Tyler Vigen’s Spurious Correlations has been a beloved corner of the internet since 2014, pairing line charts of things like Nicolas Cage film appearances and swimming pool drownings to illustrate, with great affection, why correlation is not causation. The site now has over 25,000 variables to mine for accidental patterns, which is already more than any reasonable person needs.
In early 2024, Vigen added something called Spurious Scholar, and it’s worth a look. For each absurd correlation, the site auto-generates a complete fake academic paper: journal name, abstract, results section, discussion, the works. The paper on American cheese consumption correlating with the popularity of the “This Is Fine” meme ran in The Gouda Gazette. The one on Nicolas Cage movies correlating with TSA screeners in North Dakota was sponsored by the Society for Cinematic Analysis and Theatrical Studies, or SCATS.
The AI-written causal explanations are doing heroic work and seem to know it. One paper notes that its findings “shed light on the offbeat and delightful relationship” between Texas geography teachers and Super Bowl losing scores, then appends a dad joke about maps. It’s the most honest thing a statistics paper has ever done. Have a good weekend.
