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by gruez 1055 days ago
>That calculation, which was confirmed by the EPA, came out to 1.3 in 1, meaning every person exposed to it over the course of a full lifetime would be expected to get cancer.

That's not how probabilities work. The average person might be expected to get 1.3 cancers over their lifetime (assuming they don't die early), but that doesn't guarantee that every person exposed to it will get cancer.
1 comments
fatfingerd 1055 days ago
>> exposed to it over the course of a full lifetime would be expected to get cancer

> The average person might be expected to get 1.3 cancers

Same same, expect and guaranteed are only loosely the same in English. The weatherman expects rain.

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gruez 1055 days ago
Your quote missed a few crucial words. The claim was that "every person exposed to it over the course of a full lifetime would be expected to get cancer".

Suppose you get a bunch of people to flip 3 coins. You'd expect the average person to get 1.5 heads, but it would be inaccurate to say "every person would be expected to get heads".

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fatfingerd 1055 days ago
Every person can mean considering each individually. The bigger problem is screening every person for a cancer their doctor should expect.
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