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Comparing the latest polling – pollster by pollster – politicalbetting.com

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  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,585

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    The one who's a member of the communist party?
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,865
    That's a horrific number for a small country like that, isn't it 0.5% of the country?
  • isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556

    I'm at least open-minded about a lab escape. There's plenty of coincidental evidence.

    And I definitely think China tried to cover it up for as long as it could, and silence those who spoke out.

    There could be all sorts of reasons for that but it's very far from unheard of in Xi's China.

    Holy shit, you mean China's on Xi already?!
    Do you ever wonder if people look at these punfests and Ψ?
    You know you'll tautally miss them when they're Φ-nally over...
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,164
    edited May 2021
    Foxy said:

    CatMan said:

    "Covid: WHO renames UK and other variants with Greek letters"
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-57308592

    Finally a use for all of you with your Classics degrees ;)

    Well, at least the WHO's coming up with some nu ideas...
    There is a kappa on numbers that way.
    you'll have to do beta than that!
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,749
    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    I read this USSR account some time ago. Fascinating that they formally record three Russian military personnel being killed by “them”. From memory, the account said that when they were threatened, the humanoids created a current that sucked the humans to the surface giving them the bends. Three died but there were multiple survivors.

    A very odd story to concoct and put in the military archives.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 32,585
    dixiedean said:

    Andy_JS said:

    HYUFD said:

    stodge said:

    Evening all :)

    Well, as we know, there's polling and there's polling so I thought I'd liven your Monday evening with another of my "European tours" of the polls.

    Let's kick off in Germany with another INSA poll (changes since last poll):
    CDU/CSU-EPP: 25.5% (-0.5)
    GRÜNE-G/EFA: 21.5% (-0.5)
    SPD-S&D: 15.5% (-0.5)
    FDP-RE: 13.5% (+1)
    AfD-ID: 11% (-0.5)
    LINKE-LEFT: 6.5%

    Another "high" number for the FDP and within just two points of the SPD - the thought the FDP might come third in front of the SPD now looks at least plausible even if still incredible.

    One part of Europe where politics looks quite stable currently is Greece - remember, the Greece that was going to crash out of the Euro, the Greece whose chaos overshadowed the formation of the Coalition in 2010?

    Changes since last election (2019)

    ND-EPP: 47% (+7)
    SYRIZA-LEFT: 25% (-6)
    KINAL-S&D: 8% (unc)
    KKE-NI: 7% (+2)
    EL-ECR: 5% (+1)
    MeRA25~LEFT: 4% (unc)

    On these numbers, Mitsotakis and the New Democracy Government would be re-elected with an increased majority but the election isn't until July 2023.

    Closer to home and the latest Red C poll from Ireland (changes from 2020 election)

    SF-LEFT: 29% (+4)
    FG-EPP: 29% (+8)
    FF-RE: 14% (-8)
    Greens-G/EFA: 5% (-2)
    SOC DEM→S&D: 5% (+2)
    LAB-S&D: 3% (-1)
    S-PBP~LEFT: 2% (unc)
    AONTU-*: 2% (unc)

    I wonder if we are seeing a re-alignment to a new duopoly with the FF/FG split which has dominated Irish politics for decades being replaced by a new SF/FG split with FF fading away.

    In Germany looks like will be a Union and Green coalition unless the FDP decide to do a deal with the SPD and Greens.

    In Greece Syriza has now faded like Corbyn Labour.

    In Ireland it certainly looks like SF on the left and pushing hardest for a United Ireland and FG on the centre right are becoming the main parties but FF, traditionally a bit more socially conservative and closest to the Catholic Church, is now fading.

    FG will still need FF support to keep SF out of power however
    Most polls show the CDU/CSU and Greens falling short of an absolute majority, so maybe the FDP will be invited to join the coalition as well.
    Below 50% yes.
    But not below what's needed when the smaller Parties who don't make 5% threshold are removed from the calculations. Then it becomes really knife edge.
    The FDP are very, very wary of the Greens and wouldn't join enthusiastically.
    Yes it depends on things like whether Linke manage to stay above 5%.

    It's also possible the FDP might agree not to bring down a CDU/Green coalition if they're just short of a majority without actually joining it formally.
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    MaxPB said:

    That's a horrific number for a small country like that, isn't it 0.5% of the country?
    Just over. In rough terms, equivalent to about 365,000 here.
  • AlwaysSingingAlwaysSinging Posts: 464
    algarkirk said:

    Nothing too much to see here. Nearly everything is explicable by margin of error. Secondly, apart from polls within about 7 days of a relevant general election, national polls cannot be independently evaluated except by the next set of polls, which are subject to the same uncertainty in a regress which continues until a week or so before the GE. So the subject matter, while entertaining and exciting (to PBers though not I imagine to normal people) is essentially a piece of metaphysics which, critically, is not subject to falsification.

    Question for statisticians:

    As I understand it the ordinary poll is subject to a margin of error about 3 percentage points either way. So a Lab figure of 35 is consistent with 32-38.

    Is this true of the small figures for smaller parties. If the real LD score is say 8% should I expect, in the absence of real change, the figures to range between 5 and 11? If true it would explain quite a bit.

    Finally, while a Tory lead looks baked in nothing about current times tells us about the score once stuff happens, like ending furlough, inflation happening, dealing with deficit etc. Except that a Labour majority looks impossible most other things could happen.

    It's different for smaller figures. Broadly, the margin of error is proportional to the square root of p(1-p), where p is the proportion (between 0 and 1) that you are estimating. And for very small p, further special cases apply because the confidence intervals are asymmetric.

    It's difficult to compute a margin of error for the small parties from the headline margin of error, because these polls are heavily stratified and that complicates the calculation. But you might expect a margin of error of +/-3% for parties polling around 40% to translate into +/-1.5% or 2% for parties polling around 8%.

    --AS
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,487
    Wow. I might have to change my opinion about Meghan Markle.

    It's not just the singing here - it's how she moves. She brings her whole soul to it:

    https://youtu.be/nK14Xwg4Tgs
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,749

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    Mate, have you started taking heroin again or have you just spent too long in the sun today?
    Leon is over the precipice and is doing what I did several months ago. Revisiting the numerous formal state accounts of this phenomenon from around the world, which for interesting psychological reasons most everyone has pretty much entirely ignored until now.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 51,689
    Boris Johnson seems to be fairly popular in France.

    image
  • isamisam Posts: 41,118

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,761

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    It's being portrayed as a scientific consensus on one side versus desperate to open businesses on the other. The fact that no such scientific consensus exists is completely by-the-by. Sensationalising the situation clearly makes for an easier to understand and more exciting story for hacks to tell, and both the TV and the papers are at it.
    The science zero covid cultists have lashed themselves to the Indian mast now. When the apocalypse doesn't arrive in July can we expect the media to finally start ignoring them?
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,761




    Deepti Gurdasani
    @dgurdasani1
    ·
    7m
    On
    @BBCNews
    today talking about the potential of a 3rd wave, and the unhelpful focus on opening on the 21st June, when we need to take measures to mitigate right now to prevent this, even without considering further reopening:

    from 21:04 onwards:
    https://bbc.co.uk/iplayer/live/bbcnews
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207

    On Topic is SKS doing shit or shit?

    He has been a big disappointment.

