Op-Ed: Prince, David Bowie and patterns in celebrity deaths — a numbers guy figures, what are the odds?

Before it was Prince, it was David Bowe and Alan Rickman — do celebrities really die in threes? Then what about Gary Shandling and Merle Haggard? We humans see patterns even when there are none, and the Internet, with its masses of debunking data, also makes it easier to cook the books on urban myths and superstitions. That’s where Pomona College economics professor and numbers mythbuster Gary Smith steps in.

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For a transcript of this interview, click here.

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