In The News Today...

Quote:

More than 80 researchers from 42 international organizations presented findings that show between 2012 and 2017, Antarctica's ice sheet lost 219 billion tons of ice per year -- triple the rate prior to 2012. Between 1992 and 2017, ice losses in the region contributed to a global sea level rise of 7.6 millimeters, with forty percent of that rise occurring in the last five years alone.

The global research team analyzed 24 satellite-based estimates of Antarctic ice sheet mass to calculate these rates. "We took all the estimates across all the different techniques, and we got this consensus," Isabella Velicogna, a professor at the University of California, Irvine and an author of the study, told the Washington Post. "According to our analysis, there has been a steep increase in ice losses from Antarctica during the past decade, and the continent is causing sea levels to rise faster today than at any time in the past 25 years,"

https://www.engadget.com/2018/06/13/antarctica-losing-ice-increasingly-rapid-rate/

Quote: rxwine

https://www.engadget.com/2018/06/13/antarctica-losing-ice-increasingly-rapid-rate/

So the global warming churches didn't like their stance challenged by NASA and closed ranks before they lost credibility. This would be in response to when the last "the sky is falling in the Antarctic" was disproved by NASA.

"A new NASA study says that an increase in Antarctic snow accumulation that began 10,000 years ago is currently adding enough ice to the continent to outweigh the increased losses from its thinning glaciers.

The research challenges the conclusions of other studies, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) 2013 report, which says that Antarctica is overall losing land ice.

According to the new analysis of satellite data, the Antarctic ice sheet showed a net gain of 112 billion tons of ice a year from 1992 to 2001. That net gain slowed to 82 billion tons of ice per year between 2003 and 2008."

That is from the NASA site and is from 2015. Iice pack levels since then have been relatively stable.

Quote: Wizard

I always think the best political predictor is the betting market. The going odds at Betfair suggest:

GOP majority in Senate: 70.2%
GOP majority in House: 48.3%

According to Betfair: A majority of seats requires either party to win at least 218 of the total 435 House of Representatives seats in contention. Independent or any other party Representatives caucusing with either the Democrats or Republicans will NOT count for the purposes of this market.

As of May 12, 2018 there are 193 Democrats and 235 Republicans and 7 vacancies. Republican previously occupied 5/7 vacant seats, but I know that the 2 vacancies in PA are expected to go Democrat because of the court ordered redistricting.

Pennsylvania 7. Pat Meehan (R), until April 27, 2018
Pennsylvania 15. Charlie Dent (R), until May 12, 2018
Texas 27. Blake Farenthold (R), until April 6, 2018
Oklahoma 1. Jim Bridenstine (R), until April 23, 2018
Ohio 12. Pat Tiberi (R), until January 15, 2018
New York 25. Louise Slaughter (D) until March 16, 2018
Michigan 13. John Conyers (D), until December 5, 2017

In the Senate 24 democratic seats, 9 republican and 2 independents are up for re-election

There are only two Senate seats that could conceivably switch from Republican to Democrat
Nevada Dean Heller (R)
Arizona Jeff Flake (R) (Retiring)

In contrast there are 9 Democratic seats that going to be close races.

Quote: Dalex64

To be fair, a 10% chance of rain means that for any given point within the forecast area, there is a 10% chance of rain.

Okay, I don't dispute that but it is not addressing my point. Let's say a weather forecaster says there is a 10% chance the eye of a hurricane will go over Florida and 90% that it will make a turn and stay over the ocean. It does end up going over Florida. Was the forecaster wrong?

Quote: Wizard

Okay, I don't dispute that but it is not addressing my point. Let's say a weather forecaster says there is a 10% chance the eye of a hurricane will go over Florida and 90% that it will make a turn and stay over the ocean. It does end up going over Florida. Was the forecaster wrong?

No, because he said it could have gone one way or the other.

If a forecaster says there is a "10% chance of rain" what it means is that given temp/barometer/humidity/other conditions it will rain 10% of the time. It is not a guess, it is what has happened over a measured period.

A better example. If I say "there is a 10% chance red will hit on the next roulette spin based on laid bets" and red still comes up, was I wrong? Of course I was! The chances were far more than 10%. Even if everyone was betting black because of whatever reason that did not change the odds.

Betfair bettors will be mostly European and thus naturally lean left. They are just betting what the media is reporting. Plus maybe "a little hope." Really, it is hard to predict until just weeks out for off-year congressional elections. One thing is for sure so far. The Democrats have decided to run on "Impeachment--we'll invent a charge after the election!" How America responds to this will mean a great deal in how it turns out.