    The simple fact that Labour are doing absolutely nothing to push Cummings' deaths by incompetence agenda is slightly unbelievable. Cummings has teed the ball up in front of the posts perfectly for Starmer, but he's still hunting for the ball and the bucket of sand.

    Still head and shoulders better than Corbs, RLB, Pidcock...and...Burgon!
    TBF - Burgon has posted several times on the excess deaths subject recently

    https://twitter.com/RichardBurgon/status/1399047612351848452

    https://twitter.com/RichardBurgon/status/1398685416673456130

    https://twitter.com/RichardBurgon/status/1398336986629431305

    Looking at the comments on the last one even a left wing poster is calling the grey man "Keith"

    Mind you - he thinks Burgon should be leader ......
  • isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    The so-called “left behinds” who rose up and kicked the political elite in the balls. The best day of my life after the birth of my child.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,126
    MaxPB said:

    That's a horrific number for a small country like that, isn't it 0.5% of the country?
    And about twice as bad as anyone else's (reported) numbers.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,126
    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    Mate, have you started taking heroin again or have you just spent too long in the sun today?
    Leon is over the precipice
    Curious you'd describe it in those terms, as it is not generally a positive experience.
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 27,919
    Secret courts hidden in the Australia trade deal might be another issue for Labour and Starmer to run with, though doubtless Boris will charge that Labour wants to sabotage Brexit.

    ISDS [investor state dispute settlement] is a system of private courts convened in camera and arbitrated by judges, allowing firms to bypass domestic civil courts. They were originally conceived by western multinationals to protect them against the seizure of their assets in the aftermath of a coup or by rogue states, for example a mine being nationalised without reasonable compensation.

    In recent decades they have evolved to include indirect expropriation, by which any government measure that affects the actual or expected profits of a business can be challenged.

    Recent ISDS cases brought against governments include Swedish energy firm Vattenfall suing Germany for policies that cut water pollution; US drugs giant Eli Lilly suing Canada for trying to reduce medicine prices; and French multinational Veolia suing Egypt for increasing its national minimum wage.

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/may/30/alarm-at-secret-court-scheme-in-uk-australia-trade-deal

    Not exactly Take Back Control.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,429
    edited May 2021
    THIS is incredible.


    https://www.cbsnews.com/video/ufo-national-security-unidentified-aerial-phenomena-federal-report-bryan-bender-analysis/

    The senior defence correspondent for Politico (ie: well connected, not a loony) talks to CBS, yesterday. He says, in apparent seriousness, that the Pentagon has looked into the possibility that the UFOs are "multi-dimensional" - ie they come, as he says, from here, but from "a different here"

    I kid you not

    The same esteemed journalist has tweeted and retweeted this:

    "This seems a plausible UFO reality. Has just enough “the truth is out there” but without the depths of the deepest conspiracies. And it would be a hell of a story if this was kept from Congress. Basically a government within a government."


    "David Engelson
    @David_Engelson

    Replying to @BryanDBender
    This story isn’t that hard. Over the course of decades, the government has retrieved exotic metals and/or craft. They may have a rudimentary understanding of it. These materials / craft were subsequently sent to private corporations to avoid government oversight and FOIA."

    https://twitter.com/BryanDBender/status/1399169540001452032?s=20


    Again, we have two choices. Either elite circles in the USA are going mad, or this is seriously seriously weird
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    It's being portrayed as a scientific consensus on one side versus desperate to open businesses on the other. The fact that no such scientific consensus exists is completely by-the-by. Sensationalising the situation clearly makes for an easier to understand and more exciting story for hacks to tell, and both the TV and the papers are at it.
    The science zero covid cultists have lashed themselves to the Indian mast now. When the apocalypse doesn't arrive in July can we expect the media to finally start ignoring them?
    No, I'm afraid. Any increase in cases, hospitalisations and deaths - even if it's very modest, can be managed, and was the price we were all warned we had to pay for not keeping society locked down for the rest of time - will be portrayed as the needless consequences of the actions of a heartless Government. And if that doesn't work sufficiently well, then we'll be on to the next reason to panic. How long do the vaccinations protect people for: should we lock everybody back up whilst the old get their boosters? What happens when the cold weather arrives again in the Autumn? We must lock everyone up for the Winter to avoid another massive wave! To say nothing of Winter flu + Winter Covid = NHS collapse = everyone dies horribly. You can see the conveyor belt of scare stories and the accompanied panicked screaming and moral blackmail coming a mile off.
  • SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 22,030
    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 12,533

    algarkirk said:

    Nothing too much to see here. Nearly everything is explicable by margin of error. Secondly, apart from polls within about 7 days of a relevant general election, national polls cannot be independently evaluated except by the next set of polls, which are subject to the same uncertainty in a regress which continues until a week or so before the GE. So the subject matter, while entertaining and exciting (to PBers though not I imagine to normal people) is essentially a piece of metaphysics which, critically, is not subject to falsification.

    Question for statisticians:

    As I understand it the ordinary poll is subject to a margin of error about 3 percentage points either way. So a Lab figure of 35 is consistent with 32-38.

    Is this true of the small figures for smaller parties. If the real LD score is say 8% should I expect, in the absence of real change, the figures to range between 5 and 11? If true it would explain quite a bit.

    Finally, while a Tory lead looks baked in nothing about current times tells us about the score once stuff happens, like ending furlough, inflation happening, dealing with deficit etc. Except that a Labour majority looks impossible most other things could happen.

    It's different for smaller figures. Broadly, the margin of error is proportional to the square root of p(1-p), where p is the proportion (between 0 and 1) that you are estimating. And for very small p, further special cases apply because the confidence intervals are asymmetric.

    It's difficult to compute a margin of error for the small parties from the headline margin of error, because these polls are heavily stratified and that complicates the calculation. But you might expect a margin of error of +/-3% for parties polling around 40% to translate into +/-1.5% or 2% for parties polling around 8%.

    --AS
    Thanks. Very clear and helpful.

  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,126
    Leon said:

    THIS is incredible.


    https://www.cbsnews.com/video/ufo-national-security-unidentified-aerial-phenomena-federal-report-bryan-bender-analysis/

    The senior defence correspondent for Politico (ie: well connected, not a loony) talks to CBS, yesterday. He says, in apparent seriousness, that the Pentagon has looked into the possibility that the UFOs are "multi-dimensional" - ie they come, as he says, from here, but from "a different here"

    I kid you not

    The same esteemed journalist has tweeted and retweeted this:

    "This seems a plausible UFO reality. Has just enough “the truth is out there” but without the depths of the deepest conspiracies. And it would be a hell of a story if this was kept from Congress. Basically a government within a government."


    "David Engelson
    @David_Engelson

    Replying to @BryanDBender
    This story isn’t that hard. Over the course of decades, the government has retrieved exotic metals and/or craft. They may have a rudimentary understanding of it. These materials / craft were subsequently sent to private corporations to avoid government oversight and FOIA."

    https://twitter.com/BryanDBender/status/1399169540001452032?s=20


    Again, we have three choices. Either elite circles in the USA are going mad, or this is seriously seriously weird

    You've no doubt read some of the experiments and projects the USA has funded over the years, particularly during the cold war. Pretty sure some of them have always been mad, it's presumably worth it for the 1 in a thousand time it isn't mad.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 63,100
    edited May 2021





    Deepti Gurdasani
    @dgurdasani1
    ·
    7m
    On
    @BBCNews
    today talking about the potential of a 3rd wave, and the unhelpful focus on opening on the 21st June, when we need to take measures to mitigate right now to prevent this, even without considering further reopening:

    from 21:04 onwards:
    https://bbc.co.uk/iplayer/live/bbcnews

    I listened to her with increasing incredulity and of course she was not identified as Independent Sage yet again

    The media have lost all balance
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    kle4 said:

    MaxPB said:

    That's a horrific number for a small country like that, isn't it 0.5% of the country?
    And about twice as bad as anyone else's (reported) numbers.
    Of course, there are an awful lot of countries that still have to confess that their Covid death stats are essentially fictitious.

