174 replies to this topic

[Belial]

La, on 18 July 2012 - 07:28 PM, said:

Too much ambiguity , you need to be more clear in what you mean by wahabis "getting control of anything in this world".

Ok, here is a scenario.  Country A has nuclear weapons.  There is a lot of conflict, people fighting each other for whatever reason. The government is no longer a government, just some shafty organization that extorts people for money and has a lot of guys with guns.  

There are countries that exist like this today, so its not too hard to picture it.

Some guy gets into a power position in a particular region, allowing him access to these weapons.  Bad guys have gotten into power positions before, this too is not too hard to picture.

That bad guy decides to drop a nuclear bomb on X people who he has an issue with.

It doesnt have to be wahabis, it could be anyone.  Anyone bold enough to drop a bomb, which includes, I would say more people than we commonly recognize.

I dont know how you all view world history, or the history of mankind.  But, it was really only yesterday that...well, even today, people fight wars for stupid reasons.  People kill other people all the time, for stupid reasons.  

I really, dont need to justify this statement, because its commonly known.  

Now, we can picture a world in which nuclear weapons are surplussed around the earth. One country builds them, then another builds them for "strategic" defensive reasons.  Then another, and another.  Then America comes along and uses the FBI to throw some guy out of office and some crazy fanatics take over.

There are countless possibilities, here and in the future.

A better question, why would you think that build bombs would never be used?  Maybe in the present, especially not Iran, would dare use such a thing if it had it.  But there are so many others that would. If not now, then later.  Saddam invaded kuwait and bombed saudi arabia. He blew up innocent shia villages.  You would think he would have known that was suicidal, but, I guess people get into these power positions where they just dont care.

It can and most likely will happen again. As time goes on and weapons get bigger and bigger.

And I sincerely apologize if the magic statement...you know, crossed the line.  It was honestly just a joke, and...ya know, I believe in God too, and I do respect Islam.  Ive taken the shahada twice, and sometimes consider myself to be muslim.

but, its just...yea, a joke.  No real offense was meant.

Edited by Belial, 18 July 2012 - 07:45 PM.

[Lanatin]

Belial, on 18 July 2012 - 07:34 PM, said:

Ok, here is a scenario.  Country A has nuclear weapons.  There is a lot of conflict, people fighting each other for whatever reason. The government is no longer a government, just some shafty organization that extorts people for money and has a lot of guys with guns.  

There are countries that exist like this today, so its not too hard to picture it.

Some guy gets into a power position in a particular region, allowing him access to these weapons.  Bad guys have gotten into power positions before, this too is not too hard to picture.

That bad guy decides to drop a nuclear bomb on X people who he has an issue with.

It doesnt have to be wahabis, it could be anyone.  Anyone bold enough to drop a bomb, which includes, I would say more people than we commonly recognize.

I dont know how you all view world history, or the history of mankind.  But, it was really only yesterday that...well, even today, people fight wars for stupid reasons.  People kill other people all the time, for stupid reasons.  

I really, dont need to justify this statement, because its commonly known.  

Now, we can picture a world in which nuclear weapons are surplussed around the earth. One country builds them, then another builds them for "strategic" defensive reasons.  Then another, and another.  Then America comes along and uses the FBI to throw some guy out of office and some crazy fanatics take over.

There are countless possibilities, here and in the future.

A better question, why would you think that build bombs would never be used?  Maybe in the present, especially not Iran, would dare use such a thing if it had it.  But there are so many others that would. If not now, then later.  Saddam invaded kuwait and bombed saudi arabia. He blew up innocent shia villages.  You would think he would have known that was suicidal, but, I guess people get into these power positions where they just dont care.

It can and most likely will happen again. As time goes on and weapons get bigger and bigger.

Ye ok but the thing is no one has even shown there's a nuclear weapons program going on.

[Belial]

La, on 18 July 2012 - 07:44 PM, said:

Ye ok but the thing is no one has even shown there's a nuclear weapons program going on.

