Reply #38: Ratings are biased, adding them up doesn't increase accuracy [View All]

[HereSince1628]

Rather an estimate of central tendency gives that. And that yields only a measurement of the middle score of what the advocacy groups think is important. It's often a hodge-podge measure of apples and oranges. And even so the varieties of fruits considered are carefully preselected. We never get to make the personal choices of seeds or seedless? pulp or juice? tart or sweet? mealy or crisp?

And most people don't formally arrive at that estimating means, medians or modes but rather they get an intuitive subjective perception of it. At best, that yields up only a feeling of where the middle of many biased ratings is.

I would not deny that many people prefer being told what to believe, but the ratings may also completely miss or obscure the issues, perhaps the one and only issue, a voter considers to be personally critically important. And that one thing could be which candidate is more photogenic, of the right race or of an acceptable religion.