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(52,431 posts)

4. if you asked nate prior to the election the odds of him getting ALL 51 calls right, he would have

Reply to cthulu2016 (Original post)

Thu Nov 15, 2012, 04:30 PM

Nov 2012

agreed that the odds were long.

after all, several of the states were virtual coin tosses. getting 3 coin tosses correct gets you down to 1/8th chance, 12.5% (as other have pointed out, though, these are not entirely independent variables).

if he had a state at 60% obama and obama actually won, he was admitting he had a 40% chance of being "wrong" just on that one state.

nothing surprising here. it's a bit like having a baby naturally EXACTLY on your due date. there's only about a 5% chance of this, even though there's plenty of statistics that show this is the best guess.

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A mathematical irony [View all] cthulu2016 Nov 2012 OP

The odds of hitting any one particular combination were a lot lower. immoderate Nov 2012 #1

I think you're doing the math wrong mathematic Nov 2012 #2

I think Silver was being conservative with estimates gravity Nov 2012 #3

if you asked nate prior to the election the odds of him getting ALL 51 calls right, he would have unblock Nov 2012 #4