Pollsters and political opinion polls: why so many prediction errors?
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Why pollsters get it wrong so often? How reliable are polls? We discuss the main causes of prediction errors. Participate in our debate and invite other to join
Debate created by Kenneth Bunker
Pollsters and political opinion poll errors
In 2017, the Conservative party won the UK general elections but they obtained considerably fewer MPs than most opinion polls and poll aggregators had predicted. In fact the snap election was to a great extent called by Theresa May based on the advantage that opinion polls gave her earlier in the year. That is not the only or worst example of pollsters errors. In 2016 the polls got it wrong in predicting two major events: the Brexit referendum and the US presidential election. Most opinion polls predicted a victory of the Remain camp. Although most pollsters gave a narrow advantage to those in favor of staying in the EU, some of the polls conducted by telephone calculated an 18-point lead. The previous year, during the 2015 British general election, the pollsters' prediction errors were of even a higher magnitude. None of them expected David Cameron's Conservative Party to enjoy such a landslide victory and majority in the Parliament. The American presidential elections have demonstrated again that pollsters get it wrong. Poll-based forecasts and exit polls failed to predict a Donald Trump victory.
| STATE | AVG. POLLING MARGIN | ELECTION RESULT | OVERPERFORMANCE |
|---|---|---|---|
| Utah | +9.9 | +18.4 | +8.5 |
| Ohio | +2.0 | +8.6 | +6.6 |
| Wisconsin | -5.4 | +1.0 | +6.4 |
| Iowa | +3.4 | +9.6 | +6.2 |
| Pennsylvania | -3.7 | +1.2 | +4.9 |
| Minnesota | -5.9 | -1.4 | +4.5 |
| North Carolina | -0.7 | +3.8 | +4.5 |
| Michigan | -4.0 | +0.3 | +4.3 |
| Maine | -6.9 | -3.0 | +3.9 |
| New Hampshire | -3.5 | -0.2 | +3.3 |
| Arizona | +2.4 | +4.4 | +2.0 |
| Florida | -0.6 | +1.3 | +1.9 |
| Colorado | -3.8 | -2.1 | +1.7 |
| Georgia | +4.0 | +5.7 | +1.7 |
| Virginia | -5.4 | -4.7 | +0.7 |
| Nevada | -0.7 | -2.4 | -1.7 |
| New Mexico | -5.3 | -8.3 | -3.0 |
These are only the last two polling errors in a series of elections in which pollsters have failed to predict the correct result. This would hardly be a problem if election polls weren’t so influential in electoral cycles. The numbers polls report and the media replicates have echoes in issues as diverse as internal factors such as campaign planning and everyday political affairs, as well as external issues such as international political relations and foreign investment.
But how reliable are polls? When pollsters say that their predications are only off by a small margin (usually around 3%), media, voters, investors and other interested parties all believe them. These recent failures fuel the idea that election polls can no longer be trusted. Indeed, trusting polls when they are wrong can change the results of elections by creating incentives for voters to stay home if they believe their candidate will win anyway, or of potential foreign investors of thinking twice before initiating a business relation.
It is implicit that polls are important tools for anticipating electoral results. So it is crucial to understand why they are failing to bring them back to their standards.
Why do pollsters get it wrong?
There seem to be three major reasons that could explain why polls fail:
- One reason is that there are serious involuntary methodological faults. It could be that polls do not estimate correctly the demographics and thus do not weigh results according to the true distribution in the population. It could also be that the sampling methods are incorrect, and polls are not reaching a representative group of people. This could be due to the financial restrictions of pollsters that have led to preferring online or telephone poll’s rather than face-to-face nationwide polls.
- A second reason is that there is an intentional manipulation of results. This suggests that pollsters have an agenda. It means that there is no serious fault in the methods, but a political purpose of distorting results. While this is hard to prove, since pollsters do not normally release their data, it is possible. Pollsters could, for example, change the weight that they give to different portions of the population, say age, race or geographical regions, in a manner which is convenient to them. However, this would only make sense if pollsters are confabulated or herding.
- A third reason is that voters are not answering pollster’s questions honestly. It is perfectly possible that voters are declaring that they will not vote when they finally do vote, or that voters who declare that they will vote are giving false answers. This could explain why the point estimates and the margins of error are far off the actual result of elections. Polls are built on the assumption that respondents are honest. If respondents lie, or change their opinion after the poll, then it is only natural that polls will not be able to predict results accurately.
