Beautiful Evidence by Edward R. Tufte Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Beautiful Evidence
Book Review: Another great book in the series
Summary: 5 Stars
This book is again an excellent production and is a must-have. The thing that amazes me is how a change in one's perspective of representing data can suddenly give life to a string of numbers. for example, in an excellent chapter on highlighting how PowerPoint can be misused, most people use artificial ways to make their data more interesting. however, Tufte's continually exhorts us, and shows us, how to use the data itself to uncover the mystery that lies therein - ultimately a much more powerful way to present evidence.
It's hard to find a flaw in a book such as this. But, if I were forced to, then my response would be that there are just a tad too many examples of "how not to represent data."
Book Review: Beautiful Evidence
Summary: 5 Stars
This book should be reviewed by anyone who writes reports or gives presentations. I especially like the author's views on corruption of data and facts.Book Review: Beautiful Evidence
Summary: 2 Stars
While a Tufte fan for 10 years, this seemed to be a rehash of the same...was expecting more visuals...I bought this sight unseen--will not do that again from him.Book Review: Beautiful Evidence Review
Summary: 5 Stars
This was a gift so I did not actually see or read the book, but have always been satisfied with Amazon purchases.Book Review: Beautiful Figures, Shallow Words
Summary: 2 Stars
I was disappointed by "Beautiful Evidence". It seems to me to be a medium primarily for the reproduction of many gorgeous drawings, graphs, and tables done by others and the author, and an opportunity to make a rant on PowerPoint. Yes, many bad figures have been created and Dr. Tufte has made valid points and good suggestions, but they are not as densely presented as one would expect from his own words.
One of Dr. Tufte's main theses is a good figure has high information density, yet his text descriptions do not measure up to this standard. They are regularly repetitive or shallow. He even misses an opportunity to take his own advice when he presents the cancer rate data on p. 174 and then re-presents it as a new table on p. 176 in a better format. If he had used the concept he presented through the Bumps chart on p. 56, allowing lines for the cancer types to cross according to the values of the rates so each column is correctly ordered, relationships would have been even clearer.
Although tables can be dense with information, it is the very density that makes them difficult to interpret and understand. A beautiful, but very complex, figure created from all of complex table is not necessarily better at communication even if it is interesting or pleasing to look at. This is why so often figures are made from subsets of tables. The challenge to the presenter is to find what is important in the data and clearly present it.
I often felt attempts were made to find something auspicious to say about a well executed figure when nothing more than the "beauty is apparent" is needed.
Although I don't malign PowerPoint as Dr. Tufte does, I am not enamored of it either. However, faulting the program as he does seems to me akin to faulting a hammer for the bent over nails driven into wood. A better hammer might drive nails more easily, but it is the person wielding the hammer who has the primary controlling effect. Handing out a copy of "The Table of Casualties" to an audience would certainly put more information into their hands, but it will get little into their minds. It is up to the presenter to find a means of communicating the meaningful information to those who couldn't be bothered to study such data. Whether PowerPoint slides or Word reports are used, the presenter must consider the audience and how to get important details into their heads.
Spend time enjoying the figures and know good data presentation is hard.