Wikipedia talk:Don't draw misleading graphs

Name change

You might consider a shorter name, and broaden the concept to presentation rather than drawing. For example Presenting graphs

Is this pertinent to the Manual of style, where it would cary more weight than an Essay? I would likely support that if we could come to a reasonable concept. --Kevin Murray (talk) 18:26, 14 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Develop and perfect it first as an essay. When it is good enough, then it can be incorporated into the MoS if appropriate.--Srleffler (talk) 20:21, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Follow originals?

Should we have a suggestion to follow scales in graphs used in the reliable sources used for an article? We'd still want to avoid following misleading originals, of which many exist, unless the dispute over the accuracy of the graph is textually discussed in the article. GRBerry 13:28, 16 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A bit odd

The essay makes the point that "0 K is far removed from physically obtainable values" but in the previous example, zero employment in the US is just as implausible as a 0 K day in Boston. In general I think this essay is poor because its excessive focus on the use of zero as the X intercept obscures the actual point. Christopher Parham (talk) 01:18, 18 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Misleading zeros or misleading essay?

In the case of the Mauna Loa CO2 graph -now tagged as misleading- it would actually be more misleading to refer the graph to zero concentration for two reasons:

the natural background level (prior to industrialization) was not zero.
on such a scale it would no longer be possible to see the trend relative to the yearly fluctuations of the concentration.

In a lot of technical and scientific literature, being able to see an effect with respect to the noise level is far more important than absolute scale.

I therefore have trouble with the whole essay, in that the assay is rather misleading itself on such points. Jcwf (talk) 19:59, 20 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]