You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the telling numbers tucked inside the news.
1-in-3,333 chance of winning
Probability of the Texas A&M men’s basketball team coming back from a 12-point deficit against Northern Iowa with 35 seconds left, which is exactly what they did on Sunday. These kids will, for the rest of their life, get to be Han Solo barking “never tell me the odds!” at everyone from their accountant to their bookie to their GPS system. They have earned it. [FiveThirtyEight]
41 percent
Percentage of Americans who believe that climate change will pose a “serious threat” to them in their lifetime, according to Gallup. I suppose the people who still refuse to acknowledge the threat of climate change are teenagers, people in landlocked states like Arizona and Utah, or those weirdos obsessed with cruises and boat trips. [The Guardian]
73 percent
Compared to high school students in the 1980s, teens from 2010 to 2012 were 73 percent more likely to report trouble sleeping. That’s just one example among many — young people today report having far more mental health problems than in past generations. [Quartz]
92 percent
Utah and Arizona vote today, in the first Tuesday in several Tuesdays to not earn a distinctive superlative from folks like me. Trump has a 92 percent chance of winning in Arizona, according to our polls-plus model. Cruz has a 98 percent chance of winning Utah. And we don’t have a forecast for how Democrats in Arizona and Utah will vote because, well, Democrats in Arizona and Utah? We’re not wizards, people. (Seriously, though, it’s because there haven’t been enough polls of Democrats in those states.) [FiveThirtyEight]
$8,250
Cost for a suite during peak season aboard Carnival’s newest cruise to lovely communist Cuba. It will be the first U.S. cruise line to dock in Cuba in over 50 years. [Bloomberg]
£200 million
Cost to construct a polar research vessel to explore the Antarctic. The vessel will no doubt help us understand the complicated and fragile marine ecosystem of a remote part of this beautiful world. Because the Natural Environment Research Council decided to name the vessel based on an internet poll, the ship may, according to current results, end up with the name “RRS Boaty McBoatface.” Full disclosure: Support for this name is right up there with that flamethrower bill Rep. Eliot Engel of New York pitched in January when it comes to this column’s few political stances. [The Independent]
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If you see a significant digit in the wild, send it to @WaltHickey.