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> The amount of gaslighting I got from FiveThirtyEight readers about how Kamala wasn't guaranteed to win was astronomical. I can't find any way to read this ot

> The amount of gaslighting I got from FiveThirtyEight readers about how Kamala wasn't guaranteed to win was astronomical. I can't find any way to read this other than that you think that Kamala was guaranteed to win, and are still angry that someone told you otherwise?

mandolingual 2y ago
From what I recall the main narrative was "it's neck and neck but we could be a single polling misstep from a blowout in either direction" which is about as safe a stance as you can take (understandable considering the blowback they got previously).
- PaulHoule 2y ago
  More to the point the polls do not predict who wins the election because the election is won by the electoral college, not by the popular vote. Even if you got the popular vote exact you still couldn't predict the election accurately. What you have to do is simulate all the states and DC and run a monte carlo simulation and you will always get an equivocal answer if you do that.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > polls do not predict who wins the election because the election is won by the electoral college, not by the popular vote Which is why any model worth its salt only uses national polls to predict state results. (State polls are more meaningful. But the headlines they generate aren't as nationally clickable.)
    - PaulHoule 2y ago
      Unfortunately there are too many states and not enough polls to make a model based on state-level polls so you have to infer state-level results based on something other than state-level polls.
      - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
        > there are too many states and not enough polls to make a model based on state-level polls There aren’t that may states. You don’t need partisan polling in Vermont and Wyoming, for example. > you have to infer state-level results based on something other than state-level polls Yes. As I said. That is what you use national polls. “But the electoral college” isn’t a valid argument against election models. The reality is paucity of granular data and complexity of predicting swing states.
TeaBrain 2y ago
I think they probably meant the opposite. There's an statistics-illiterate subreddit for FiveThirtyEight, which largely refused to believe any poll that said that Kamala was going to lose, and heavily pushed any poll that reinforced the idea that Kamala would come out ahead.
- techpineapple 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - TeaBrain 2y ago
    Thanks for catching that. Amusingly, it looks like we did make the same mistake. Completely unintentional on my part, but I've fixed it now. That first mentioned of "win" was meant to be "lose".

mandolingual 2y ago

From what I recall the main narrative was "it's neck and neck but we could be a single polling misstep from a blowout in either direction" which is about as safe a stance as you can take (understandable considering the blowback they got previously).

PaulHoule 2y ago
More to the point the polls do not predict who wins the election because the election is won by the electoral college, not by the popular vote. Even if you got the popular vote exact you still couldn't predict the election accurately. What you have to do is simulate all the states and DC and run a monte carlo simulation and you will always get an equivocal answer if you do that.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > polls do not predict who wins the election because the election is won by the electoral college, not by the popular vote Which is why any model worth its salt only uses national polls to predict state results. (State polls are more meaningful. But the headlines they generate aren't as nationally clickable.)
  - PaulHoule 2y ago
    Unfortunately there are too many states and not enough polls to make a model based on state-level polls so you have to infer state-level results based on something other than state-level polls.
    - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
      > there are too many states and not enough polls to make a model based on state-level polls There aren’t that may states. You don’t need partisan polling in Vermont and Wyoming, for example. > you have to infer state-level results based on something other than state-level polls Yes. As I said. That is what you use national polls. “But the electoral college” isn’t a valid argument against election models. The reality is paucity of granular data and complexity of predicting swing states.

TeaBrain 2y ago

I think they probably meant the opposite. There's an statistics-illiterate subreddit for FiveThirtyEight, which largely refused to believe any poll that said that Kamala was going to lose, and heavily pushed any poll that reinforced the idea that Kamala would come out ahead.

techpineapple 2y ago
[flagged]
- TeaBrain 2y ago
  Thanks for catching that. Amusingly, it looks like we did make the same mistake. Completely unintentional on my part, but I've fixed it now. That first mentioned of "win" was meant to be "lose".