    The ones that published inaccurate figures because their testing and record keeping weren't up to the task (and one imagines that Peru falls into this category) will come clean in the fullness of time. The ones that are deliberately covering up the scale of the catastrophe that they have suffered (and one imagines that Russia, for example, falls into this category) probably won't.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,429
    kle4 said:

    Leon said:

    THIS is incredible.


    https://www.cbsnews.com/video/ufo-national-security-unidentified-aerial-phenomena-federal-report-bryan-bender-analysis/

    The senior defence correspondent for Politico (ie: well connected, not a loony) talks to CBS, yesterday. He says, in apparent seriousness, that the Pentagon has looked into the possibility that the UFOs are "multi-dimensional" - ie they come, as he says, from here, but from "a different here"

    I kid you not

    The same esteemed journalist has tweeted and retweeted this:

    "This seems a plausible UFO reality. Has just enough “the truth is out there” but without the depths of the deepest conspiracies. And it would be a hell of a story if this was kept from Congress. Basically a government within a government."


    "David Engelson
    @David_Engelson

    Replying to @BryanDBender
    This story isn’t that hard. Over the course of decades, the government has retrieved exotic metals and/or craft. They may have a rudimentary understanding of it. These materials / craft were subsequently sent to private corporations to avoid government oversight and FOIA."

    https://twitter.com/BryanDBender/status/1399169540001452032?s=20


    Again, we have three choices. Either elite circles in the USA are going mad, or this is seriously seriously weird

    You've no doubt read some of the experiments and projects the USA has funded over the years, particularly during the cold war. Pretty sure some of them have always been mad, it's presumably worth it for the 1 in a thousand time it isn't mad.
    Sure. But this is hugely different. Back then when America was denying its military developments you didn't get former presidents going on TV saying, "yeah, we haven't a fucking clue, could be ET"
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    edited May 2021
    Someone's been editing Mr Murrell's wiki entry:

    https://twitter.com/KieranPAndrews/status/1399463005264490499?s=20

    I'm not posting a screenshot because it's libellous.

    Mr Murrell has not even been charged, let alone convicted of any criminal activity.
  • BigRichBigRich Posts: 3,492
    MaxPB said:

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    It's being portrayed as a scientific consensus on one side versus desperate to open businesses on the other. The fact that no such scientific consensus exists is completely by-the-by. Sensationalising the situation clearly makes for an easier to understand and more exciting story for hacks to tell, and both the TV and the papers are at it.
    The science zero covid cultists have lashed themselves to the Indian mast now. When the apocalypse doesn't arrive in July can we expect the media to finally start ignoring them?
    No, the media will need their latest helping of doom porn to drive their 24h news channels. Sky and the BBC are absolutely awful for this, Sky especially so. They think they exist to create the news as if they were an actualised version of Elliott Carver's news agency. They think that their reporting should drive the national narrative so they constantly put out a stream of shit topped with horse manure swimming in a pool of pig shit.

    Every time these scientists come on TV their previous predictions should be announced before they start their latest bit of bullshit. Eventually they'll just stop coming on as their credibility drains away.
    Will the launch of GB News change things?

    Don't know, but I hope so.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKBx80WayjA
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518
    kle4 said:

    MaxPB said:

    That's a horrific number for a small country like that, isn't it 0.5% of the country?
    And about twice as bad as anyone else's (reported) numbers.
    Didn't Mexico massive increase their official totals a month or so ago - but go to sites like Worldometer basically ignored it?
  • isamisam Posts: 41,118

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    The so-called “left behinds” who rose up and kicked the political elite in the balls. The best day of my life after the birth of my child.
    That’s Entertainment!
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,706
    isam said:

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    The so-called “left behinds” who rose up and kicked the political elite in the balls. The best day of my life after the birth of my child.
    That’s Entertainment!
    The Bitterist Pill.
  • isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    Cameron said “Eton rifles” was his favourite song. That’s when I knew he was a twunt
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 63,100

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
    But they had Deepti Gurdasani predicting thousands of deaths, doom and gloom, and close everything now

    And did not say she was a member of the Independent Sage group
  • isamisam Posts: 41,118

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    ‘Set The House Ablaze’ is deffo BNP in my eyes.

    New Labour are the ‘Burning Sky’

    DC and Bojo surely ‘The Eton Rifles’?
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 12,533
    Leon said:

    THIS is incredible.


    https://www.cbsnews.com/video/ufo-national-security-unidentified-aerial-phenomena-federal-report-bryan-bender-analysis/

    The senior defence correspondent for Politico (ie: well connected, not a loony) talks to CBS, yesterday. He says, in apparent seriousness, that the Pentagon has looked into the possibility that the UFOs are "multi-dimensional" - ie they come, as he says, from here, but from "a different here"

    I kid you not

    The same esteemed journalist has tweeted and retweeted this:

    "This seems a plausible UFO reality. Has just enough “the truth is out there” but without the depths of the deepest conspiracies. And it would be a hell of a story if this was kept from Congress. Basically a government within a government."


    "David Engelson
    @David_Engelson

    Replying to @BryanDBender
    This story isn’t that hard. Over the course of decades, the government has retrieved exotic metals and/or craft. They may have a rudimentary understanding of it. These materials / craft were subsequently sent to private corporations to avoid government oversight and FOIA."

    https://twitter.com/BryanDBender/status/1399169540001452032?s=20


    Again, we have two choices. Either elite circles in the USA are going mad, or this is seriously seriously weird

    Peer reviewed articles in Nature awaited. To believe this stuff requires full disclosure, transparent expert analysis, including the case for both/all sides, refutation of objections, examination of the weakest bits of the evidence and argument, elimination of alternatives and all that.

    As, in addition, there is a fortune awaiting the physicists/engineers/maths people who can write these compelling, evidence based, peer reviewed science papers from their popular books (which would sell by the 100 million at a time) and lecture circuit I think we can be sure that at this moment MIT, UCLA, Harvard and Stanford are not yet convinced. So I'm not either.

  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,429
    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    I read this USSR account some time ago. Fascinating that they formally record three Russian military personnel being killed by “them”. From memory, the account said that when they were threatened, the humanoids created a current that sucked the humans to the surface giving them the bends. Three died but there were multiple survivors.

