Many readers may be feeling that they need to wear tin-foil hats following the recent BBC Panorama “exposé” of Wi-Fi and the supposedly harmful effects on the brains of children caused by installing wireless networks in schools. All I can say in reassurance is that this sort of mathematically dysfunctional, scare-mongering drivel really makes me cross.

The programme started off by shooting itself in the foot when it admitted that half of the reported experiments showed an effect and the other half didn’t. However, the presenters bravely soldiered on with the disdain for statistical concepts that has become customary in recent years. The only person on the programme who knew what he was talking about was a World Health Organisation (WHO) scientist, who patiently tried to explain the science. This was too much for the reporter, who tried to discredit the WHO scientist by pointing to his associations with industry, although it seemed a far greater crime was daring to disagree with the programme.

This is how this sort of nonsense works. Suppose I am a Panorama reporter and I believe that the tossing of coins is influenced by the presence of invisible UFOs. I arrange for 1,000 reputable scientists around the world to toss a coin 100 times each. If heads turns up more than 60 times, then I will assert that there is an obvious effect due to the UFOs; 3/5 sounds perfectly convincing. The probability of this happening by chance is about 0.0287. In other words, if 1,000 people do this, then on average about 29 people will report more than 60 heads, and one of them may report 70 heads or more.

Then in a masterstroke, I interview three of the 29 who will report an effect, and I can build up a story that the government really should do something about invisible UFOs. To provide balance, I will also interview one scientist who didn’t note the effect, but I will accuse him or her of being an alien.

In the Wi-Fi programme, Panorama asserted that Wi-Fi in schools posed a risk to children. The fact that the WHO has found no statistically significant evidence to support this claim cut no ice with our Panorama reporter, who no doubt is now working on a programme to implicate fairies in house subsidence.

My book of the month is Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and its Consequences by John Allen Paulos, a real mathematician. I suggest the Panorama team read it before inflicting any more of this nonsense on us.