Let’s suppose that:
of students who study Chinese are artistic and love poetry. of students who study Business are artistic and love poetry, and- Only about
of students study Chinese, whereas about of students study Business.
Thus, out of every
So if a student is artistic and loves poetry, it’s
So much for preconceptions (and “correlation”).
More starkly:
40% of Spice Girls are called Melanie.
0.2% of English-speaking girls are called Melanie (roughly).
But if you bump into someone called Melanie in the street, the odds are pretty good that she’s not a Spice Girl.