    A very odd story to concoct and put in the military archives.
    Yes. And the way it exactly matches the behaviour of UFOs seen not just off America, but elsewhere. The UK for one.

    https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/police-helicopter-footage-captures-ufo-3765?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sharebar

    Solid spheres, very hard to see, but visible to infra-red, moving above, or into and out of, large bodies of water

    If you put an inter-galactic love bassoon to my head right now, and asked me to make a choice, or fake a gallon of purple alien love-spunk all over my head, I'd say we are looking at aliens who have sent AI probes to earth, that base themselves underwater, and are weirdly obsessed with our technology, perhaps in the same way we get over-excited when it seems chimps can do sign language
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905

    Boris Johnson seems to be fairly popular in France.

    image

    Suspiciously close to 52:48 :smile:

    Looks like the Leave/Remain (or, at any rate, Eurosceptic vs Europhile) divide manifesting itself in those numbers. Hard left, hard right and conservatives (an exotic combination!) on one side; greens, social democrats and wet centrists (if you can call LREM such a thing after the Macron Government's posturing on Muslims) on the other.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    edited May 2021

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
    But they had Deepti Gurdasani predicting thousands of deaths, doom and gloom, and close everything now

    And did not say she was a member of the Independent Sage group
    Across the media they are running...third wave its here....lock up your daughters.

    Its the classic media circle jerk...one person claims something and instantly it is reported across 20 outlets as fact.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
    They're trying hard to move the needle towards tightening restrictions. It's no good to their case (if they're wrong) if we continue as we are (even without further relaxation). Because if increases in cases is exponential now, then we get to see how it all plays out and proves them right or wrong.

    If we reverse the opening up we've already done, then they can always say that it was these actions that meant "disaster averted".
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,429
    algarkirk said:

    Leon said:

    THIS is incredible.


    https://www.cbsnews.com/video/ufo-national-security-unidentified-aerial-phenomena-federal-report-bryan-bender-analysis/

    The senior defence correspondent for Politico (ie: well connected, not a loony) talks to CBS, yesterday. He says, in apparent seriousness, that the Pentagon has looked into the possibility that the UFOs are "multi-dimensional" - ie they come, as he says, from here, but from "a different here"

    I kid you not

    The same esteemed journalist has tweeted and retweeted this:

    "This seems a plausible UFO reality. Has just enough “the truth is out there” but without the depths of the deepest conspiracies. And it would be a hell of a story if this was kept from Congress. Basically a government within a government."


    "David Engelson
    @David_Engelson

    Replying to @BryanDBender
    This story isn’t that hard. Over the course of decades, the government has retrieved exotic metals and/or craft. They may have a rudimentary understanding of it. These materials / craft were subsequently sent to private corporations to avoid government oversight and FOIA."

    https://twitter.com/BryanDBender/status/1399169540001452032?s=20


    Again, we have two choices. Either elite circles in the USA are going mad, or this is seriously seriously weird

    Peer reviewed articles in Nature awaited. To believe this stuff requires full disclosure, transparent expert analysis, including the case for both/all sides, refutation of objections, examination of the weakest bits of the evidence and argument, elimination of alternatives and all that.

    As, in addition, there is a fortune awaiting the physicists/engineers/maths people who can write these compelling, evidence based, peer reviewed science papers from their popular books (which would sell by the 100 million at a time) and lecture circuit I think we can be sure that at this moment MIT, UCLA, Harvard and Stanford are not yet convinced. So I'm not either.

    But you still have to choose on the evidence we have right now. And your choice seems to be: elite America is going mad. Fair enough
  • isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    Cameron said “Eton rifles” was his favourite song. That’s when I knew he was a twunt

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    Cameron said “Eton rifles” was his favourite song. That’s when I knew he was a twunt
    Blair would be “Mr. Clean”

  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,429
    alex_ said:

    France: 1200 positive tested cases, 126 deaths in hospitals.

    Italy 1800 and 82, Germany 2100 and 89

    Can we now conclude quite clearly that the French (and others) simply aren't testing any one on anything like the scale of the UK, and the idea that the UK is the current concerning "hotspot" in Europe is simply nonsense?

    Yes
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,410
    Am unable to come up with a pun for epsil

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    Cameron said “Eton rifles” was his favourite song. That’s when I knew he was a twunt
    Thought it was Tangled up in Blue? ISTR that was his Desert Island choice.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518
    edited May 2021
    Leon said:

    algarkirk said:

    Leon said:

    THIS is incredible.


    https://www.cbsnews.com/video/ufo-national-security-unidentified-aerial-phenomena-federal-report-bryan-bender-analysis/

    The senior defence correspondent for Politico (ie: well connected, not a loony) talks to CBS, yesterday. He says, in apparent seriousness, that the Pentagon has looked into the possibility that the UFOs are "multi-dimensional" - ie they come, as he says, from here, but from "a different here"

    I kid you not

    The same esteemed journalist has tweeted and retweeted this:

    "This seems a plausible UFO reality. Has just enough “the truth is out there” but without the depths of the deepest conspiracies. And it would be a hell of a story if this was kept from Congress. Basically a government within a government."


    "David Engelson
    @David_Engelson

    Replying to @BryanDBender
    This story isn’t that hard. Over the course of decades, the government has retrieved exotic metals and/or craft. They may have a rudimentary understanding of it. These materials / craft were subsequently sent to private corporations to avoid government oversight and FOIA."

    https://twitter.com/BryanDBender/status/1399169540001452032?s=20


    Again, we have two choices. Either elite circles in the USA are going mad, or this is seriously seriously weird

    Peer reviewed articles in Nature awaited. To believe this stuff requires full disclosure, transparent expert analysis, including the case for both/all sides, refutation of objections, examination of the weakest bits of the evidence and argument, elimination of alternatives and all that.

    As, in addition, there is a fortune awaiting the physicists/engineers/maths people who can write these compelling, evidence based, peer reviewed science papers from their popular books (which would sell by the 100 million at a time) and lecture circuit I think we can be sure that at this moment MIT, UCLA, Harvard and Stanford are not yet convinced. So I'm not either.

    But you still have to choose on the evidence we have right now. And your choice seems to be: elite America is going mad. Fair enough
    Roswell was a US Government invented fiction to distract from ... a facility in a different bit of the desert?

    I do like the idea that this is project "save democracy". Desperately trying to get the crazies off Qanon theories and back to the traditional stuff!
  • glwglw Posts: 9,908
    alex_ said:

    kle4 said:

    MaxPB said:

    That's a horrific number for a small country like that, isn't it 0.5% of the country?
    And about twice as bad as anyone else's (reported) numbers.
    Didn't Mexico massive increase their official totals a month or so ago - but go to sites like Worldometer basically ignored it?
    Worldometer is useless for such stuff. The Economist is doing a good job with excess deaths data, and Googling for excess deaths stories is also quite effective as the press in many countries are just as interested in getting the real story as anyone else.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518
    glw said:

    alex_ said:

    kle4 said:

    MaxPB said:

    That's a horrific number for a small country like that, isn't it 0.5% of the country?
    And about twice as bad as anyone else's (reported) numbers.
    Didn't Mexico massive increase their official totals a month or so ago - but go to sites like Worldometer basically ignored it?
    Worldometer is useless for such stuff. The Economist is doing a good job with excess deaths data, and Googling for excess deaths stories is also quite effective as the press in many countries are just as interested in getting the real story as anyone else.
    No i know it is - but that's not the point. It's the go to place in the UK.
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 41,988
    Stalky Piers has got a new mark(le) I see






  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
    AIUI the dominant trend amongst the lockdown movement is that two weeks is too long to wait to slam re-opening *into reverse.* I think they basically want us to regress back to Step 2 and then wait at least until the entire adult population has been double-jabbed.

