Saphroneth’s Recent Comments

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  Predictions, Politics and experts

  Have you ever heard of Nate Silver? He would be surprised to learn that his models on baseball and on politics - most of which were based on theory, measurements and past results - were 'only guesswork'. Especially when he predicted the popular vote and electoral vote to a very small margin of error in the recent election.
  See his sites, Baseball Prospectus and FiveThirtyEight.com to see what I mean.On 'We can't even predict the weather next week'--But weather is not climate posted 11 months, 1 week ago 11 Responses

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  Notes on the model

  The model B is the one that was the actual prediction. It assumed a volcanic eruption in 1995, when Pinatubo actually went off in 1991. That said, the model was posted to show that there is a prediction that is fairly accurate (hell, it is 20 years old and was hence done on a computer approximately 5000 times less powerful in calculations per second than modern ones) from a model that used historical data as a starting point then made a prediction based on that. Verified predictions are the very lifeblood of scientific theories, and this fits the bill. In addition, the only refutation of that model I have seen erased the actual prediction (B) and the government clampdown prediction (C) and only used the worst - case scenario (A) to refute as if it was the actual prediction, rather than an additional model not actually used in testimony. (see http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2006/12/13/21360/608 for the details)On 'Climate models are unproven'--Actually, GCM's have many confirmed successes under their belts posted 11 months, 1 week ago 13 Responses