A nuclear weapons program, yes, indeed.  Politics will be politics, in all its disgusting glory and unjustified contradictions.

And people believe we are greater beings than the packs of wolves hunting the bison.  As if we aren't, inherently monsters. Consuming the world for our own benefit.

Edited by Belial, 18 July 2012 - 08:06 PM.

[Ugly Jinn]

Logic, on 18 July 2012 - 11:19 AM, said:

Iranian nuclear thread was completed the day you admitted these sanctions to be unlawful. At this point you are just confirming our opinions about you.

That is something we both agree to, but that isn't the topic of this thread.

kadhim, on 18 July 2012 - 04:21 PM, said:

Uh..that's how polls work. If you take a proper representative sample, 1000 people can reasonably accurately represent the larger population. This is literally the entire concept of how public opinion polling works. 1000 is a good sample size in terms of allowing you to draw inferences about the actual population. Again, assuming representative sampling.

The size is too small to determine anything via phone. And the biggest factor is that many don't give an opinion, they are too scared to say anything negative about the regime. You think most people will say anything bad about the regime when they get some random call? They might think it's a trap.

Just goto Azadi Square and stand peacefully with a sign saying, "I disagree with the regime's strategy", you'll see what happens.

Quote

Doesn't matter where the call centre is located, so long as the sample is representative.

It doesn't matter, all these polls are tainted. People are thrown in jail on a regular basis for speaking against the regime, you think most will speak freely on random phone calls...

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 18 July 2012 - 09:45 PM.

[kadhim]

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The size is too small to determine anything via phone.

Nonsense. You have literally no clue what you are talking about. 1000 is plenty, plenty, plenty given a representative sample. 1000 is a huge sample for an opinion survey. If you're trying to estimate a proportion of a population holding a certain opinion, n=1000 gives you an estimate within +/-3%, 95 times out of 100. http://en.wikipedia....e_determination

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And the biggest factor is that many don't give an opinion, they are too scared to say anything negative about the regime.

Pure speculation. On the contrary, these phone polls show plenty of people perfectly willing to say negative things over the phone.
The very fact of sizeable minorities supporting opposition positions in these phone polls refutes you.

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Just goto Azadi Square and stand peacefully with a sign saying, "I disagree with the regime's strategy", you'll see what happens.

As I understand it from reports from people within Iran, people make such sorts of protests all the time without harm.
Now, if you combine your protest with trying to burn down a police station, you'll tend to have problems, but that's a different kettle of fish entirely.

[Ugly Jinn]

kadhim, on 18 July 2012 - 10:37 PM, said:

Nonsense. You have literally no clue what you are talking about. 1000 is plenty, plenty, plenty given a representative sample. 1000 is a huge sample for an opinion survey. If you're trying to estimate a proportion of a population holding a certain opinion, n=1000 gives you an estimate within +/-3%, 95 times out of 100. http://en.wikipedia....e_determination

This is getting ridiculous. 1000 will not represent the voices of 75 million in an atmosphere where freedom of speech doesn't exist.

And this is how pathetic your scientific wiki link is. Use a calculator:
http://www.raosoft.com/samplesize.html

Population Size = 7,500
Recommended Sample Size = 366

Population Size = 75 million
Recommended Sample Size = 385

19 individuals equate to 74,992,500 difference in population?! This is as retarded as it can get. If the population is 1 billion+ the sample size still remains 385.  

This is the height of inaccuracy and distortion. Even your Wiki link states, "Larger sample sizes generally lead to increased precision when estimating unknown parameters." The only problem is the IRI doesn't give Iranians the freedom to have polls, hence international phone calls.

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Pure speculation. On the contrary, these phone polls show plenty of people perfectly willing to say negative things over the phone.
The very fact of sizeable minorities supporting opposition positions in these phone polls refutes you.

It is written in the poll itself!