    Of course, if we let them have what they want then a new excuse (cold weather, need for booster shots, need to vaccinate children, flu and covid striking at the same time over the Winter and flooding the hospitals, whatever new variants appear between now and then, and most likely some combination of all of those things) will be found to keep us locked up. They would probably issue a new set of dodgy models and start insisting on a Draconian full lockdown for the entire Winter come about October time.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518

    Stalky Piers has got a new mark(le) I see






    He knows she's just withdrawn from the tournament, right?
  • dixiedean said:

    Am unable to come up with a pun for epsil

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    Cameron said “Eton rifles” was his favourite song. That’s when I knew he was a twunt
    Thought it was Tangled up in Blue? ISTR that was his Desert Island choice.
    Sorry. One of. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eton_Rifles
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    I hope nobody sponsors a poor kid...cos you are now a racist and have a colonist attitude.

    https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/may/31/sponsor-a-child-schemes-attacked-for-perpetuating-racist-attitudes
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758
    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    I read this USSR account some time ago. Fascinating that they formally record three Russian military personnel being killed by “them”. From memory, the account said that when they were threatened, the humanoids created a current that sucked the humans to the surface giving them the bends. Three died but there were multiple survivors.

    A very odd story to concoct and put in the military archives.
    Or they screwed up and strayed into a vertical current that they had been warned about. Choice: boss we screwed up and 3 died. Or boss: there were these weird aliens that zapped us…

    In soviet Russia…
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,761

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
    But they had Deepti Gurdasani predicting thousands of deaths, doom and gloom, and close everything now

    And did not say she was a member of the Independent Sage group
    Across the media they are running...third wave its here....lock up your daughters.

    Its the classic media circle jerk...one person claims something and instantly it is reported across 20 outlets as fact.
    Deepti Gurdasani
    @dgurdasani1
    ·
    1h
    The point I'm trying to make is that it's clear that even if we move forward as we are, and don't open up further on June 21st, we're still likely to face a wave exceeding Jan - so postponing June 21st isn't sufficient. And distracts from the urgent need to act now.

    (my bold)
  • isamisam Posts: 41,118

    Stalky Piers has got a new mark(le) I see






    She just quit the tournament!
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    One thing that is always worth noting...all these Independent SAGErs are working on the public data. Actual SAGE / government get to see much richer data and sooner.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    Charles said:

    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    I read this USSR account some time ago. Fascinating that they formally record three Russian military personnel being killed by “them”. From memory, the account said that when they were threatened, the humanoids created a current that sucked the humans to the surface giving them the bends. Three died but there were multiple survivors.

    A very odd story to concoct and put in the military archives.
    Or they screwed up and strayed into a vertical current that they had been warned about. Choice: boss we screwed up and 3 died. Or boss: there were these weird aliens that zapped us…

    In soviet Russia…
    I am generally persuadable that there is weird stuff out there, but I'm deeply suspicious of humanoid aliens. Too star trek for me.
  • isamisam Posts: 41,118

    dixiedean said:

    Am unable to come up with a pun for epsil

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    Cameron said “Eton rifles” was his favourite song. That’s when I knew he was a twunt
    Thought it was Tangled up in Blue? ISTR that was his Desert Island choice.
    Sorry. One of. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eton_Rifles
    Have to agree with DC there really
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,761

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    I believe they claim the Secondary Infection Rate is 67% higher than Kent.
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 27,919
    BigRich said:

    MaxPB said:

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    It's being portrayed as a scientific consensus on one side versus desperate to open businesses on the other. The fact that no such scientific consensus exists is completely by-the-by. Sensationalising the situation clearly makes for an easier to understand and more exciting story for hacks to tell, and both the TV and the papers are at it.
    The science zero covid cultists have lashed themselves to the Indian mast now. When the apocalypse doesn't arrive in July can we expect the media to finally start ignoring them?
    No, the media will need their latest helping of doom porn to drive their 24h news channels. Sky and the BBC are absolutely awful for this, Sky especially so. They think they exist to create the news as if they were an actualised version of Elliott Carver's news agency. They think that their reporting should drive the national narrative so they constantly put out a stream of shit topped with horse manure swimming in a pool of pig shit.

    Every time these scientists come on TV their previous predictions should be announced before they start their latest bit of bullshit. Eventually they'll just stop coming on as their credibility drains away.
    Will the launch of GB News change things?

    Don't know, but I hope so.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKBx80WayjA
    Is Andrew Neil still stuck at home in France, as claimed by the Express?

    GB News chaos as Andrew Neil's flagship show to be broadcast from FRANCE
    GB NEWS seems to already be in chaos as the mastermind behind the network, Andrew Neil, is reportedly stranded in France ahead of the channel going live on air next month.

    https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/1442682/GB-News-chaos-Andrew-Neil-stranded-France-latest-news-launch-date-video

  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    dixiedean said:

    Am unable to come up with a pun for epsil

    isam said:

    isam said:

    kinabalu said:

    isam said:

    Opinium lead 23rd April: 11
    Opinium lead 30th April: 5
    Opinium lead 14th May: 13
    Opinium lead 28th May: 6
    Opinium lead Xth June: ???

    Opinium looks particularly susceptible to the short-term impact of stories that receive saturation coverage in the media - Wallpapergate and Cummingsgate II most recently (like World Wars, we've started numbering them!). Then the saturation coverage ends and the long-term trend reasserts itself. YouGov, by contrast, astutely filters out the most highly-engaged voters and so tends to avoid the whiplash effect produced by the volatile moods of the obsessives following every syllable of the proceedings:

    The fact YouGov do that is great. I think it makes them the best pollsters.

    But, given the worst poll for the Tories has them with a 30 seat majority, how is Con Maj EVS?
    Should be 4/6 for me.

    Starmer does like The Jam btw. He especially likes the album of theirs which you said is your favourite. The one you mentioned the other day. He loves that album too.
    Oh jolly good. Doesn't make any difference though

    My Dad bought me a book for Christmas called "To Be Someone" by Ian D Stone. This IDS is a massive Jam fan and also a massive Arsenal fan, so two big ticks from me, he is in the good books in that respect. Also, my Dad has bought me the book, so I am motivated to read, and enjoy, it. It's the story of a teenager growing up in London supporting the Arsenal and loving The Jam, what's not to like?

    A couple of chapters in. getting a real modern left comedian vibe, not making me laugh, but making 'clever'; points. Then, a dig at Brexiteers, comparing Brexit to the numbskullery of the NF in the 70s - tough to take, but I plough on.

    Then starts a chapter by stating "Paul Weller was in his mid 20s when he wrote 'I Got By in Time' " - I KNOW Weller was a teenager when that song was released, but I check wiki anyway, hoping against hope to be wrong...

    No, I am right. I put the book back on the shelf and move on.

    So many ex-ukippers I know love The Jam. A few lines from them kept me going whenever everything looked shit in my life.

    Going to the gigs gave a lot of people a true sense of community. The fact they were from Woking, as nondescript a town as there is, seems important in what they meant.
    UKIPpers were "Saturday's Kids"

    https://thejam.org.uk/home/the-songs-lyrics/the-jam-saturdays-kids-lyrics
    I like the idea of mapping Jam songs to various cohorts of voters.

    Thankfully Nick Griffin and the Set the House Ablaze lads died a death.

