fall of 538

dilbert firestorm's Avatar
The Fall of Nate Silver

https://newrepublic.com/article/155761/fall-nate-silver


His data journalism blog, FiveThirtyEight, is a political website with no politics—or rather, no politics beyond a mute approval of the status quo.
The larger fault here is not with Silver, but in our collective misreading of him. Silver has never ducked from his self-identification as a relatively conservative, markets-loving stats nerd. He came up with the Obama ascendancy, when it was possible to indulge in the delusional belief that wonks in the West Wing and the algo whisperers of Silicon Valley would catapult humanity to a new plane of post-partisan progress.


nate silver, snake oil salesperson???? no kidding..
SpeedRacerXXX's Avatar
Interesting. You do realize that The New Republic is a rather far left publication?

As the article states, 538 predictions are more right than they are wrong. Whereas RealClearPolitics gives ACTUAL poll results, 538 weight the poll results based on their past accuracy. Right or wrong.

The paragraph you took from the article casts him as a conservative, which I never thought about. I do follow his polling information, none of which is his own, and I read what he has to say and I think he has a neutral stance on most issues.
Interesting. You do realize that The New Republic is a rather far left publication?

As the article states, 538 predictions are more right than they are wrong. Whereas RealClearPolitics gives ACTUAL poll results, 538 weight the poll results based on their past accuracy. Right or wrong.

The paragraph you took from the article casts him as a conservative, which I never thought about. I do follow his polling information, none of which is his own, and I read what he has to say and I think he has a neutral stance on most issues. Originally Posted by SpeedRacerXXX
And what people really forget is that nate silver is a numbers and statistics guy. His site was originally far more sports oriented than anything else, but he expanded his analysis to many other areas.

And I agree that for the most part, he is relatively neutral in his politcal bent and relies on analyzing numbers for his statements. I've seen people on both sides of the aisle get pissed when his projections don't match what they believe is going to happen.

He tracked the 2016 election very accurately and even predicted Trumps chance at winning based on the margin of error of all the polls. Few forecasters and pundits were willing to even mention that Trump had a shot based on polling numbers.
dilbert firestorm's Avatar
Interesting. You do realize that The New Republic is a rather far left publication? Originally Posted by SpeedRacerXXX

hmm. I wouldn't know from the way they write their articles.


I've posted articles of lefty viewpoints including radical ones like Jacobin.



I posted this as I thought his was interesting that they pegged nate silver as leaning "conservative". they kind of rapped him for being dishonest about his gambling past.
SpeedRacerXXX's Avatar
hmm. I wouldn't know from the way they write their articles.

I've posted articles of lefty viewpoints including radical ones like Jacobin.

I posted this as I thought his was interesting that they pegged nate silver as leaning "conservative". they kind of rapped him for being dishonest about his gambling past. Originally Posted by dilbert firestorm
Thanks for posting. It was an interesting article.