"The WorldPublicOpinion.org poll also was conducted in late August and early September after a period of great controversy about the election and a crackdown on demonstrations by Iranian authorities. We see in the WPO poll not only a lower response rate overall, but a lower response to the question about voting choice."
http://www.worldpubl...n_Feb10_rpt.pdf

The poll you are using clearly states what I'm stating yet you are ignoring it.

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As I understand it from reports from people within Iran, people make such sorts of protests all the time without harm.
Now, if you combine your protest with trying to burn down a police station, you'll tend to have problems, but that's a different kettle of fish entirely.

Ohh please, from Human Rights Watch:

Journalists’ Families Targeted in Campaign Against Media
http://www.hrw.org/n...latives-hostage

^But it's not PressTv so it could be inaccurate.

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 19 July 2012 - 12:28 AM.

[kadhim]

Quote

This is getting ridiculous. 1000 will not represent the voices of 75 million in an atmosphere where freedom of speech doesn't exist.

Yes, someone who doesn't seem to know the first thing about stats (that would be you) arguing with someone who used to earn his bread tutoring the subject (that would be me) is pretty ridiculous. Assuming without ervidence, and in fact in spite of evidence to the contrary, that Iranians don't have enough freedom of speech to be able to be polled effectively, is ridiculous. You make yourself look stupid.

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And this is how pathetic your scientific wiki link is. Use a calculator: http://www.raosoft.com/samplesize.html Population Size = 7,500 Recommended Sample Size = 366 Population Size = 75 million Recommended Sample Size = 385 19 individuals equate to 74,992,500 difference in population?! This is as retarded as it can get. If the population is 1 billion+ the sample size still remains 385. This is the height of inaccuracy and distortion. Even your Wiki link states, "Larger sample sizes generally lead to increased precision when estimating unknown parameters."

Shrugs. That's just statistics. That's the mathematics of parameter estimation. You need a surprisingly small sample to make surprisingly accurate estimates (again, assuming methodological issues like proper sampling and properly worded questions, etc), and once the population size is beyond a certain level, it is effectively, from the standpoint of the math, infinite, and the required sample size for a desired level of accuracy is, for all intents and purposes independent of the population size. You see this in your calculator comparing 75 million vs 1 billion at 95% confidence and +/-5% error band. If the population is more than say 100 000, the required sample size basically only depends on the desired level of confidence and margin of error. That's not stupid, that's the coolness of stats.

Larger sample sizes do give increased precision yes. If you want to tighten your error bars to get a closer fix, to estimate, say, a proportion within 1% rather than within 5%, you need more people. But once you have settled on a desired level of precision, as long as your population is sufficiently big the sample size you need, is almost independent (to a few decimal places it doesn't matter) of the population, whether 1 million or 1 billion. Again, that's just stats. If you take even a low level university course, you learn this.

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It is written in the poll itself! "The WorldPublicOpinion.org poll also was conducted in late August and early September after a period of great controversy about the election and a crackdown on demonstrations by Iranian authorities. We see in the WPO poll not only a lower response rate overall, but a lower response to the question about voting choice." http://www.worldpubl...n_Feb10_rpt.pdf The poll you are using clearly states what I'm stating yet you are ignoring it.

This is a 38 page document. You're going to have to indicate a page number. Quickly looking however, the most relevant section I can reasonably see appears to indicate quite the opposite of what you claim. What you claim being that Iranian polling is unreliable because people are supposedly largely terrified to express their true opinion. In fact, in your document, the authors spend some time highlighting evidence that contradicts that claim. See the section starting on pdf page 5, document page 3, titled "Can Polls of Iranians Be Considered Valid?" > "Can Iranians express their views honestly given the possibility of reprisals?"

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Ohh please, from Human Rights Watc Journalists’ Families Targeted in Campaign Against Media http://www.hrw.org/n...latives-hostage ^But it's not PressTv so it could be inaccurate.

