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Let's make America smart again

Argumemnon said:
Yeah but I can see his point.



Here you have a point, however. If it's impossible to tell how much one lies no matter what your sample is, it should follow that you can't tell who's thin-skinned either, and I do remember that thread.
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No, he doesn't have a point (and neither do you). The whole thin-skinned narcissist discussion was about an opinion that both Ziggurat and I held. We never claimed that our shared opinion was proven in a scientific way, or that it was even possible to prove. In fact, much of the discussion in that thread concerned the unfairness of our antagonists demanding something akin to scientific proof for an opinion gleaned from thousands of hours of subjective observation. Something that is almost never demanded around here of liberals expressing negative opinions about conservatives. Unsurprisingly, when both of us admitted that we thought that Trump was a narcissist, nobody demanded "evidence."

What started this little digression was your implication that there was scientific proof that Trump lies more than Clinton. IIRC, you even claimed that Trump lied 71% of the time, which I think even you would admit now is simply absurd in that it implies a precision which is both impossible and also wholly meaningless, given that some lies are not only harmless but might even be considered necessary and responsible.

I do consider Trump a liar. I have no doubt that Ziggurat does too. Does it bother me? Sure. But not as much as Hillary Clinton's lying does. You might ask "why?" I've explained this before. I think Trump's lies are transparent, and represent little more than rhetorical flourish. Almost a verbal tic driven by his own narcissism and inability to admit error. Hillary Clinton's lies, however, are much more difficult to judge. It often takes the uncovering of more evidence over months or even years to establish that her lies were really lies. Even worse, a significant fraction of the people will continue to believe her lies. Almost nobody believes Trump's lies. As has been said many times, his supporters take him seriously, but not literally.
 
sunmaster14 said:
No, he doesn't have a point (and neither do you). The whole thin-skinned narcissist discussion was about an opinion that both Ziggurat and I held.
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Yes but the question was whether the opinion was based on objective evidence, which by Zig's logic here he couldn't possibly have. If it was a gut feeling, then it wouldn't have been so strongly defended in that thread. "It's just a feeling I have" wasn't the argument. We were told that there was a lot of evidence to support that conclusion. Now you are pretending otherwise.

What started this little digression was your implication that there was scientific proof that Trump lies more than Clinton.
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I never said or implied this. I said that it had been shown. I never mentioned science in any way, shape or form, because I'm well aware that the sample can't really be controlled. I'm pretty sure you know this.

IIRC, you even claimed that Trump lied 71% of the time, which I think even you would admit now is simply absurd in that it implies a precision which is both impossible and also wholly meaningless
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I didn't claim that. Politifact determined that 71% of the Trump statements they checked were lies. That is a fact. The only question is about the sampling.

given that some lies are not only harmless but might even be considered necessary and responsible.
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What a load of crock. That is just an excuse to ignore dishonesty by Trump. In what way would lying to your voters be "necessary" or "responsible"?

I do consider Trump a liar. I have no doubt that Ziggurat does too. Does it bother me? Sure. But not as much as Hillary Clinton's lying does. You might ask "why?" I've explained this before. I think Trump's lies are transparent, and represent little more than rhetorical flourish. Almost a verbal tic driven by his own narcissism and inability to admit error. Hillary Clinton's lies, however, are much more difficult to judge.
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...to the point that she's often accused of lying without any evidence that she is. It doesn't bother you as much that Trump lies constantly, so much so that you have no idea what his opinions or policies are?
 
Argumemnon said:
<snip>

I never said or implied this. I said that it had been shown. I never mentioned science in any way, shape or form, because I'm well aware that the sample can't really be controlled. I'm pretty sure you know this.
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Of course you did, as I'll show below.


I didn't claim that. Politifact determined that 71% of the Trump statements they checked were lies. That is a fact. The only question is about the sampling.
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The problem of sampling makes the statistic almost meaningless. In any case, you wrote this:

Argumemnon said:
<snip>


http://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/

71% of Trump's checked statements were lies. Hillary's record is a lot better. Ergo she is the lesser liar.
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Note the conclusion. You presented the fact about the results of Politifact's sampling (which isn't even a fact because many of Politifact's judgments are biased) and drew a completely unjustified conclusion. Is the factoid about Politifact's results evidence in favor of your proposition? Sure. Pretty damn weak evidence, but certainly positive. But you made it clear you thought it was dispositive.
 
sunmaster14 said:
Of course you did, as I'll show below.
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Having a conclusion doesn't imply science in any way shape or form. If you think it does, you simply don't understand how arguments and evidence work. I would like you to retract your accusation that I claimed there was scientific proof.