    Which politicians align with David Watts and Billy Hunt. Cammo and Bozo?
    Cameron said “Eton rifles” was his favourite song. That’s when I knew he was a twunt
    Thought it was Tangled up in Blue? ISTR that was his Desert Island choice.
    Fuck, something he was right about.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    edited May 2021

    BigRich said:

    MaxPB said:

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    It's being portrayed as a scientific consensus on one side versus desperate to open businesses on the other. The fact that no such scientific consensus exists is completely by-the-by. Sensationalising the situation clearly makes for an easier to understand and more exciting story for hacks to tell, and both the TV and the papers are at it.
    The science zero covid cultists have lashed themselves to the Indian mast now. When the apocalypse doesn't arrive in July can we expect the media to finally start ignoring them?
    No, the media will need their latest helping of doom porn to drive their 24h news channels. Sky and the BBC are absolutely awful for this, Sky especially so. They think they exist to create the news as if they were an actualised version of Elliott Carver's news agency. They think that their reporting should drive the national narrative so they constantly put out a stream of shit topped with horse manure swimming in a pool of pig shit.

    Every time these scientists come on TV their previous predictions should be announced before they start their latest bit of bullshit. Eventually they'll just stop coming on as their credibility drains away.
    Will the launch of GB News change things?

    Don't know, but I hope so.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKBx80WayjA
    Is Andrew Neil still stuck at home in France, as claimed by the Express?

    GB News chaos as Andrew Neil's flagship show to be broadcast from FRANCE
    GB NEWS seems to already be in chaos as the mastermind behind the network, Andrew Neil, is reportedly stranded in France ahead of the channel going live on air next month.

    https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/1442682/GB-News-chaos-Andrew-Neil-stranded-France-latest-news-launch-date-video

    How is he stranded? The media have never been stopped from travelling.
  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,612
    alex_ said:

    France: 1200 positive tested cases, 126 deaths in hospitals.

    Italy 1800 and 82, Germany 2100 and 89

    Can we now conclude quite clearly that the French (and others) simply aren't testing any one on anything like the scale of the UK, and the idea that the UK is the current concerning "hotspot" in Europe is simply nonsense?

    According to world in data the UK's current tests per 1000 are approximately three times that of France and Italy, seven times that of Germany and Spain, ten times that of Poland and fifteen times that of Romania.

    https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-testing
  • Black_RookBlack_Rook Posts: 8,905
    alex_ said:

    France: 1200 positive tested cases, 126 deaths in hospitals.

    Italy 1800 and 82, Germany 2100 and 89

    Can we now conclude quite clearly that the French (and others) simply aren't testing any one on anything like the scale of the UK, and the idea that the UK is the current concerning "hotspot" in Europe is simply nonsense?

    You do have to wonder, with the amount of time so many of these advanced industrialised countries have had to ramp up their testing and yet seem not to have bothered to do so, whether they are failing to look for cases, and especially for novel variants, so that they don't have to report them and account for their existence within their borders?

    According to Our World in Data, here are the current number of tests undertaken per confirmed case of Covid-19 in a selection of countries:

    Australia: 4,466.0
    Israel: 1,165.9
    Malta: 478.2
    UK: 379.7
    Vietnam: 204.0
    Denmark: 160.2
    Portugal: 86.9
    Zimbabwe: 58.3
    Italy: 57.8
    Ireland: 43.5
    Zambia: 32.3
    France: 30.3
    US: 29.4
    Germany: 17.2

    It's a total piss-take, basically.
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,487

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    I believe they claim the Secondary Infection Rate is 67% higher than Kent.
    From memory, I think Kent was due to the longer pre-symptomatic period (so you have it and spread it for longer without knowing) rather than it developing superpowers to punch through walls and masks.

    The virus wants to go undetected for as long as possible. That way it survives longer and replicates more.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,429
    edited May 2021
    IshmaelZ said:

    Charles said:

    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    I read this USSR account some time ago. Fascinating that they formally record three Russian military personnel being killed by “them”. From memory, the account said that when they were threatened, the humanoids created a current that sucked the humans to the surface giving them the bends. Three died but there were multiple survivors.

    A very odd story to concoct and put in the military archives.
    Or they screwed up and strayed into a vertical current that they had been warned about. Choice: boss we screwed up and 3 died. Or boss: there were these weird aliens that zapped us…

    In soviet Russia…
    I am generally persuadable that there is weird stuff out there, but I'm deeply suspicious of humanoid aliens. Too star trek for me.
    Aliens: who the fuck knows. So mad it is incomprehensible

    However, what we can look at, and what is within the realms of our comprehension, is political behaviour in the USA vis-a-vis this same topic

    Look at how the reactions of US presidents to queries on this have changed, or stayed the same

    https://twitter.com/zcichy/status/1399416232814678021?s=20


    Body language is key. As well as the evolution. I think they do know something which is at least disturbing, and the urge to tell us has grown
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,595

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    I wonder of Jezza managed to get to twickers today and finally get his jab?
  • isamisam Posts: 41,118
    edited May 2021

    Stalky Piers has got a new mark(le) I see






    Anyone associated with Piers Morgan in the not too distant future deserves to be tainted by this 😝
  • ChameleonChameleon Posts: 4,264

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
    But they had Deepti Gurdasani predicting thousands of deaths, doom and gloom, and close everything now

    And did not say she was a member of the Independent Sage group
    Across the media they are running...third wave its here....lock up your daughters.

    Its the classic media circle jerk...one person claims something and instantly it is reported across 20 outlets as fact.
    Deepti Gurdasani
    @dgurdasani1
    ·
    1h
    The point I'm trying to make is that it's clear that even if we move forward as we are, and don't open up further on June 21st, we're still likely to face a wave exceeding Jan - so postponing June 21st isn't sufficient. And distracts from the urgent need to act now.

    (my bold)
    It's probably for the best that I'm extremely unlikely to meet these people in a social setting. They're right towards the top of the list of people that I detest in this country.
  • RobDRobD Posts: 59,930

    BigRich said:

    MaxPB said:

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    It's being portrayed as a scientific consensus on one side versus desperate to open businesses on the other. The fact that no such scientific consensus exists is completely by-the-by. Sensationalising the situation clearly makes for an easier to understand and more exciting story for hacks to tell, and both the TV and the papers are at it.
    The science zero covid cultists have lashed themselves to the Indian mast now. When the apocalypse doesn't arrive in July can we expect the media to finally start ignoring them?
    No, the media will need their latest helping of doom porn to drive their 24h news channels. Sky and the BBC are absolutely awful for this, Sky especially so. They think they exist to create the news as if they were an actualised version of Elliott Carver's news agency. They think that their reporting should drive the national narrative so they constantly put out a stream of shit topped with horse manure swimming in a pool of pig shit.

    Every time these scientists come on TV their previous predictions should be announced before they start their latest bit of bullshit. Eventually they'll just stop coming on as their credibility drains away.
    Will the launch of GB News change things?

    Don't know, but I hope so.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKBx80WayjA
    Is Andrew Neil still stuck at home in France, as claimed by the Express?

    GB News chaos as Andrew Neil's flagship show to be broadcast from FRANCE
    GB NEWS seems to already be in chaos as the mastermind behind the network, Andrew Neil, is reportedly stranded in France ahead of the channel going live on air next month.

    https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/1442682/GB-News-chaos-Andrew-Neil-stranded-France-latest-news-launch-date-video

    How is he stranded? The media have never been stopped from travelling.
    That’s what you get for using the Express as a source.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    isam said:

    Stalky Piers has got a new mark(le) I see






    Anyone associated with Piers Morgan in the not too distant future deserves to be tainted by this 😝
    Piers Moron will be back...no matter what the scandal, so how he always finds a way back. Most normal people who have had just one of the scandals he has been involved would be, would be finished.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,595
    alex_ said:

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
    And all of this says absolutely NOTHING about hospitalisations and deaths, which is the WHOLE POINT of the basis for the roadmap - vaccines decoupling case numbers from serious illness!
    A worse wave than January - after 3/4 of adults have had one jab and a half have had both.

    Excuse me, but I think there is A FUCKING GREAT BIG FLAW somewhere in their model. Unless they are suggesting having the vaccine is actually the vector for that next wave....
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    edited May 2021

    alex_ said:

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
    And all of this says absolutely NOTHING about hospitalisations and deaths, which is the WHOLE POINT of the basis for the roadmap - vaccines decoupling case numbers from serious illness!
    A worse wave than January - after 3/4 of adults have had one jab and a half have had both.

    Excuse me, but I think there is A FUCKING GREAT BIG FLAW somewhere in their model. Unless they are suggesting having the vaccine is actually the vector for that next wave....
    They are the zero covid equivalent of the other Gupta...who even in the past week was still claiming they thought in mid 2020 there was 50% or more who had had COVID and we had reached herd immunity for the summer season.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 48,706

    I hope nobody sponsors a poor kid...cos you are now a racist and have a colonist attitude.

    https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/may/31/sponsor-a-child-schemes-attacked-for-perpetuating-racist-attitudes

    The article cites:

    "A study on the impact of child sponsorship in four countries – Columbia, the Philippines, Uganda and Burkina Faso – for Plan International in 2008, found several problems, including high management costs and staff concerns over “paternalistic tendencies” of the funding model. It also found unequal distribution of gifts and letters had led to “anxiety, jealousy and disappointment” in children and an erosion of trust."

    Hence the move away from sponsorship. I support a number of development charities, but have long thought "sponsorship" a bit odd.

    This article from 1982 shows that such concerns have been around for a long time:

    https://newint.org/features/1982/05/01/keynote
  • Casino_RoyaleCasino_Royale Posts: 60,487
    Leon said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Charles said:

    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    I read this USSR account some time ago. Fascinating that they formally record three Russian military personnel being killed by “them”. From memory, the account said that when they were threatened, the humanoids created a current that sucked the humans to the surface giving them the bends. Three died but there were multiple survivors.

    A very odd story to concoct and put in the military archives.
    Or they screwed up and strayed into a vertical current that they had been warned about. Choice: boss we screwed up and 3 died. Or boss: there were these weird aliens that zapped us…

    In soviet Russia…
    I am generally persuadable that there is weird stuff out there, but I'm deeply suspicious of humanoid aliens. Too star trek for me.
    Aliens: who the fuck knows. So mad it is incomprehensible

    However, what we can look at, and what is within the realms of our comprehension, is political behaviour in the USA vis-a-vis this same topic

    Look at how the reactions of US presidents to queries on this have changed, or stayed the same

    https://twitter.com/zcichy/status/1399416232814678021?s=20


    Body language is key. As well as the evolution. I think they do know something which is at least disturbing, and the urge to tell us has grown
    God, Hillary Clinton even manages to annoy me in that clip when she's trying to be "folksy". It's just something about her; the voice, the mannerisms, the eyes, the lack of humour.. ugh.

    By contrast, George W Bush easily comes across as the most relatable. Even more than Obama.

    I see why he was elected President.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518

    alex_ said:

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
    And all of this says absolutely NOTHING about hospitalisations and deaths, which is the WHOLE POINT of the basis for the roadmap - vaccines decoupling case numbers from serious illness!
    A worse wave than January - after 3/4 of adults have had one jab and a half have had both.

    Excuse me, but I think there is A FUCKING GREAT BIG FLAW somewhere in their model. Unless they are suggesting having the vaccine is actually the vector for that next wave....
    Perhaps somebody accidentally added a 0 to the UK population into the model...
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    edited May 2021
    Foxy said:

    I hope nobody sponsors a poor kid...cos you are now a racist and have a colonist attitude.

    https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/may/31/sponsor-a-child-schemes-attacked-for-perpetuating-racist-attitudes

    The article cites:

    "A study on the impact of child sponsorship in four countries – Columbia, the Philippines, Uganda and Burkina Faso – for Plan International in 2008, found several problems, including high management costs and staff concerns over “paternalistic tendencies” of the funding model. It also found unequal distribution of gifts and letters had led to “anxiety, jealousy and disappointment” in children and an erosion of trust."

    Hence the move away from sponsorship. I support a number of development charities, but have long thought "sponsorship" a bit odd.

    This article from 1982 shows that such concerns have been around for a long time:

    https://newint.org/features/1982/05/01/keynote
    Which isn't the same as claiming it perpetrates racist and colonist attitudes. That is arguing it is a sub optimal way of giving, which I can believe
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,761
    edited May 2021

    alex_ said:

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
    And all of this says absolutely NOTHING about hospitalisations and deaths, which is the WHOLE POINT of the basis for the roadmap - vaccines decoupling case numbers from serious illness!
    A worse wave than January - after 3/4 of adults have had one jab and a half have had both.

    Excuse me, but I think there is A FUCKING GREAT BIG FLAW somewhere in their model. Unless they are suggesting having the vaccine is actually the vector for that next wave....


    Here is the kind of calc they are coming up with (there's a graph):



    Prof. Christina Pagel
    @chrischirp
    ·
    7h
    If we ended up with 3x as many cases - say 7 million - then even though vaccination continues to protect massively, we could still have about same number of hosp admissions as winter (115K) and a lot of deaths (15K).

    https://twitter.com/chrischirp/status/1399366973990096896
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,595

    alex_ said:

    France: 1200 positive tested cases, 126 deaths in hospitals.

    Italy 1800 and 82, Germany 2100 and 89

    Can we now conclude quite clearly that the French (and others) simply aren't testing any one on anything like the scale of the UK, and the idea that the UK is the current concerning "hotspot" in Europe is simply nonsense?

    You do have to wonder, with the amount of time so many of these advanced industrialised countries have had to ramp up their testing and yet seem not to have bothered to do so, whether they are failing to look for cases, and especially for novel variants, so that they don't have to report them and account for their existence within their borders?

    According to Our World in Data, here are the current number of tests undertaken per confirmed case of Covid-19 in a selection of countries:

    Australia: 4,466.0
    Israel: 1,165.9
    Malta: 478.2
    UK: 379.7
    Vietnam: 204.0
    Denmark: 160.2
    Portugal: 86.9
    Zimbabwe: 58.3
    Italy: 57.8
    Ireland: 43.5
    Zambia: 32.3
    France: 30.3
    US: 29.4
    Germany: 17.2

    It's a total piss-take, basically.
    When Zambia's testing is better than that of France, that is not a piss-take. It is an intentional regime from a President desperate not to have the people know the extent of the epidemic which has occurred on his watch.

    Oh, and who has an upcoming election.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    I know it's very concentrated among the under-20s (though the rise was concentrated there too) but the Bolton cases seemingly now being in decline doesn't seem to have received very much attention. Am I missing something?


    https://twitter.com/Birdyword/status/1399376685493940234?s=20
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,749
    IshmaelZ said:

    Charles said:

    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    That's it. We've solved the aliens question

    They live IN LAKE BAIKAL. And they are three metre high humanoids in silvery suits

    "Another incident cited involved six unknown objects that followed a nuclear submarine in the Pacific. When the sub surfaced, so did the objects — which then lifted themselves out of the water and flew away.

