Posts by John Armstrong
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Hard News: The Big 2012 US Election PAS Thread, in reply to David Hood,
or it could lead to judgements about the people who support x if one is certain in ones knowledge on a matter.
I hope I'm not being too cynical by suggesting that this seems to be a pretty common response. It's why I don't read too many blogs / message boards / etc outside of Public Address. Reading such judgements only begets judgements. It's catching.
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Hard News: The Big 2012 US Election PAS Thread, in reply to BenWilson,
I guess that depends on what is being polled.
Yes, I agree completely. I am thinking mainly about polls for things like preferred Prime Minister or current voting preference, which perhaps don't add much to anyone's understanding of the policy platforms that the prime Minister or the various parties are standing on.
Having said this, I am far from certain about this and currently have that funny feeling that I am making an argument that will fall to bits pretty quickly under the right kind of pressure. I've been trying to conduct a thought experiment whereby I am standing over the ballot box with no knowledge of the respective parties' current relative support, but have a full working knowledge of their policies. How would I feel? Probably quite purposeful, but also a bit isolated.
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Russell, have any of your media-watching shows examined the influence or propriety of polling (as opposed to examining its accuracy)?
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Hard News: The Big 2012 US Election PAS Thread, in reply to BenWilson,
Everything is known, and you pick where you feel most comfortable. That's democracy in action too.
But people only have so much time and energy to absorb information. With so much media content focusing on poll results, it surely must be less likely that the electorate is well informed about policy.
But I should shut up about this: I'm getting repetitive. I am appreciating the thoughts it's provoking in others, though.
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Hard News: The Big 2012 US Election PAS Thread, in reply to Kyle Matthews,
the states they have vastly more knowledge at their fingertips
But is the accuracy of the polls even the main issue? I agree with Bart that inaccurate polling is the worst case scenario, but I repeat my earlier point that foregrounding how people are likely to vote in political coverage, ahead of analysis of policies can't be a good thing, regardless of whether those polls are accurate or not. Can it?
for a lot of people to vote for a candidate they can live with that might actually win needs knowledge of what the rest of the voting population is indicating.
I'm really not sure what you mean here. If you are saying that in a system where one of two parties is always going to win, it's better to have some influence on the actual outcome, rather than vote for some unelectable third party, maybe that's fair enough. But in the context of a proportionally elected parliament, surely having people vote in alignment with their actual beliefs is preferable to them just trying to back the winning horse?
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Hard News: The Big 2012 US Election PAS Thread, in reply to Hebe,
Where do they get those Foxbots?
Weta Workshops, hopefully.
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Hard News: The Big 2012 US Election PAS Thread, in reply to David Hood,
grounded in the reality of the situation, rather than rating gaining high-drama narratives.
Yup.
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Hard News: The Big 2012 US Election PAS Thread, in reply to Russell Brown,
How much of an impact does being told what's very probably going to happen, or what everyone else thinks, or what you care about, have on individual choices?
And further, what does focussing on these questions do for democracy? I guess that as a way of guaging people's reaction to policy, polling serves the democratic process. But I genuinely wonder whether saturation coverage of poll results and trends, both here and in the United States, reduces engagement with actual policy platforms.
On a related note, I was interested to see Karl Rove being poleaxed last night after his questioning Fox news' early call of Ohio for Obama. Despise his politics I might, but I thought his point was perfectly valid given the information that he had to hand. Nor did I see spit flying from his mouth, as was implied in the Guardian's coverage of the event. It's always interesting to see how powerfully worldviews can shape what people actually see. Across the political spectrum.
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I notice that Nate Silver is going to be on the Daily Show later in the week. Day after the election, in fact..
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OnPoint: H4x0rs and You, in reply to mark taslov,
Knowledge doesn't really come into it. We want unbiased fact
Far out. I know the, um, cognitive inconsistency, of this has already been pointed out, but as a latecomer to the thread I would like to lend my support to the pointing out of said cognitive inconsistency. I mean, really?