US Census officials have completed their once-a-decade count of the American population, showing the second slowest growth in recorded history. Texas and Florida, two Republican titans of the Sunbelt, will gain congressional seats, while two Democratic giants, California and New York, are losing political influence. US population growth slows, but some regions boom The census shows the US population currently stands at 331,449,281 - an increase of 7.4% over 2010's count. The number is the slowest since the 1930s during the Great Depression. But some regions are booming: the South grew fastest at 10.2%, the West was second fastest at…

Ian Leslie In 1906, the British statistician and polymath Francis Galton attended a country fair at which the attendees were invited to estimate the weight of an ox. Out of curiosity, Galton borrowed the cards on which the guesses were written, took them home, and ran the numbers. To his surprise, the average of the 787 entries turned out to be almost exactly the precise weight of the animal. It was more accurate than even the individual estimates of butchers and farmers, who presumably had an eye for such things. Galton published his findings in Nature, thus establishing the study…