CHEESE CONSUMPTION AND DEADLY BEDSHEETS. Tyler Cowen at the Marginal Revolution blog links to a website devoted to spurious correlations. The website says that the server attempts to find a new correlation every 60 seconds. Here are some examples.
The first shows a correlation of 0.992082 between US spending on science, space, and technology and suicides by hanging, strangulation and suffocation.
Another shows a correlation of 0.947091 between per capita consumption of cheese (US) and the number of people who died by becoming tangled in their bedsheets.
That’s simultaneously hysterical and almost disturbing. I like how consumption of margarine correlates with starving to death.