The problem of sampling makes the statistic almost meaningless.
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Yes, we've already had this conversation with Ziggurat and you'll notice that I've agreed with him.
 
wareyin said:
Not reliable? Are you now claiming that what Politifact claims is a lie is not a lie?
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What part of the word "sampling" do you not understand? Evidently all of it.

Politifact's sampling is unreliable even if we assume (and it is an assumption) that their evaluation of each individual sample is perfect.

What lengths people will go to in order to not question their own biases.
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Ironic.

You have done the work? Or it's too much work to do?
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Sorry, ambiguous phrasing. Of course I have refused to follow up on it. Yes, it's too much work. Isn't that the reason you haven't done it?
 
wareyin said:
In other words, having his cake and eating it, too. He rejects this evidence because it is potentially biased, but also claims that it is impossible to ensure an unbiased sample. As I said before, it's just an excuse to ignore evidence that would challenge his bias.
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Once again you cannot challenge my argument that Politifact's sampling is not reliable. But despite having no reason to accept its sampling as representative, you still want me to because... reasons.

And I never said it was impossible to do good sampling. It's hard, though, and furthermore I don't even think it's worth the effort. And that's why I don't blame Politifact for not trying.

Supposing hypothetical candidate A lies 10% of the time, but they lie about the things you care about the most. Candidate B lies 20% of the time, but they lie about things you don't care about. Which candidate has a bigger honesty problem for you? Candidate A, obviously, even though candidate B lies more often. There's a large subjective component here, and justifiably so because we don't all have the same priorities. Why should we treat all lies as being the same? Well, we shouldn't, obviously. Furthermore we need not (and will not) always agree on which lies are more serious, because we do not have identical values.

So if you were to say that you are bothered more by Trump's lies than by Hillary's lies, that's a perfectly valid position. I have no basis on which to challenge it. But you don't need to resort to meaningless statistics to draw that conclusion.
 
Argumemnon said:
Having a conclusion doesn't imply science in any way shape or form. If you think it does, you simply don't understand how arguments and evidence work. I would like you to retract your accusation that I claimed there was scientific proof.
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I never accused you of claiming there was scientific proof. I accused you of implying it. Which I stand by. I would like you to retract your accusation that I accused you of claiming there was scientific proof. And I won't post again until you do, or until I feel like posting again.
 
sunmaster14 said:
I never accused you of claiming there was scientific proof. I accused you of implying it.
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Since you can find "implications" in anything you read or hear without having to show some sort of reasoning for it, I'm still asking you to demonstrate the existence of this implication.

I would like you to retract your accusation that I accused you of claiming there was scientific proof.
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An implied claim is a claim. My post was accurate.
 
caveman1917 said:
In principle you could account for every statement ever made by the person under consideration. In practice? Forget it.
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You could try to tally all of their statements during debates or interviews, but it would be a colossal undertaking, if a possible one.

Huh, there you go. I just found a "good" way to do it. Any takers?
 
Argumemnon said:
You could try to tally all of their statements during debates or interviews, but it would be a colossal undertaking, if a possible one.

Huh, there you go. I just found a "good" way to do it. Any takers?
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Apart from being mostly facetious, what I proposed in my post has a problem - you might not be able to check veracity of statements. If one candidate lies a lot on verifiable things whereas another lies a lot on unverifiable things, then you could still reach the wrong conclusions.
 
caveman1917 said:
Apart from being mostly facetious, what I proposed in my post has a problem - you might not be able to check veracity of statements. If one candidate lies a lot on verifiable things whereas another lies a lot on unverifiable things, then you could still reach the wrong conclusions.
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Yeah, well every method has its limits, but you could also mention in your results the number of unverifiable claims.
 
caveman1917 said:
In principle you could account for every statement ever made by the person under consideration. In practice? Forget it.
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actually you could not, because it is impossible weigh objectively.

Case in point, Donald Trump tells many small fibs, Hillary Clinton tells many monstrous lies.

Hillary is in it for the long con, fortunately the electorate was "smart" enough" to see through it last week.
 
Argumemnon said:
You could try to tally all of their statements during debates or interviews, but it would be a colossal undertaking, if a possible one.
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Yes, it would be a colossal undertaking. That magnitude of effort is what makes it not a good method. Like trying to fill a bathtub with a thimble: it's possible, but why the hell would you ever want to try?
 
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