alt Hacker NewsBut a graph, which provides a view at a certain level of resolution, can often be described in a few consise statements. That's why we make them, to get a view we can condense.
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No, if we can condense something in a few short statements, we don't generally bother making a graph. We exactly make graphs when something is not easily explained in words, but instead requires visualization.
Of course, not all graphs are equally information dense, and some are only used for decorative purposes more than actually conveying information. But in the general case, and especially when used well, graphs convey much more information at a glance than a short text description could.
Many years ago, in college, I used to volunteer for Recording For The Blind, reading various math texts aloud. I had to verbally describe every illustration in the textbook, including graphs, using a few concise statements. Not perfect, but possible.
I feel like it's more that we have statements that are "pointers" to the graph. "According to Figure 1, we see that temperature rises do to pressure." So we can summarise with words, but the intuition and proof comes from the visual medium.