• Vagaries of human behavior to cold numerical probabilities. Who among us wants to describe ourselves as “typical”? If, for instance, you added up all the women and men on the planet, you would find that, on average, the typical adult human being has one breast and one testicle—and yet how many people fit that description? If your loved one was killed in a drunk-driving accident, what comfort is there in knowing that walking drunk is more dangerous? If you are the young Indian bride who is brutalized by her husband, what cheer can be had from learning that cable TV has empowered the typical Indian bride?
• In a complex world where people can be atypical in an infinite number of ways, there is great value in discovering the baseline. And knowing what happens on average is a good place to start.
• So for a moment, instead of thinking about poor Jessie Arbogast and the tragedy he and his family faced, think of this: in a world with more than 6 billion people, only 4 of them died in 2001 from shark attacks. More people are probably run over each year by TV news vans.
• Most of the stories fall into one of two categories: things you always thought you knew but didn’t; and things you never knew you wanted to know but do.

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything