Baby Names

Upon my desktop this morning was deposited a list of the most popular baby names, researched and produced by the office of national statistics. Now, since the office of national statistics was set up in October 1999, not once have they produced one sound set of statistics. However, I have some advice:

  • 99% of statistics cannot be trusted.
  • Only the statistics that you have made up yourself can truly be relied upon.

The ONS has lists from the past 5 years compiled from another government office, the general register office. These lists are quite interesting, but for the year 2005, here are the top 25 most popular baby names:
Boys

  1. Jack
  2. Joshua
  3. Thomas
  4. James
  5. Oliver
  6. Daniel
  7. Samuel
  8. William
  9. Harry
  10. Joseph
  11. Benjamin
  12. Charlie
  13. Luke
  14. Matthew
  15. Callum
  16. Jake
  17. Ethan
  18. George
  19. Lewis
  20. Alexander
  21. Jacob
  22. Alfie
  23. Mohammed
  24. Dylan
  25. Ryan

This list is not really suprising, many of the names have stayed in similar places over the last five years, and they are all normal names, nothing obscure like “Google” or “Olbanoinglent Fongentula”.
My name, just out of interest has dropped 22 places over the last five years, from 47th in 2001 to 69th in 2005.

The list of girls names is a little more varied and suprising.

  1. Jessica
  2. Emily
  3. Sophie
  4. Olivia
  5. Chloe
  6. Ellie
  7. Grace
  8. Lucy
  9. Charlotte
  10. Katie
  11. Ella
  12. Megan
  13. Hannah
  14. Amelia
  15. Ruby
  16. Lily
  17. Amy
  18. Mia
  19. Abigail
  20. Millie
  21. Molly
  22. Emma
  23. Holly
  24. Leah
  25. Isabella

Again, the names are usual names but they are much more varied. For example, the name “Mia” has gone up and down every year, but has ended up 7 places higher overall than place 25th where it was in 2001.

Anyway, thought you may find that interesting.

There may not be any updates until the new year, so if there aren’t:
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

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