104 books
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5 voters
Phrenology Books
Showing 1-22 of 22

by (shelved 2 times as phrenology)
avg rating 2.39 � 18 ratings � published 1902
![Objections to Phrenology: Being the Substance of a Series of Papers Communicated to the Calcutta ... 1829 [Leather Bound]](https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/book/50x75-a91bf249278a81aabab721ef782c4a74.png)
by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 0.0 � 0 ratings � published

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.59 � 2,766 ratings � published 2022

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.00 � 8 ratings � published 1980

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.00 � 2 ratings � published 1887

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.45 � 1,083 ratings � published 2017

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 4.03 � 29 ratings � published 1976

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.63 � 2,745 ratings � published 2019

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.20 � 1,431 ratings � published 2018

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 4.14 � 15,157 ratings � published 2018

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 4.50 � 115,415 ratings � published 2002

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 4.03 � 42,737 ratings � published 2014

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 4.19 � 787,146 ratings � published 2008

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.72 � 624 ratings � published 2007

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.69 � 9,783 ratings � published 2014

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.36 � 383 ratings � published 2010

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 4.16 � 505 ratings � published 2012

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.60 � 118 ratings � published 2014

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.63 � 17,024 ratings � published 1975

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.78 � 77,442 ratings � published 1853

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.79 � 979 ratings � published 1836

by (shelved 1 time as phrenology)
avg rating 3.55 � 247 ratings � published 2009

“Retrophrenology:
It works like this. Phrenology, as everyone knows, is a way of reading someone's character, aptitude and abilities by examining the bumps and hollows on their head. Therefore - according to the kind of logical thinking that characterizes the Ankh-Morpork mind - it should be possible to mould someone's character by giving them carefully graded bumps in all the right places. You can go into a shop and order an artistic temperament with a tendency to introspection and a side order of hysteria. What you actually get is hit on the head with a selection of different size mallets, but it creates employment and keeps the money in circulation, and that's the main thing.”
― Men at Arms
It works like this. Phrenology, as everyone knows, is a way of reading someone's character, aptitude and abilities by examining the bumps and hollows on their head. Therefore - according to the kind of logical thinking that characterizes the Ankh-Morpork mind - it should be possible to mould someone's character by giving them carefully graded bumps in all the right places. You can go into a shop and order an artistic temperament with a tendency to introspection and a side order of hysteria. What you actually get is hit on the head with a selection of different size mallets, but it creates employment and keeps the money in circulation, and that's the main thing.”
― Men at Arms

“Will those insights be tested, or simply used to justify the status quo and reinforce prejudices? When I consider the sloppy and self-serving ways that companies use data, I'm often reminded of phrenology, a pseudoscience that was briefly the rage in the nineteenth century. Phrenologists would run their fingers over the patient's skull, probing for bumps and indentations. Each one, they thought, was linked to personality traits that existed in twenty-seven regions of the brain. Usually the conclusion of the phrenologist jibed with the observations he made. If the patient was morbidly anxious or suffering from alcoholism, the skull probe would usually find bumps and dips that correlated with that observation - which, in turn, bolstered faith in the science of phrenology. Phrenology was a model that relied on pseudoscientific nonsense to make authoritative pronouncements, and for decades it went untested. Big Data can fall into the same trap. Models like the ones that red-lighted Kyle Behm and black-balled foreign medical students and St. George's can lock people out, even when the "science" inside them is little more than a bundle of untested assumptions.”
― Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy
― Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy