Lies, damned lies and zombies

io9.com published a couple of weeks ago this cute little chart that attempts to correlate spikes in the production of zombie movies with “war and social upheaval”:

See anything odd? No? What about the values on the Y axis?

According to the chart, in 2006, at the height of zombie-movie production, 34 zombie movies were produced. One suspects that this sample size is just not big enough to draw any sound statistical correlation between zombie movie production and anything else. But it makes for cute graphics, so who am I to complain?

Funny, too, that the Sputnik launch is considered a time of “social upheaval,” since it was a “foreign military development”. I am guessing my parents and a few other million non-American folks disagree.

(found via Freakonomics)