brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
Yep; think folk would be well advised to remember that it's the old fuckers that bother voting.
The 2024 UK General Election - news, speculation and updates
- Thread starter chilango
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Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
The libraries of the houses of Parliament would be worth saving
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
I * think * it's because their deprivation is classified as this
Fraction of households which are classed as deprived on one or more of the following four indicators: employment (unemployed or long-term sick); education (no good GCSE); health and disability (bad health or long-term problem); and housing (overcrowded, shared or no central heating).
So you can be ABC1 but with bad health or long term health problem, which makes you deprived. If I'm reading it right. However, I am highly skeptical of the whole site. I found it messy. And it conveniently asks you to pay 'shop online!' if you want more detailed info on your area.
People are paying too much attention to electoral calculus. But it must be science right coz it's got the word calculus in it.
andysays
Love and solidarity
cupid_stunt
Chief seagull hater & farmerbarleymow's nemesis.
They did well predicting the overall result of the GE 2019, which would suggest they were as accurate as possible at seat levels.
UK General Election December 2019
www.electoralcalculus.co.uk
PTK
Paul Kegan
It can never be proved or disproved what the "chance" is of a party winning a particular constituency.
This is a classical view of probability that is well out of date. Modern theory views probability as a statement about knowledge, not about what the universe would actually do if it were rerun 1000 times. If the universe were rerun 1000 times, you’d still get the same result every time, because conditions would be identical. When we say that the Liberals have a 40% change of winning, it’s a statement about the state of knowledge we currently have and our observations about what that state of knowledge tends to be associated with. This model says that demographics that look like this combined with the current state of responses to specific questions tends to be associated with particular types of voting, and that model allows us to make a prediction that can be couched in terms of what we call “probability”.
PTK
Paul Kegan
It is a meaningless figure, because we can not prove if it is true or false. What does a 40% chance of winning mean?
We don’t attempt to “prove” it is true or false. We use large historic data sets to regress the logistic transformation of the response variable against a function of the linear combination of input variables. We can use inferential statistics to derive information about the certainty of our position from the deviations in the dataset between response and input variables.
If you don’t like this approach then I suggest you take it up with, well, science.
The probabilities reflect the parameter uncertainty that is inherent to the model fit, as well as the process uncertainty for what actually happens. A slightly different parameter fit might produce a prediction that is closer still to a Labour victory, and then the reality on the ground could tip it over the edge. The modelling approach assesses the overall probability of all that as being 20%.
This modelling approach is definitely by far and away the best way to predict the election in theory. The biggest problem with it is that you need tens of thousands of data points and time to process the data, by which time your predictions may already be out of date. It’s a rapidly evolving feast and the probabilities next month may look very different to their position right now. But that doesn’t mean that the model is inaccurate for a given data set.
PTK
Paul Kegan
Well, if you cannot prove it, then it ain't science.
Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
I’m in a new constituency which will go from Quite Labour to Very Very Labour, so won’t be voting for them. Will decide between whichever People’s Front Of Judea or Judean People’s Front is standing on the day
Rob Ray
Weight is meaningless
Of course he does. First you take your proof to the Grand Arbiter in his lair under the Champs Elysee, and if your work passes muster you are allowed entry into the tomb of the Sphinx, where a themed riddle will be posed. If you correctly deduce the answer your wisdom is officially added to the Hall of Facts, where it sits forever bathed in the glorious light of the Golden Knowledge Tree, and can be repeated on Urban without issue.
Newton Abbot has a history of going Lib Dem when the tories are struggling, I think, though I’m not sure how much the Lib Dem wipe out has changed that. Strikes me it could be the sort of seat where Labour and lib dem votes could cancel each other out unless there’s some kind of arrangement.
I find the Tory MP to be fairly anonymous.
The council are Lib Dem I think but not sure if that helps their chances at a Westminster election or not.
I find the Tory MP to be fairly anonymous.
The council are Lib Dem I think but not sure if that helps their chances at a Westminster election or not.
PTK
Paul Kegan
What is the chance of a scone falling on my head while I am walking across the South Downs? It is not possible to assign a probability to a unique event. To say the Liberal Democrats have 40% chance of winning a constituency is a meaningless assertion. It is not true. You cannot prove that it is true. We should not believe in entities that cannot be proven to exist.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
They're ok. But they're not as good as me and Knotted
May I remind you of this thread for predictions on the 2019 Election.
GE19:The Sir John Curtis Urban Pollster: Seat Predictions
Who is Urban's equal to Sir John Curtis? Predict the number of seats for each of the 4 main parties: Con, Lab, Lib, SNP. You start with 1000 points. You lose a point for each prediction above or below seats won. Person with highest points wins. Entries close 9.59pm or before any fancy...
www.urban75.net
The results of which were here.
Electoral calculus would have come 3rd, with a score of 955.
