O/T. The Government's handling of Covid

[ramAnag]

Only you could turn a lesson in numeracy into a polemic on the Brexit vote! So following your lead......

Percentage changes in percentages are a bit tricky to get your head round. lets try it in a way closer to home

In a hypothetical poll 52% voted in a particular way. if 10% more had voted this way, would the vote in favour of the decision have been

(a) 62% or (b) 57.2% or (c) still less than half ?

You or I might think (a). MA would think (b). Swale would think (c)

Sorry...I didn’t actually mean to do that. I was really talking about democracy...especially where single issue complexities are involved.
Does it ever work? I suspect not.

In answer to your question...I’d have thought 62% but then worried about agreeing with you and probably copied off MA...which is, coincidentally, what I did in my General Studies ‘A’ level. There were two 3hr papers...one was all ‘arty farty waffle’ which you’ll be unsurprised to know I excelled at. The other was science, maths and languages, which I was seriously bad at. Fortunately my mate, who’s surname was fortuitously directly before mine so he sat immediately in front of me, was the exact reverse and he put his papers where I could see his answers.
The outcome...I passed...he failed and an initial life lesson was learned. I became a teacher...he became an accountant.

[Geoff Parkstone]

Sorry...I didn’t actually mean to do that. I was really talking about democracy...especially where single issue complexities are involved.
Does it ever work? I suspect not.

In answer to your question...I’d have thought 62% but then worried about agreeing with you and probably copied off MA...which is, coincidentally, what I did in my General Studies ‘A’ level. There were two 3hr papers...one was all ‘arty farty waffle’ which you’ll be unsurprised to know I excelled at. The other was science, maths and languages, which I was seriously bad at. Fortunately my mate, who’s surname was fortuitously directly before mine so he sat immediately in front of me, was the exact reverse and he put his papers where I could see his answers.
The outcome...I passed...he failed and an initial life lesson was learned. I became a teacher...he became an accountant.

I guess the moral of the story is that his failure drove his ambition and led him on to greater things

[ramAnag]

I guess the moral of the story is that his failure drove his ambition and led him on to greater things

I think there are two...he learned that doing something out of the kindness of his heart didn’t pay and just devoted his life to counting...oh...and never let me teach maths.

[Geoff Parkstone]

in fact the moral is that neither of us should teach maths - you cant count and I cant teach

[Trickytreesreds]

Only you could turn a lesson in numeracy into a polemic on the Brexit vote! So following your lead......

Percentage changes in percentages are a bit tricky to get your head round. lets try it in a way closer to home

In a hypothetical poll 52% voted in a particular way. if 10% more had voted this way, would the vote in favour of the decision have been

(a) 62% or (b) 57.2% or (c) still less than half ?

You or I might think (a). MA would think (b). Swale would think (c)

get that man a gold fish
classic

[Geoff Parkstone]

oh don't go confuddling poor old rA any more

[Andy_Faber]

Does kind of illustrate a point about democracy though. I’m, allegedly, educated (to post graduate level) and relatively intelligent (debatable...I know) and I still don’t really get it. More complex numeracy is, as you know, not one of my strengths, in the same way as I might argue that morality and sensitivity aren’t yours. If that’s true of us then was there really any chance of the proletariat/electorate voting intelligently and with an informed voice over Brexit?

I made a similar point way back in the Brexit thread - as I recall I mentioned that a number of folk on my Facebook friends list asked me, as a known ‘clever tw@t’’ how they could make an informed decision and I responded that was no way of doing so on such a complex issue. I suggested they read up as much as they could on the single subject that mattered most to them and voted on that basis

[ramAnag]

I made a similar point way back in the Brexit thread - as I recall I mentioned that a number of folk on my Facebook friends list asked me, as a known ‘clever tw@t’’ how they could make an informed decision and I responded that was no way of doing so on such a complex issue. I suggested they read up as much as they could on the single subject that mattered most to them and voted on that basis

So, and this isn’t an attempt at discrediting THE Referendum...was there any point?

[Andy_Faber]

So, and this isn’t an attempt at discrediting THE Referendum...was there any point?

Many. Amongst which, The (slim) silent majority found their voice and the ‘powers that be’ at last realised that if they went too far, the ‘idiots’ would f@ck em over good and proper, regardless of party allegiance. Happened to the conservatives, happened to labour, happened to EU, indirectly it happened to the cosyness that was Obama politics

[swaledale]

Many. Amongst which, The (slim) silent majority found their voice and the ‘powers that be’ at last realised that if they went too far, the ‘idiots’ would f@ck em over good and proper, regardless of party allegiance. Happened to the conservatives, happened to labour, happened to EU, indirectly it happened to the cosyness that was Obama politics

Thats not true though is it? I mean 37% of the electorate who actually voted for Brexit isn't a majority silent or otherwise and with Brexit, its the idiots that have been ****ed, over by the real elite that is ex pat multi billionaires who are looking for a low tax light touch regulation economy to make more money and exploit the useful idiots even more.

In fact one could argue the "powers that be" certainly those of a right of centre persuasion have realised both in the UK and the USA that there are sufficient "useful idiots" out there who can be conned quite simply by telling them what they want to hear, rather than what they need to hear so that the "powers that be" can "go to far" as you put it.

So far from the silent majority finding their voice, they have actually been silenced whilst politics and good the governance of the country is in the hands of incompetent self serving fools.