# Is Nate Silver just in an "I can never be wrong" position. **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [October 30, 2012, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287 "2012-10-30T02:19:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/102 "2012-10-31T16:18:31Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > In sum, NS seems to be doing a very thorough job and he adds a lot to the field (& I agree that most of the criticism he currently receives is sour grapes from conservatives), but while I suspect that his model is more accurate than just averaging polls or educated guesses from political junkies or the like, I think the verdict is very much out at this time. > [@GIGObuster](#): > > The verdict is much out? I suspect that Mr. **-Phipps** meant to say “the _jury_ is very much out,” thus implying that events may prove Mr. Silver’s forecast to have been in error (whereas “the _verdict_ is very much out” can carry an implication that Mr. Silver has called the election for Obama, and will be proven wrong – particularly if one drops the “very”). Mr. **-Phipps** , please correct me if I am mistaken. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/103 "2012-10-31T17:24:38Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > I suspect that Mr. **-Phipps** meant to say “the _jury_ is very much out,” thus implying that events may prove Mr. Silver’s forecast to have been in error (whereas “the _verdict_ is very much out” can carry an implication that Mr. Silver has called the election for Obama, and will be proven wrong – particularly if one drops the “very”). > Mr. **-Phipps** , please correct me if I am mistaken. Maybe, but that was also granted, Romney can still win, what I noticed in that post from \*\*Phipps \*\*was the affirmation that what silver is doing is mostly a “black box” when there is plenty of evidence to show what he has done. IIUC what some are demanding from Silver is a little bit like demanding that he has to give the store away. It is like affirming that there is no evidence that the makers of the famed Damascus steel never produced some of the best steel weapons of their day, when there is plenty of practical evidence that the things worked as the old warriors claimed and the sword makers of the day did show the general way they did them, but the sword makers of Damascus knew that they should not reveal all the secrets of their craft. That logical limitation at hand, it is however clear that there is a lot one can check that Nate is doing properly, when NS investigated the odd data (and he realized it was odd thanks to his background) coming from Research 2000 others did check and confirmed the oddities and Research 2000 fell on its face because they could not explain properly when and how they did the specific data collection, pointing to fraud. In this case what Silver and others demanded was hardly a trade secret, so I do point out that affirming that NS methods are like a black box is leaving a lot of context out. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/104 "2012-10-31T18:08:29Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > I suspect that Mr. **-Phipps** meant to say “the _jury_ is very much out,” thus implying that events may prove Mr. Silver’s forecast to have been in error (whereas “the _verdict_ is very much out” can carry an implication that Mr. Silver has called the election for Obama, and will be proven wrong – particularly if one drops the “very”). > > Mr. **-Phipps** , please correct me if I am mistaken. I may have used the wrong term - what I meant was that the jury is still out. But I didn’t mean the jury verdict about Silver’s 2012 election call specifically. (As noted, I don’t think his model will been shown to be valueless simply by Romney winning, or validated by Obama winning). I meant the jury verdict as to the value of Silver’s model in general. IMO the tract record of this model is too short, and too little is known of the nitty gritty details of the model, for it to be validated or rejected at this time. That would have to wait for a longer track record and/or a more in depth analysis of the methodology and assumptions. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/105 "2012-10-31T22:42:24Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > he was very close in 2010. Within 1 Senate seat > [@Enginerd](#): > > Silver also predicted 34/36 2010 Senate races correctly > [@WickedJay](#): > > Silver correctly got all the Senate races but three. Which was it? And how can we pretend to have a serious discussion about Nate Silver’s predictions when we can’t even agree on the most fundamental facts about them? > [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > Also a significant point is that some of the accurate predictions that NS made - alond with all other posters - are really no big deal and shouldn’t count in the W column. If a modeler or pollster gets 49 of 50 states correct (as NS did in 2008) that’s pretty good, but not as good as it may appear. The vast majority of these results are not all that close, and most of the remaining ones could prbably be accurately predicted based on cruder methods. **The only way to rate a pollster or modeler is how much of an increase in accuracy his polls or models provide** , and I don’t see this being done, at least in Silver’s case. This. Despite NS’s snarky reply, is it true that RCP also was correct about 49/50 states in '08? If so, why should I believe him over RCP? > [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > What seems to me to be the bigger GIGO issue is that his model seems very much to be a black box. He describes in very general terms what he is doing. He says the model accounts for this and it accounts for that, but he doesn’t describe precisely how it accounts for these things, and his assumptions in general - and their basis - are very unclear. Agreed, another example is the way he adjusts polls after a convention. He has an “average convention bounce” assumption in his model. I can’t remember the exact figure, but it’s not important to my point. If you took the average convention bounce in the last 3 elections, it’d be different than if your average stretched back to the last 10 elections. Which one NS uses, and the reasons for his decision, are relevant and will affect the accuracy of his model, and they’re also largely a mystery, as you noted. