Here's a sample of what Wagner will speak about:

Mandatory HIV Testing, Drug-Sniffing Dogs, and the Probative Value of a Cold Hit: The Gospel According to the Rev. Thomas Bayes”

Journalists routinely use the term odds to denote certain ratios that should actually be called probabilities or, more simply, chances. When very small probabilities are involved, the difference between these ratios is slight (example: there is a 1 in 175,223,510 chance (the ratio of favorable cases to total possible cases) of winning the jackpot in Powerball, whereas the odds (the ratio of favorable to unfavorable cases) in favor of winning are 1 to 175,223,509). In general, however, the difference between these ratios can be substantial. While the ratios reported in newspapers and magazines are, almost without exception, probabilities (to the extent that journalists might as well drop the term odds from their professional vocabulary), genuine odds play a crucial role in quantifying the impact of a particular item of evidence on the credibility of claims in areas as disparate as diagnostic testing for HIV, as well as other diseases, detection of illegal drugs by drug-sniffing dogs, and the guilt of an individual based on his or her having a certain DNA or blood-type profile. Remarkably, all of these cases are treated by a simple formula developed by the Rev. Thomas Bayes (1702-1761), an English mathematician and Presbyterian minister.