Iran is not the world's freest country, politically. I would not live there myself. I'm not their government's big fan, and I'm not really a cheerleader for the country. But according to credible evidence, North Korea it ain't. Freedom of the press is a point to critique. But, again, this is changing the subject we were actually talking about, which was whether average people feel comfortable expressing thoughts critical of their government. Evidence and anecdotal reports indicate that they do.

Edited by kadhim, 19 July 2012 - 08:55 AM.

[Ugly Jinn]

kadhim, on 19 July 2012 - 08:33 AM, said:

Yes, someone who doesn't seem to know the first thing about stats (that would be you) arguing with someone who used to earn his bread tutoring the subject (that would be me) is pretty ridiculous. Assuming without ervidence, and in fact in spite of evidence to the contrary, that Iranians don't have enough freedom of speech to be able to be polled effectively, is ridiculous. You make yourself look stupid.

If you are oblivious to the strict environment of Iran where journalists, protesters, students, relatives, marjas, etc. face consequences for expressing their opinion then you need to get out of your cave. If a marja can be put in house arrest for speaking his view then random blokes have no chance, and you think people are going to speak freely right after Iran was cracking down on it's opposition, as the report clearly states for the polls done after the election,  "Polls conducted after the election, especially those conducted during the crackdown, are more rightly subject to concern about possible self-censorship" Page 3. With or without crackdown, the environment is such that many chose to stay silent. You basically lost credibility.

Quote

Shrugs. That's just statistics. That's the mathematics of parameter estimation. You need a surprisingly small sample to make surprisingly accurate estimates (again, assuming methodological issues like proper sampling and properly worded questions, etc), and once the population size is beyond a certain level, it is effectively, from the standpoint of the math, infinite, and the required sample size for a desired level of accuracy is, for all intents and purposes independent of the population size. You see this in your calculator comparing 75 million vs 1 billion at 95% confidence and +/-5% error band. If the population is more than say 100 000, the required sample size basically only depends on the desired level of confidence and margin of error. That's not stupid, that's the coolness of stats.

Larger sample sizes do give increased precision yes. If you want to tighten your error bars to get a closer fix, to estimate, say, a proportion within 1% rather than within 5%, you need more people. But once you have settled on a desired level of precision, as long as your population is sufficiently big the sample size you need, is almost independent (to a few decimal places it doesn't matter) of the population, whether 1 million or 1 billion. Again, that's just stats. If you take even a low level university course, you learn this.

All polls in Iran are tainted, and when you have a small number like 1000 then it's not even worth discussing. If sampling 1000 individuals is as accurate as you make it seem then Presidents would be chosen by sampling 1000 random individuals rather than allowing everyone to vote. So please spare me the accuracy of such trivial poll. IRI will never allow polls which go against it's regime to go public, or atleast will try it's best (I already provided proof of certain polls being pulled from Statetv).

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This is a 38 page document. You're going to have to indicate a page number. Quickly looking however, the most relevant section I can reasonably see appears to indicate quite the opposite of what you claim. What you claim being that Iranian polling is unreliable because people are supposedly largely terrified to express their true opinion. In fact, in your document, the authors spend some time highlighting evidence that contradicts that claim. See the section starting on pdf page 5, document page 3, titled "Can Polls of Iranians Be Considered Valid?" > "Can Iranians express their views honestly given the possibility of reprisals?"

You couldn't even do a search with what I quoted..

Page 33.

Quote

Iran is not the world's freest country, politically. I would not live there myself. I'm not their government's big fan, and I'm not really a cheerleader for the country. But according to credible evidence, North Korea it ain't. Freedom of the press is a point to critique.

Agreed.

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 19 July 2012 - 02:15 PM.

[kadhim]

Quote

If you are oblivious to the strict environment of Iran where journalists, protesters, students, relatives, marjas, etc. face consequences for expressing their opinion then you need to get out of your cave. If a marja can be put in house arrest for speaking his view then random blokes have no chance, and you think people are going to speak freely right after Iran was cracking down on it's opposition??

