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I’m curious why you would think that. afaik, Taleb has repeatedly & explicitly stated “no probability without ergodicity”, which is pretty much a frequentist mantra. The problem with non-statisticians like Nate Silvers (who holds a BS in Econ, as opposed to Taleb who earned his PhD in Statistics), is that they traffic in electoral polls involving human subjects which are anything but ergodicity. Yet, they brazenly attribute probability models to their conclusions. That has severe definitional issues, which is what Taleb objects to. As to the gatekeeping issues, my mom buys eggs for $3 and groceries for $7. 3+7=10, so she hands over a $10 bill. Wait a minute, does that mean my mom is a mathematician, because she has engaged in arithmetic, which is math ? That’s the issue here. Silvers can simply post how many people want to vote which way & leave it at that. It’s just an opinion poll. Instead he engages in an elaborate charade where he takes polls of polls, ensemble averages, then says this is what is most likely, then on election day when most likely becomes least likely, he washes his hands off. Thats just clearcut fraud. All Taleb is saying is that you simply don’t have ergodicity here so you don’t have a probability. You just have a [0..1] fraction that doesn’t mean much because it doesn’t converge to a limit as information approaches infinity. So if you had skin in the game and purchased an option based on the projected outcome you would lose big time. |
I agree with the idea that Nate Silver is an entertainer, and if he were a bookie he'd need to be more precise about the odds he places on things and his range of uncertainty. But to me that doesn't suggest that Silver shouldn't speak in terms of probability at all. For a journalist (a big caveat) he's remarkable for being rigorous, open about his level of certainty, and willing to admit to mistakes.