I’m curious what your theory is for why Ron Paul supporters are especially prone to wishful thinking compared to supporters of other political candidates. Presumably you have some basis for deciding that Ron Paul supporters are either particularly prone to wishful thinking or more likely to express their wishful thinking on Intrade?
Where did taw say or imply that Ron Paul supporters are especially prone to wishful thinking compared to supporters of other political candidates?
(If he does think that they are particularly prone either to do it or to show it on Intrade, part of his “basis” might in fact be that 3.5% figure he quoted.)
It’s implied in his belief that the 3.5% probability is an over-estimate. He says that estimate is ‘clearly wishful thinking of Ron Paul supporters’. If that is true then Ron Paul supporters must either be more prone to wishful thinking than supporters of other candidates (if everyone was equally prone to wishful thinking then the biases should cancel out) or more likely to participate on Intrade. Either or both of these hypotheses may be true but I’m curious what the reasoning is.
Depending on taw’s theory to explain the Ron Paul bias he may be able to identify better arbitrage opportunities. If he believes that Ron Paul supporters are over-represented on Intrade for example then he should seek out other venues to place the other side of the bet to take advantage of the hedging opportunity described by Blueberry. Identify a venue where supporters of other candidates are over-represented and seek someone to take the bet at what he believes to be fair odds or at odds that underestimate Paul’s chances. Pocket the spread whoever wins.
He also suggests that Ron Paul supporters are trying to artificially pump estimates for Ron Paul and are willing to write off losses as a marketing expense. If this is more true for Ron Paul than it is for other candidates’ supporters then that suggests Ron Paul may have more dedicated supporters or wealthier supporters, both of which are tendencies that should in fact raise his probability of success given the nature of the US political system. Is he factoring that information into his own estimates?
Given your first paragraph, I think your question answers itself: his evidence is the 3.5% figure, which (for reasons unspecified) he considers an obvious overestimate.
There is something rather odd going on in this discussion, whose structure is as follows. A indicates belief in proposition p; B notices that p ⇒ q; B challenges A to supply evidence for q. This seems to presuppose that A’s belief in p is actually derived from a prior belief in q, since otherwise p would be the proposition to ask for evidence of; but when asked, B claims that s/he is only saying “A believes p, p ⇒ q, so A must believe q”. Which, by the by, is invalid if there’s any doubt about A’s agreeing that p ⇒ q. And, in this instance, there is plenty of scope for doubt about p ⇒ q: perhaps, for instance, Ron Paul supporters in general are no more prone to wishful thinking than anyone else, and no more prone to participate in Intrade, but there are one or two extremely determined and well-heeled ones.
The way I read his post it didn’t seem to me that he believed that the Intrade odds were an obvious overestimate for reasons unspecified. Rather it seemed that he proposed two possible reasons for the odds being overestimated. One was that the wishful thinking of Ron Paul supporters explained the overestimate, the other was that Ron Paul supporters were deliberately bidding up the market as a marketing exercise.
The weakness of the second explanation has already been pointed out. The first explanation is only an explanation at all if Ron Paul supporters are consistently more likely to be prone to wishful thinking than others. I was curious what taw’s reasons for believing that are.
It turns out that the explanation may be that all candidate’s supporters are prone to wishful thinking—we discussed in a separate thread the fact that Intrade appears to make it difficult to arbitrage consistent over-estimates of the odds of winning in this particular market. If that’s the case taw is probably right that the 3.5% is an overestimate for Ron Paul but was wrong to single out any one candidate as an example of a clear persistent overestimate in a prediction market.
I’m curious what your theory is for why Ron Paul supporters are especially prone to wishful thinking compared to supporters of other political candidates. Presumably you have some basis for deciding that Ron Paul supporters are either particularly prone to wishful thinking or more likely to express their wishful thinking on Intrade?
Where did taw say or imply that Ron Paul supporters are especially prone to wishful thinking compared to supporters of other political candidates?
(If he does think that they are particularly prone either to do it or to show it on Intrade, part of his “basis” might in fact be that 3.5% figure he quoted.)
It’s implied in his belief that the 3.5% probability is an over-estimate. He says that estimate is ‘clearly wishful thinking of Ron Paul supporters’. If that is true then Ron Paul supporters must either be more prone to wishful thinking than supporters of other candidates (if everyone was equally prone to wishful thinking then the biases should cancel out) or more likely to participate on Intrade. Either or both of these hypotheses may be true but I’m curious what the reasoning is.
Depending on taw’s theory to explain the Ron Paul bias he may be able to identify better arbitrage opportunities. If he believes that Ron Paul supporters are over-represented on Intrade for example then he should seek out other venues to place the other side of the bet to take advantage of the hedging opportunity described by Blueberry. Identify a venue where supporters of other candidates are over-represented and seek someone to take the bet at what he believes to be fair odds or at odds that underestimate Paul’s chances. Pocket the spread whoever wins.
He also suggests that Ron Paul supporters are trying to artificially pump estimates for Ron Paul and are willing to write off losses as a marketing expense. If this is more true for Ron Paul than it is for other candidates’ supporters then that suggests Ron Paul may have more dedicated supporters or wealthier supporters, both of which are tendencies that should in fact raise his probability of success given the nature of the US political system. Is he factoring that information into his own estimates?
Given your first paragraph, I think your question answers itself: his evidence is the 3.5% figure, which (for reasons unspecified) he considers an obvious overestimate.
There is something rather odd going on in this discussion, whose structure is as follows. A indicates belief in proposition p; B notices that p ⇒ q; B challenges A to supply evidence for q. This seems to presuppose that A’s belief in p is actually derived from a prior belief in q, since otherwise p would be the proposition to ask for evidence of; but when asked, B claims that s/he is only saying “A believes p, p ⇒ q, so A must believe q”. Which, by the by, is invalid if there’s any doubt about A’s agreeing that p ⇒ q. And, in this instance, there is plenty of scope for doubt about p ⇒ q: perhaps, for instance, Ron Paul supporters in general are no more prone to wishful thinking than anyone else, and no more prone to participate in Intrade, but there are one or two extremely determined and well-heeled ones.
The way I read his post it didn’t seem to me that he believed that the Intrade odds were an obvious overestimate for reasons unspecified. Rather it seemed that he proposed two possible reasons for the odds being overestimated. One was that the wishful thinking of Ron Paul supporters explained the overestimate, the other was that Ron Paul supporters were deliberately bidding up the market as a marketing exercise.
The weakness of the second explanation has already been pointed out. The first explanation is only an explanation at all if Ron Paul supporters are consistently more likely to be prone to wishful thinking than others. I was curious what taw’s reasons for believing that are.
It turns out that the explanation may be that all candidate’s supporters are prone to wishful thinking—we discussed in a separate thread the fact that Intrade appears to make it difficult to arbitrage consistent over-estimates of the odds of winning in this particular market. If that’s the case taw is probably right that the 3.5% is an overestimate for Ron Paul but was wrong to single out any one candidate as an example of a clear persistent overestimate in a prediction market.