First, your perceptions are basically 180 degrees backwards from what basic common sense would tell you. An anonymous average private citizen has a much easier time speaking his mind than a public figure with fame / notoriety / influence because people care what a famous public figure says and not what Yusuf Six-Pack says. A well-connected public figure has a certain advantage in shielding himself from consequences, but is conversely taken more seriously because of his influence, his "Klout score" if you will. The second factor is the more determining factor in how much mouth flapping one can get away with.

Aside from that, however, as I have already pointed out, the pdf you linked to clearly shows a large stratified random sampling of Iranians having little apparent troubles expressing their opinions to researchers.

Quote

All polls in Iran are tainted, and when you have a small number like 1000 then it's not even worth discussing. If sampling 1000 individuals is as accurate as you make it seem then Presidents would be chosen by sampling 1000 random individuals rather than allowing everyone to vote.

It doesn't have anything to do with any sort of subjective opinion. It is objective, accepted, known, mathematical reality as taught in any stats textbook. If you get your methodology correct, there is a proven formula that tells you that with a given sample size, you will get a given accuracy and precision. It's statistics. If you take issue with this basic fact, you take issue with ALL opinion polling everywhere.

Incidentally, as an aside, I recall someone proposing precisely what you suggested about election by polls. Wired, I think. A few months back. It would never fly, mind, you; people like their quadrennial illusion of political potency - but it would, given a proper methodology, be remarkably accurate, not to mention a lot cheaper. If you don't believe that, check out the Real Clear Politics archives in the week before the 2008 US election and compare to the actual results. It's within a percent or two for most polls. And again, that's with about 1000 people.

Anyway, let me summarize your apparent argument, such as it is.
1. You in effect refuse to acknowledge the existence of statistics as a mathematical discipline with reliable results.
2. Even though, objectively, both Iranian and Western interviewers apparently have no trouble getting Iranians to speak their mind in polls, such cooperation is axiomatically impossible. Presumably, "cus you said so."

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You couldn't even do a search with what I quoted..

Page 33.

Why would you expect someone to do that for you?
You're incrediby obnoxious.

In any case, the point on p 33 is addressed in the p. 3-4 section I mentioned earlier. To quote:

Quote

The idea here is that many respondents in Iran may say the opposite of what they think and do so
across various questions.
It should be noted that eight of the polls explored here were conducted before the election. While it is
true that Ahmadinejad was the sitting president, expressing support for another candidate was not at
that time a politically subversive act. The election itself was sanctioned by the government, and
Mousavi was clearly associated with the Iranian revolution. Further, most observers of Iran agree that
the weeks of the 2009 election campaign were the most open period Iranian society had experienced
in recent years. People were freely expressing support for candidates other than Ahmadinejad
without any negative consequences.
Polls conducted after the election, especially those conducted during the crackdown, are more rightly
subject to concern about possible self-censorship. However, it should be noted that respondents did
have the option of declining to answer questions rather than proffering false statements.
As we shall see, polls conducted during the three months after the election did find a smaller number
willing to say that they voted for Mousavi and, in the one conducted three months after the election, a
larger number declining to answer—something that could be attributed to self-censorship. However,
as we shall see, there was not a substantial increase in the numbers saying that they voted for
Ahmadinejad. Interestingly, this is the case even though in Western countries it is common for post-
election polls to show more saying they voted for the declared winner than said so before the vote,
and more than the actual vote tally—something that is called the “bandwagon effect.”
In addition, if we assume that respondents might be censoring themselves for fear that they are being
monitored and might be punished for making politically undesirable statements, we would expect that
responses to other sensitive questions would show this censoring effect. However, in a number of
cases majorities took positions that were arguably more sensitive than saying they did not vote for
Ahmadinejad. For example, in the WPO poll, conducted during the crackdown, respondents were
asked how much confidence they had in a number of institutions. For all institutions, a majority said
they had at least some confidence, but for some of the most politically sensitive institutions less than
half said they had a lot of confidence. For the Guardian Council—the institution most associated with
the regime itself—just 42% said they had a lot of confidence. Even for the institutions that might be
assumed to be monitoring the respondent’s responses, only modest numbers said they had a lot of
confidence—Ministry of Interior (38%) and the police (52%).
Furthermore, respondents showed a readiness to implicitly criticize the Guardian Council. In the press
there was much discussion of the fact that before the election took place, some members of the
council had openly declared for Ahmadinejad. In September WPO asked “Do you think it is
appropriate for members of the Guardian Council to support a candidate in an election, or do you
think they should always remain neutral?” An overwhelming majority (75%) said Council members
should always remain neutral.

