6:26 PM on October 20, 2013


Well, whatever's funny should probably be a factor.
posted by Artw at 6:29 PM on October 20, 2013 [2 favorites]


Sadly that's often a case of the latter. And when it's people from the US deciding what's funny about other countries, we get the umpteenth iteration on LOLJapanSEX and Drunken Russians, the modern day equivalent of accusing people of being cannibals. As I said, happily this map falls in the dodgy statistics category.
posted by Thing at 6:49 PM on October 20, 2013


so, evidently panama leads the world in "being defenseless" because it doesn't have a military. a rather uncharitable interpretation.
posted by maximum sensing at 6:54 PM on October 20, 2013


p.s. i am panamanian and i have a black belt in karate, so suck on that
posted by maximum sensing at 6:54 PM on October 20, 2013 [5 favorites]


Iceland: "Internet penetration." Well, Iceland, I'm not sure whether to congratulate you on your infrastructure or to look you up on xvideos...
posted by FreelanceBureaucrat at 6:56 PM on October 20, 2013 [1 favorite]


Also, when the map indicates that Lesotho leads the world in mortality, does the mean it is higher than the 1 per 1 elsewhere?

No. That is a mistake. The actual thing Lesotho leads the world in is counterintuitive denonymns. The singular is Mosotho the plural is Basotho. Crazy Basotho.
posted by vorpal bunny at 9:36 PM on October 20, 2013 [3 favorites]


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