FiveThirtyEight’s Influence
By Daniel Strauss - Nov 14th, 2008 at 2:15 pmBecks of Unfogged wonders how powerful Nate Silver of Fivethirtyeight now is:
I’ll admit to being skeptical of Five Thirty Eight before the election but now that Nate Silver has proven himself to be accurate and he’s attracted many deserved followers and fans, I wonder how future elections might be impacted by so many people treating his word as gospel. Could an outcome be affected by people being complacent about a predicted win and not donating or volunteering? If he predicts a loss, will people just accept that as fate and give up? If so, how far out? As predictions get more accurate, what are the impacts they might have on the electoral process?
I think Becks is overreacting here. Yes, Nate Silver’s projections have been accurate and they offer a new way of understanding political polls, but in the end Silver’s influence will probably be as great as the superstition that Iowa dictates the democratic nominee or the (now disproved) rule that whichever presidential contender wins Missouri wins the White House. That doesn’t mean Silver’s calculations are a fraud–they’re carefully done with reason but no personal bias. But Silver’s projections are reactive: they change with events.
What Becks is really afraid of is that an election will hinge on what Silver says. There’s an argument to make for that. Back in March Silver accurately predicted that Obama would win the White House. That’s no small accomplishments in terms of polls and projections. But giving up just because of what one person says is pretty naive. There’s always the possibility that some world event will cause candidates to do things they didn’t expect, or that some information about a candidate will come out which greatly turns public opinion in a different direction.
In this past presidential election that really didn’t happen as much as it could have to Obama or McCain, butfuture elections on all levels will probably be very different. Silver’s projections are valuable, especially if they continue to be as accurate as they have been, but the real benefit FiveThirtyEight offers is a way of understanding the bias and methodology behind polls.
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