I'll trust my own instincts. And we must repeat that thread this time around.
Statistically speaking, I would expect the best model to be beaten in a single event by some random outliers. Because that’s how outliers work. Over time, however, I would be amazed if any individual could consistently beat it.They're ok. But they're not as good as me and Knotted
May I remind you of this thread for predictions on the 2019 Election.
The results of which were here.GE19:The Sir John Curtis Urban Pollster: Seat Predictions
Who is Urban's equal to Sir John Curtis? Predict the number of seats for each of the 4 main parties: Con, Lab, Lib, SNP. You start with 1000 points. You lose a point for each prediction above or below seats won. Person with highest points wins. Entries close 9.59pm or before any fancy...
Electoral calculus would have come 3rd, with a score of 955.
I'll trust my own instincts. And we must repeat that thread this time around.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
I'm consistently good at it. I don't bet much. At all. But I've won a fair bit at elections. And been right about others when I haven't bet (I still grimace at missing out by not having a bet against Kinnock when everyone thought he would win - 'alright!').
I’m sure you are good at it. You’re a very knowledgeable chap. I’m betting that the model is consistently good at it too. And in this one test, you outscored the model by 0.9% (with the model using an older dataset than you, of course). Can you repeatedly outscore it by 0.9%? If so, the model authors need to include whatever factor you’re using that is currently out of scope of their model. And then the model will be better than you.
PTK
Paul Kegan
Labour has supposedly an 80% chance of winning Hertford and Stortford?
That is a load of bollocks.
Prediction: LAB
See overview of other seats in Anglia.
That is a load of bollocks.
Hertford and Stortford: Overview
Prediction: LAB
| Implied MP at 2019: | Julie Marson (CON) |
| County/Area: | Hertfordshire (Anglia) |
| Electorate: | 74,993 |
| Implied Turnout 2019: | 73.5% |
| Predicted Turnout: | 69.3% |
| Party | 2019 Votes | 2019 Share | Pred Votes |
|---|---|---|---|
| CON | 30,695 | 55.7% | 30.3% |
| LAB | 13,205 | 24.0% | 43.1% |
| LIB | 7,815 | 14.2% | 7.3% |
| Green | 2,533 | 4.6% | 11.4% |
| OTH | 867 | 1.6% | 0.2% |
| Reform | 0 | 0.0% | 7.7% |
| CON Majority | 17,490 | 31.7% | 12.8% Pred Maj |
See overview of other seats in Anglia.
| Chance of winning | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| CON |
| ||
| LAB |
| ||
| LIB |
| ||
| Green |
| ||
| OTH |
| ||
| Reform |
|
andysays
Love and solidarity
To someone like me, with a good understanding of the traditional way these things have been measured and communicated (essentially giving a poll result plus a margin of error), the combination of the data table you've posted and the words you've used don't really make it clear what they and you are on about (I'm not suggesting this is your fault, just making an observation).
If the "chance of winning" is to be genuinely meaningful to me, I need to have some idea of how that figure was arrived at.
Is it a poll, is it a projection from previous polls or is it something else and if so, what? And how have they gone from predicted vote share to "chance of winning"? The people who've come up with this figure haven't bothered to include that (or at least the stuff you've posted doesn't include it), so it's not meaningful to me.
In the absence of that explanation, I personally, and I suspect many others in a similar position to me, would find it much more helpful to have the information presented in the traditional way, from which I can deduce my own idea of the chance of a particular party winning.
No.
Not really
Yes. It uses a methodology that is used a lot across biological and social sciences. You hypothesise a big, complex mathematical description of a response variable (in this case, this is related to the probability that an individual votes in a particular way) in terms of a whole bunch of input variables (like income, belief in remain, location, attitude to economics etc). These variables can interact too — maybe an economic right winger who is also nationalistic is different to one who is merely one of those things alone. Then you determine the values associated with that model using massive data sets.
The model is actually predicting the probability of an individual vote. The predicted vote share drops out of the aggregate of those predictions, rather than the other way around.
I get that. Unfortunately, this is one of those occasions where if you have to ask, you’re already in trouble when it comes to understanding the answer. The maths of it is not straightforward. The technique is absolutely standard in scientific quantitative analysis though.
They’ve given their prediction of vote share, though. That’s as traditional as it gets.
andysays
Love and solidarity
Thanks for your explanation which has made it clearer, though perhaps not as clear as I might like.
One specific question - why don't they give an indication of the possible error as was traditional with polling data?
The probabilities encapsulate the error. The probability always has to add to 1, remember. So the more uncertain the prediction, the closer the probabilities will get to random chance.
It might help to think of the results as the opposite of a usual poll. It tells you the error, and the predicted result is kind of the afterthought!
Serge Forward
Just enjoyin' my coffee.
Just looked my address up on the predictor thingy. 99% chance of Liz Kendall 
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