    "In perhaps the most compelling account, military divers in Siberia's Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake, encountered "a group of humanoid creatures dressed in silvery suits" at a depth of 160 feet. Three humans died during the ensuing chase."

    https://www.foxnews.com/story/russian-navy-reveals-its-secret-ufo-encounters


    Almost as intriguing, the objects in the lake behave exactly like the objects viewed, filmed and caught on radar by the USS Omaha in 2019....

    I read this USSR account some time ago. Fascinating that they formally record three Russian military personnel being killed by “them”. From memory, the account said that when they were threatened, the humanoids created a current that sucked the humans to the surface giving them the bends. Three died but there were multiple survivors.

    A very odd story to concoct and put in the military archives.
    Or they screwed up and strayed into a vertical current that they had been warned about. Choice: boss we screwed up and 3 died. Or boss: there were these weird aliens that zapped us…

    In soviet Russia…
    I am generally persuadable that there is weird stuff out there, but I'm deeply suspicious of humanoid aliens. Too star trek for me.
    Most of us have for years looked at all the ufo stories with apathy, or sometimes amusement at the creative quality of the hoaxer.

    But... an interesting thing happens when you make the mental leap that the US government is probably not lying when it indicates non human technology over its air space. You are forced to reconsider the stories that have little or no evidence, as the probability that some of them are true has substantially increased in the last year.

  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 62,761

    One thing that is always worth noting...all these Independent SAGErs are working on the public data. Actual SAGE / government get to see much richer data and sooner.

    I dont think they actually care about the data...
    one of them is very interested in five year tractor production stats.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518
    Here's the other thing. If anybody in SAGE was serious in believing this "massive July peak idea", if it were even half plausible, wouldn't we be hearing stories about all NHS leave being cancelled for 2 months time, and everyone being told to go on holiday now whilst there's still time? Regardless of Government decisions on restrictions. We wouldn't be getting NHS CEOs being quoted as saying "the NHS will get overwhelmed if COVID cases in individual hospitals go over 10"
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 82,080
    edited May 2021

    alex_ said:

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
    And all of this says absolutely NOTHING about hospitalisations and deaths, which is the WHOLE POINT of the basis for the roadmap - vaccines decoupling case numbers from serious illness!
    A worse wave than January - after 3/4 of adults have had one jab and a half have had both.

    Excuse me, but I think there is A FUCKING GREAT BIG FLAW somewhere in their model. Unless they are suggesting having the vaccine is actually the vector for that next wave....


    Here is the kind of calc they are coming up with (there's a graph):



    Prof. Christina Pagel
    @chrischirp
    ·
    7h
    If we ended up with 3x as many cases - say 7 million - then even though vaccination continues to protect massively, we could still have about same number of hosp admissions as winter (115K) and a lot of deaths (15K).

    https://twitter.com/chrischirp/status/1399366973990096896
    7 million.....where is the virus going to find 7 million peoppe to infect?
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 17,428

    alex_ said:

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
    And all of this says absolutely NOTHING about hospitalisations and deaths, which is the WHOLE POINT of the basis for the roadmap - vaccines decoupling case numbers from serious illness!
    A worse wave than January - after 3/4 of adults have had one jab and a half have had both.

    Excuse me, but I think there is A FUCKING GREAT BIG FLAW somewhere in their model. Unless they are suggesting having the vaccine is actually the vector for that next wave....


    Here is the kind of calc they are coming up with (there's a graph):



    Prof. Christina Pagel
    @chrischirp
    ·
    7h
    If we ended up with 3x as many cases - say 7 million - then even though vaccination continues to protect massively, we could still have about same number of hosp admissions as winter (115K) and a lot of deaths (15K).

    https://twitter.com/chrischirp/status/1399366973990096896
    Insane. Half the adult population have have two jabs, pretty much not gonna get it at all, let alone seriously ill. In three weeks we’ll be even better placed. Their numbers are utter, utter shite.
  • alex_alex_ Posts: 7,518

    I know it's very concentrated among the under-20s (though the rise was concentrated there too) but the Bolton cases seemingly now being in decline doesn't seem to have received very much attention. Am I missing something?


    https://twitter.com/Birdyword/status/1399376685493940234?s=20

    Quite - Bolton has had it's massive third wave, through a relatively unvaccinated population, and the impact on hospitalisations and deaths was...?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 55,429

    alex_ said:

    Prof Ravi Gupta, from the University of Cambridge, said although new cases were "relatively low" the Indian variant had fuelled "exponential growth".


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57304515

    Is it "fuelling exponential growth" because:

    i) It's inherently more infectious, or
    ii) it's affecting communities with lower vaccination rates or
    iii) it's affecting communities with higher levels of intergenerational housing or
    iv) Because we're testing extensively in these communities we're finding more of it?

    I don't think we know yet, do we?

    v) all of the above? Which makes getting a handle on its "exponential growth" damned near impossible with so many variables.
    And all of this says absolutely NOTHING about hospitalisations and deaths, which is the WHOLE POINT of the basis for the roadmap - vaccines decoupling case numbers from serious illness!
    A worse wave than January - after 3/4 of adults have had one jab and a half have had both.

    Excuse me, but I think there is A FUCKING GREAT BIG FLAW somewhere in their model. Unless they are suggesting having the vaccine is actually the vector for that next wave....


    Here is the kind of calc they are coming up with (there's a graph):



    Prof. Christina Pagel
    @chrischirp
    ·
    7h
    If we ended up with 3x as many cases - say 7 million - then even though vaccination continues to protect massively, we could still have about same number of hosp admissions as winter (115K) and a lot of deaths (15K).

    https://twitter.com/chrischirp/status/1399366973990096896
    15K deaths is a bad flu season. Which is not great, but it is a bad flu season. We don't lock down the country for that

    At some point we just have to accept we have a nasty new illness in our midst which will kill many, and put a lot of people in bed for weeks, but it isn't any reason to cease normal human society and business. And therapies will get better. Enough
  • BigRichBigRich Posts: 3,492
    alex_ said:

    Good evening

    Just returned home and switched on the 9.00 o clock news

    And predictably both Sky and BBC using the same zero covid scientists even one saying it is going to overwhelm the hospitals

    They need putting in their box as it is becoming quite ridiculous

    In fairness the BBC News channel had a NERVTAG scientist on who said "it's too soon to say and in two weeks we'll have two weeks' more data" - which is the government line.

    The "scrap June 21 now" crowd should be asked "what's wrong with waiting two more weeks to decide"?
    They're trying hard to move the needle towards tightening restrictions. It's no good to their case (if they're wrong) if we continue as we are (even without further relaxation). Because if increases in cases is exponential now, then we get to see how it all plays out and proves them right or wrong.

    If we reverse the opening up we've already done, then they can always say that it was these actions that meant "disaster averted".
    I did a little maths with the COVID Hospitalisations, what this 'exponential' growth will soon over run.

    yesterday 133 people where hospitalised, and week on week cases have grown by 23.2%

    if we round that up to 25% and take no account of additional vaccine jabs, or the improving weather,

    Then how long before the hospitals are overrun? well its 15 weeks, or 105 days before we are at the level of new addmitions we had in January, when the hospitals we busy but not 'over-run'

    We have time to wait and see the full effect of vaccination.
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