A good statistician knows how to not lie and yet fail to tell the truth. The same holds true for actuaries. The only difference is that a statistician can use data to convince you that what didn’t happen, did, while an actuary, armed with the same data, can convince you that what won’t happen, will.
We worry about extremists like Timothy McVeigh and Osama bin Laden because they blow up buildings. I’m more concerned about an ever-increasing number of people with phenomenal computing skills and not a shred of ethical conviction.