Quote: AZDuffman

If a forecaster says there is a "10% chance of rain" what it means is that given temp/barometer/humidity/other conditions it will rain 10% of the time. It is not a guess, it is what has happened over a measured period.

A better example. If I say "there is a 10% chance red will hit on the next roulette spin based on laid bets" and red still comes up, was I wrong? Of course I was! The chances were far more than 10%. Even if everyone was betting black because of whatever reason that did not change the odds.

Thank you. So, if somebody uses the best polling and results from similar elections and determines that Trump has a 10% chance of winning, that does not make the forecaster wrong if Trump wins. The way to judge the forecaster is to look at all the candidates he said had a 10% chance of winning. If close to 10% of them did, that indicates the forecaster is either good or lucky.

Quote: Wizard

Thank you. So, if somebody uses the best polling and results from similar elections and determines that Trump has a 10% chance of winning, that does not make the forecaster wrong if Trump wins. The way to judge the forecaster is to look at all the candidates he said had a 10% chance of winning. If close to 10% of them did, that indicates the forecaster is either good or lucky.

The problem Mike is that your statement has two subjective terms, 'best polling' and 'similar elections'. You will never get agreement among pollsters on what method those terms refer too. In your example if you have a second pollster who says who says that Trump has a 90% chance of winning is he right if Trump wins?

In your example would you agree that he was wrong with that poll? Or do you only look at long term results across multiple predictions to determine if he was right or wrong on that one prediction?

Quote: Wizard

Thank you. So, if somebody uses the best polling and results from similar elections and determines that Trump has a 10% chance of winning, that does not make the forecaster wrong if Trump wins. The way to judge the forecaster is to look at all the candidates he said had a 10% chance of winning. If close to 10% of them did, that indicates the forecaster is either good or lucky.

I am not quite sure how you are using "similar elections." I'll just give you my take.

You need to look at the elections the pollster has predicted. What was his prediction, what were the results, how far was he off? A good pollster will do this themselves. Look at what their prediction for say Hillary was. How far was it off? Then go back. How far off for Romney, Gore, etc. If their raw data say keeps overstating the Democrat by 1%, then they need to adjust down 1% when they make a prediction. More comes into it, and you are about the last person that needs a math model explained, but errors need to be fixed.

This part is no different than if I had an NFL spreadsheet that predicted scores. If I see the result is always off by some similar thing, then I need to adjust my model or go broke.

Back to 10%. Mathematically, you can get a level of confidence. I know it is not an easy thing as I asked about how to do it over a year ago in one of the math groups here and got a collective, "yeah, you can do it, but I need a ton of info to tell you." I needed it to figure out how to tel management we did not need to look at every last field in a spreadsheet. A good pollster should be doing the same. Look at all their models. Figure what the chances of being off by whatever % is, then get a confidence level.

The question is, do they do this? I mostly doubt it. IMHO it is more for TV. "She is ahead 4%, chances of him covering that are 1/10." "She is ahead by 2%, chances of him covering that are 1/3." It is for the news since the average American is math stupid.

"Are they wrong?" We cannot say since we do not run the test 10 times. That weatherman who says there is a 10% chance of rain (actually he is just reading AccuWeather from Penn State) we can count how often he is right. He says 10% chance 10 days in a row, it rains one of those days, he is pretty good. It rains 5 of those days, he needs to move to the sports desk. Sample size would have to be over many years, but that is how to measure.

I guess you could look at all elections and see how often Gallup, Rasmussen, et al are right on calling an upset. 10% chance Mondale wins, 10% Dukakis, 10% Perot, 10% Dole, 10% Gore....... and if they called the upset 1 of 10 times, they are pretty right, even with the small sample size.

Quote: kenarman

So the global warming churches didn't like their stance challenged by NASA and closed ranks before they lost credibility. This would be in response to when the last "the sky is falling in the Antarctic" was disproved by NASA.

The study I cited

Quote:

funded by NASA and ESA (European Space Agency).

https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2749/ramp-up-in-antarctic-ice-loss-speeds-sea-level-rise/

Quote: rxwine

The study I cited



https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2749/ramp-up-in-antarctic-ice-loss-speeds-sea-level-rise/

What a great Nasa site
Been looking all over this site
There is no doubt Global warming is happening