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/106 "2012-10-31T22:44:39Z")
RCP is also predicting an Obama re-election. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/107 "2012-10-31T22:54:07Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Which was it? And how can we pretend to have a serious discussion about Nate Silver’s predictions when we can’t even agree on the most fundamental facts about them? I think I might have been wrong before about missing just one. According to [this](http://www.pacificnorthwestcoastbias.com/grading-nate-silvers-election-predictions/), he missed 3 Senate seats (not surprisingly, ones he had assigned a lower confidence level to). ---
**Author:** ![regginbrow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ba9def/32.png) [@regginbrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/regginbrow)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/108 "2012-10-31T22:57:39Z")
The convention bounce is only temporary, and resolves itself after a week or two. He penalizes each candidate by a set amount after their conventions, a penalty which slowly goes to zero. It has no effect on the final projection results, i.e. his actual forecast before the election, which means it’s semi-useless in my opinion, but it does theoretically give an idea of what a candidate’s ‘true’ support is during the weeks immediately after their convention. Also, a better way to measure his and RCP’s accuracy is by what % of votes each candidate was forecasted to receive, versus actual. I don’t have that readily available, but I believe that 538 was appreciably more accurate than any of his competitors. This is far better, because 538 isn’t projecting who will win a given election, but rather forecasting election results for each race. If he forecasts ten candidates to have a 70% probability of winning, then you would expect three of them to actually lose. If none of them do, then he likely forecasted too high for these candidates, which reduces his accuracy. He isn’t ‘calling states’ like every other mainstream election predictor out there. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/109 "2012-10-31T22:58:37Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > This. Despite NS’s snarky reply, is it true that RCP also was correct about 49/50 states in '08? If so, why should I believe him over RCP? You shouldn’t necessarily and no one has indicated otherwise. Are Silver and RCP in major disagreement? Minor disagreement? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/110 "2012-10-31T23:25:59Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > You shouldn’t necessarily and no one has indicated otherwise. > > Are Silver and RCP in major disagreement? Minor disagreement? Current [RCP prediction no toss ups](http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/2012_elections_electoral_college_map_no_toss_ups.html) 290 Obama. [538’s mean prediction](http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/) 299. So no not major electoral disagreement. Is that even minor? Popular vote RCP calls “tie” right now while 538 calls it close, ranging day to day from 1.5 to 2% Obama. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2012, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/111 "2012-10-31T23:46:52Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > Current [RCP prediction no toss ups](http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/2012_elections_electoral_college_map_no_toss_ups.html) 290 Obama. [538’s mean prediction](http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/) 299. So no not major electoral disagreement. Is that even minor? > > Popular vote RCP calls “tie” right now while 538 calls it close, ranging day to day from 1.5 to 2% Obama. I suspected as much but was too lazy to look it up. Thank you very much. So I guess one can equally trust or distrust both of them. ---
**Author:** ![Enginerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bcef8e/32.png) [@Enginerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enginerd)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/112 "2012-11-01T00:48:05Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I think I might have been wrong before about missing just one. According to [this](http://www.pacificnorthwestcoastbias.com/grading-nate-silvers-election-predictions/), he missed 3 Senate seats (not surprisingly, ones he had assigned a lower confidence level to). He missed 2, not 3. That site has Alaska attributed incorrectly to the Dems - it took a while after the election for everything to be counted, but Lisa Murkowski (R) eventually won the seat. [Here’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FiveThirtyEight#U.S._Senate) a recap of Silver’s results for that year, and you can compare it to the actual election [here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_elections,_2010) (note the red Alaska). ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/113 "2012-11-01T04:05:11Z")
> [@Enginerd](#): > > He missed 2, not 3. That site has Alaska attributed incorrectly to the Dems - it took a while after the election for everything to be counted, but Lisa Murkowski (R) eventually won the seat. [Here’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FiveThirtyEight#U.S._Senate) a recap of Silver’s results for that year, and you can compare it to the actual election [here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_elections,_2010) (note the red Alaska). Your first cite says Nate Silver predicted a win by Joe Miller, the Tea Party backed Republican who won the Republican primary. But it was won by Lisa Murkowski, who was the incumbent was not on the ballot and ran as a write-in candidate. Nate was right about a Republican winning the seat, but chose the wrong Republican. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/114 "2012-11-01T04:41:18Z")
