When I'm doing talks about data, particularly averages, I like to use some extreme examples - like taking the average height of Muggsy Bogues and Manute Bol (6'5", google it), the average height of an NBA player (6'7") or wild density metrics (everyone in US moving to Texas) 1/4
the Texas example is a useful reference point (not a policy of mine!) when I'm talking about 'lived density', and the NBA height data serves multiple purposes - including discussions of veracity and 'dodgy data' (it's often inflated) 2/4
then you can get into extreme small area extrapolations - the famous case being Kowloon Walled City of course (this is a very useful 'lived density' metric in many ways 3/4
but the real moral of this story is that the NBA now requires player heights to be listed 'without shoes' (since 2019) and lots of players have 'shrunk' (and some have 'grown' - e.g. Kevin Durant), so my NBA height is no longer 6'7.5" 4/4 https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/26/sports/basketball/nba-height-age.html
actually, the Kowloon example really needs a visual reference to highlight the amazing density in such a small space, so I added a couple of scale lines in metres and feet
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