The Book of Risks : Fascinating Facts About the Chances We Take Everyday
by Larry Laudan
Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours.
Paperback, 221 pages
Published by John Wiley & Sons
Publication date: October 1994
Dimensions (in inches): 0.65 x 9.04 x 6.05
ISBN: 0471310344

From Booklist , 11/15/94:
"A number is sometimes worth a thousand pictures," Laudan--a specialist in philosophy of science, statistical inference, and experimental design, and president-elect of the American Philosophical Association--maintains. The Book of Risks has its share of pictures (mainly charts), but its focus is numbers: the odds, ratios, and percentages that define the relative risks of travel and nontravel accidents, infectious and chronic diseases and conditions, the spectrum of crimes and the wages of sin, nature's cruelty and technology's implacable force. When friends--or the media--insist that a particular behavior or substance is risky or safe, Laudan suggests asking, "Compared to what?" Where Bob Berger's Beating Murphy's Law used the author's fictionalized courtship and marriage as an object lesson in the process of assessing and managing risks, Laudan concentrates on the results of that process. "Too often," his introduction declares, "we end up preparing ourselves for the improbable risk while failing to take precautions against more likely ones." A more rational approach demands common sense plus the kind of perspective-granting facts about chance-taking that Laudan's Book of Risks supplies.
Copyright© 1994, American Library Association. All rights reserved

Synopsis:
Did you know that your chances of dying of rabies this year are less than your chances of being hit by a falling airplane? Guaranteed to pique your curiosity and open your eyes about life's myriad perils, this book takes a lighthearted look at the risks we face every day, providing hours of astonishing information. Sidebars and graphs.

Danger Ahead : The Risks You Really Face on Life's Highway
by Larry Laudan
Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours.
Paperback, 203 pages
Published by John Wiley & Sons
Publication date: September 1997
Dimensions (in inches): 0.61 x 9.75 x 6.07
ISBN: 0471134406

The publisher, John Wiley & Sons :
True or false: We live in especially risky times. Not so, says this delightful, statistics-packed volume that calculates the exact probability of everything from your chance of going bankrupt to getting divorced. The author of the lauded "The Book of Risks" also takes on the Politically Correct Risk and explores why, sometimes, ignorance really is bliss. Filled with fascinating charts, graphs and sidebars that prove its controversial but undeniable facts and logic.