Also, if one assumes that the fear of reprisals causes people to refrain from taking positions that are
less than laudatory of the government, then it follows that when the government has intensified its
crackdowns on dissent, full endorsement of the government should increase. However, if people are
answering candidly they are probably less likely to give their full endorsement. As we shall see
below, in a poll by GlobeScan conducted in the week after the election, a large number but less than a
majority (49%) said they were very satisfied with the current system of government. When WPO
asked the same question in early September--when government repression was more extensive and
systematic--the number saying they were very satisfied did not increase, but dropped 8 points to 41%.

The pattern of responses over time is also relevant to this issue. As we shall see in the first weeks of
the campaign there was a sharp decline in support for Ahmadinejad, which then strengthened
following the debate and leading up to election day. This weakens the argument that the Iranian
public was unwilling to express their views on the candidates. Most outside commentary about the
campaign noted the vigor of campaigners in both camps. It seems implausible that public frankness
suddenly peaked on June 1, but then receded sharply in the remaining ten days of the contest.

The commentary on pages 4-5 entitled "Could the poll data have been fabricated?"
is also instructive.

Quote

In part to address these concerns, the WPO poll was conducted by telephone, calling into Iran from a

nearby country. Fortunately, telephone penetration in Iran is high enough to make this feasible, with

slightly over 80% of households having a landline telephone. Thus the possibility of government

intervention was eliminated. The telephone interviewing was supervised by a WPO associate, and

analysis of the patterns of responses by different interviewers did not reveal any indication that any

interviewers were biasing the results.

Concerns about government fabrication or data-tampering can however be raised in connection with

the series of polls conducted by the survey unit at the University of Tehran. While the university is a

respected academic institution and is generally seen as being much more closely aligned with the

opposition than with the Ahmadinejad administration, it is possible that the government stepped in

and forced the researchers to put forward fabricated or falsified data. The same can be said for the

GlobeScan poll that was conducted by a fielding agency in Iran through telephone interviews.

First, as we shall see, the top-line answers to the key questions are largely consistent between the poll

that was conducted from outside Iran and those conducted inside Iran.


Further, substantial efforts were made to determine whether such fabrication or data-tampering

occurred. It should be noted that, while it is easy to manufacture findings for a single question, it not

easy to produce a credible dataset that includes multiple questions. There are logical relations

between answers on different questions, and one would expect to find these patterns reappearing

across different polls. In examining the patterns of relations between question answers within

specific polls, between polls conducted within Iran, and between polls conducted within Iran and

from the outside, we found that the patterns of responses were largely consistent.

As we shall see, the top-line findings from the various polls vary across time. Another effort,

discussed below, was to determine if these variations had any logical relation to external events over

the course of the election. As we shall see, we found that they did.

Edited by kadhim, 19 July 2012 - 02:56 PM.

[Ugly Jinn]

kadhim, on 19 July 2012 - 02:32 PM, said:

First, your perceptions are basically 180 backwards from what basic common sense would tell you. An anonymous average private citizen has a much easier time speaking his mind than a public figure with fame / notoriety / influence because people care what a famous public figure says and not what Yusuf Six-Pack says. A well-connected public figure has a certain advantage in shielding himself from consequences, but is conversely taken more seriously because of his influence, his "Klout score" if you will. The second factor is the more determining factor in how much mouth flapping one can get away with.