Dr Kenneth Bunker is a political scientist at Universidad Central de Chile and director of the electoral and political analysis website Tresquintos
Watch these videos about polling mistakes
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Mind Reading Technologies and Tongues - Governments from around the world have been using mind reading technologies that can read your mind. They use the same technologies that God would use to talk to you. They use Remote Neural Monitoring (RNM) against us. Look it up online. Satellites delivered to space by Space X founder Elon Musk, The Russian Federation, The Federal Government and NASA. Comparable to cellular satellites. It’s a high bandwidth U or Z linking A signal that listens to your brains wavelength and reads your conscience. Activating up to 40-90% of your brain. Many define it as a form of telepathy. People who can talk back and hear the satellite with their mind talk tongues. They've had this technology for years now. Not informing the world to stay ahead of our civilization. To be as intelligent as the combined world they record our thoughts. They steal our ideas, murder, blackmail and use it as a tool for war. You sometimes get a headache when a mind reading machine is on you. Suspected users of mind reading technologies are as follow: Vladimir Putin, Donald J. Trump, Xi Jinping, some in DARPA, Chancellor Merkel, Justin Trudeau and Benjamin Netanyahu. Were to hold are governments accountable. A Ravenous wolf in sheep’s clothing - An alien spirit reborn as a Human being. They use A.I. and walk the Earth. An alien had shot an asteroid at us. Fire and brimstone to reborn Earth. He was working with the devil an alien being. The devil walked. God saved us. Destroying an alien ship. The devil to tell us we weren’t deserving and bring back his deserving. Aliens. To use our image from the casket that preserved our flesh. For us to be damned to hell for cremation. The devil to conquer the world. Mathew 7:15 Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. Your spirit is in your brain and leaves your body when you die. The spirit slowly rises towards the North Pole after death. The atmosphere to keep your spirit contained. A solar flare can kill your spirit. Your conscience/soul controls much of the brain and the brain controls the body. To be brought back as flesh and bone means to be reborn as a clone. Wolves in American and Russian governments have been stealing spirits for their memories to help them conquer the world. Look into monopoles (spirits). Utilizing the Bermuda Triangle changing the magnetic compass .003 degrees. Transferring spirits to technologies. The simulation. Not disclosing the true purpose of certain military bases at the Bermuda Triangle and the North Pole. A spirit can be put in a chip and be reborn. The clone grown around the chip within a tank like a womb. Artificial intelligence can also walk as flesh and blood using a programmed chip similar to a robot. Not meant to be. They can create remote controlled clones much like a remote-control vehicle/robot that have computer brains. Utilizing satellite reception and signal strength. Grown in labs around the computer where the brain would be. Some are partial brain and computer. Using the flesh from the ethnicity preferred. Many can be commanded to/not to perform a certain task. They can see and hear through them. Having them raised in the country they want to conquer. To win an election in your country and have others get into positions of power within military, intelligence, elite society and space agencies. Also having them do their wet work. We need to be educated on these technologies. There taking our world. Revelation behold, he is coming with the clouds. A spaceship from Alpha Centauri. The planet Kent. I was told Jesus Christ landed in Russia. A spirit can fly a spaceship. No natural life support needed. God saved him from the devil unfortunately his ship was low on energy. He had to land. President Putin gave his word to him. Jesus was to have 7 days to honor flesh and blood. Jesus to walk and honor the church. He wanted to inform the world and save me and you. President Putin and Trump denied him. Not telling the world. Many said Jesus is stuck in his ship at a top-secret installation in Russia similar to area 51. We need to save many other souls. They have our friends and families. Were to prove a reborn clone, UFO's (seen using micro waves or at area 51), hacked satellites, telescopes and mind reading technologies. To find the clone labs and destroy them. The clones to change our genome. They want to deny our children. To deny us free will and take our world and soul. Many in positions of power. To look you in the face and lie. About a 120 billion souls from Earth now live in a medium class ship between Earth and Mars. God saved them. No hell. You can communicate with them if you have a line of communication with a satellite. The government hiding much. Purgatory is Mars. To improve overtime and become a flesh and blood experience. Your spirit can become a robot. Energy is life. Humans to honor the full rotation of life. Not to deny natural existence. That we can bring ourselves back. Were to walk as 1. A form of creation is to redistribute matter and alter a big bang. We live in a Multiverse. Spirits to be added to evolution. Bred in from Kent. Earth to become a tier 1 civilization. To have 1 heaven on Earth. To have a democracy of heaven and Earth. For us to live like kings in time. Humans to learn they have spirits. Science and technology to prove them. Church to become community and teaching. Many religions to become 1. To be self-reliant. Were to save of ourselves. To have judgment on evil beings walking as flesh and blood humans. God and Allah one in the same after the New Testament. The devil to split us apart. God said I’m to tell you a revelation. For me to teach you prophecy and fix his word. The devil changed word to push his agenda. A man talking tongues to save the world by informing you. God wants his original doctrine to be released along with the book of Judah. The truth to come out. The Catholic Church to obtain it from Pope Francis. Please spread the word. Christopher, I speak tongues. prophecyisnow.com
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