In identifying innumerable fallacies that befuddle human reasoning, statisticians have arguably forged the principal tools of modern scholarship. Most scientists have a healthy respect for the statistician's art, even if, in practice, the application of statistics is less than ideal.

By contrast, most humanities scholars, take a dim (and often dismissive) view of statistics. For those of us who employ statistical procedures in humanities scholarship, we daily meet the derision of our colleagues: Isn't "bean counting" antithetical to the very spirit of the humanities enterprise?

In this lecture, I propose to explain why humanities scholars tend to distrust quantitative methods, and propose new directions in statistical research that might better address the concerns. In the process, I will present several examples of statistical problems in the field of music.