> [@Jas09](#): > > That may be true in a world where there were good pollsters and bad pollsters and the good pollsters only put out good polls and the bad pollsters only put out bad polls. (In this I mean “good” and “bad” to mean something tied to accuracy and bias). > > But the reality is that good pollsters sometimes put out bad polls - it’s just part of the job. And, conversely, sometimes bad pollsters will put out good polls. The worst posters -those who fabricate their data- never put out good polls. They might happen to be accurate by chance (though we would never know), but they never add information. In contrast, systematically biased polls can add value provided you attach an adjustment factor. Polls with small sample sizes can also add value, though they should be weighted less. These are the sorts of things Nate does. He’s not working any miracles and someday I expect him to have many more competitors. For the present he is providing a valuable service for the reality based community. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Dord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3be4f8/32.png) [@The\_Dord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Dord)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/115 "2012-11-01T06:55:25Z")
> [@astro](#): > > Nate Silver is [a limp wristed queer](http://www.allvoices.com/news/13276576-dont-listen-to-nate-silvers-gay-polls-says-superstar-conservative-pollster). You can ignore his faggoty polls. Why the gay hate? ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/116 "2012-11-01T12:18:39Z")
> [@The\_Dord](#): > > Why the gay hate? From **astro**? Because it’s a satirical reference to what Dean Chambers said (see the link) and not meant seriously. From Dean Chambers? Because he’s an asshole. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/117 "2012-11-01T12:26:49Z")
Actually I take that back. Chambers didn’t mean to imply that Silver was gay when he said this: > [@](#): > > Nate Silver is a man of very small stature, a thin and effeminate man with a soft-sounding voice that sounds almost exactly like the ‘Mr. New Castrati’ voice used by Rush Limbaugh on his program.“In fact, Silver could easily be the poster child for the New Castrati in both image and sound. He just meant that he’s [subservient to women and liberals, and he also has no testicles](http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/10/27/conservative-pollster-nate-silver-is-wrong-because-he-is-thin-and-effeminate/). A compelling rebuttal of Silver’s statistical analytical model, you must agree. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/118 "2012-11-01T12:40:06Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > Actually I take that back. Chambers didn’t mean to imply that Silver was gay I agree he didn’t imply it. That’s some blunt, disgusting, old-fashioned gay bashing right there. ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/119 "2012-11-01T12:40:50Z")
> [@The\_Dord](#): > > Why the gay hate? It’s sarcasm, implying that the objections conservatives have to Nate Silver has little to do with the validity or reliability or his model and rather to do with ideology. I suppose “disproving” the effectiveness of Silver’s model is quite difficult. One of the components of experimental science is that following the same procedure one should receive similar (not different to a statistically significant degree) results. That may be why assigning a prediction interval to a one off event is so tricky - as rigorous as a model is, the conditions of any one election can not be replicated (or reproduced, as Drummond would have us say). Neither can one eliminate problematic variables. I hope that’s accurate anyway - I have had lectures on statistics, but I have learned quite a bit from this thread and would be glad for corrections. ---
**Author:** ![Enginerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bcef8e/32.png) [@Enginerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enginerd)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/120 "2012-11-01T13:52:11Z")
> [@scr4](#): > > Your first cite says Nate Silver predicted a win by Joe Miller, the Tea Party backed Republican who won the Republican primary. But it was won by Lisa Murkowski, who was the incumbent was not on the ballot and ran as a write-in candidate. Nate was right about a Republican winning the seat, but chose the wrong Republican. Yep. my mistake - that race was still undecided the day after election day and I somehow decided to neglect it in the numbers (34/36, instead of 34/37), despite a decision having been reached two years ago. No good reason to do that, and I’m not sure why I did. Sorry! ---
**Author:** ![CJJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecc23a/32.png) [@CJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CJJ)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2012, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287/121 "2012-11-01T15:32:46Z")
Gang, the GOP routinely denies the existence of global warming, favors biblical creationism over scientific evolution, distrusts vaccines (especially when they have something to do with sex, such as HPV), and thinks God is creating hurricanes to punish us for allowing homosexuality. They have a history of not allowing science to interfere with their antiquated world-view. In this context, I am not at all surprised the right is attacking Nate Silver; if this were 300 years ago, they would be putting him on trial for being a sorcerer and burning his demonic, future-predicting scrolls. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nate-silver-just-in-an-i-can-never-be-wrong-position/639287.md?page=7)