Anonymous average private citizens chose to stay silent for the most part, that's the fundamental point you keep ignoring. It's either 'stay quiet' or take a risk and face consequances. Students have been arrested. Just google it, there are plenty of arrests to suffice to every average citizen's category.

Students:
http://www.rferl.org...__/1883427.html

Teachers:
http://www.iranhrdc....ml#.UAhyYLSXT8c

Journalists:
http://www.guardian....alists-arrested

Relatives (who weren't involved):
http://english.alara.../04/192496.html

Google for more, there are plenty to keep you busy for few hours.

Quote

Aside from that, however, as I have already pointed out, the pdf you linked to clearly shows a large stratified random sampling of Iranians having little apparent troubles expressing their opinions to researchers.

Certain polls were executed by University of Tehran funded by the Iranian government. Did you actually think the University would allow any polls which would be against the regime which funds it?! Do you not see the credibility issues at the fundamental level?!

Quote

Anyway, let me summarize your apparent argument, such as it is.
1. You in effect refuse to acknowledge the existence of statistics as a mathematical discipline with reliable results.
2. Even though, objectively, Westerners apparently have no trouble getting Iranians to speak their mind in polls, such cooperation is axiomatically impossible. Presumably, "cus you said so."

No.

1. I reject a poll where the environment doesn't allow people to voice their opinion freely without consequences.
2. I reject a poll where the institution is funded by the government.
3. I reject 1000 individuals represent 75 million in Iran.
4. I reject polls where especially conducted after crackdowns, which makes it even worse atmosphere.
5. Feb. 2010 study, Iran is alot worse

And to back up my issues, I'm using the study itself!

1.  "Naturally, the question arises as whether it is feasible to conduct polls in Iran, given its authoritarian nature. These concerns fall into two broad categories: questions about whether Iranians can express their views honestly, and questions about whether the data could be fabricated."   Page 3

2. "A series of 10 tracking telephone surveys on the election and voter preferences conducted by the University of Tehran’s survey unit, with  eight waves leading up to the election and two subsequent to it". Page 3.

3. Explained already.

4. Explained already. "Polls conducted after the election, especially those conducted during the crackdown, are more rightly subject to concern about possible self-censorship." Page 3

AND

"As we shall see below, in a poll by GlobeScan conducted in the week after the election, a large number but less than a majority (49%) said they were very satisfied with the current system of government.  When WPO asked the same question in early September--when government repression was more extensive and systematic--the number saying they were very satisfied did not increase, but dropped 8 points to 41%." Page 4

5. Check date Page 1

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 19 July 2012 - 03:53 PM.

[kadhim]

Quote

Certain polls were executed by University of Tehran funded by the Iranian government. Did you actually think the University would allow any polls which would be against the regime which funds it?! Do you not see the credibility issues at the fundamental level?!

Wow, you seriously shouldn't quote from papers you either didn't or can't read.
The WPO paper mentions a number of polls from both inside and outside Iran.
As I quoted above, comparisons were made by the WPO researchers between results from polls conducted inside and outside Iran. No significant differences were found.
The researchers also explicitly mention having analyzed the in-Iran polls for signs of fraud. They didn't actually find any.
Page 4 and 5 of the report.

Quote

1. "Naturally, the question arises as whether it is feasible to conduct polls in Iran, given its authoritarian nature. These concerns fall into two broad categories: questions about whether Iranians can express their views honestly, and questions about whether the data could be fabricated." Page 3

Wow. This is a statement of a research question. The summary/analysis which DIRECTLY FOLLOWS concludes that it WAS feasible to conduct such polls, and that Iranians CAN express their views honestly.

Quote

3. I reject 1000 individuals represent 75 million in Iran.

Then you reject the existence of the branch of math known as statistics. Which makes you an idiot.

Quote

4. Explained already. "Polls conducted after the election, especially those conducted during the crackdown, are more rightly subject to concern about possible self-censorship." Page 3

Again, you're confusing (or deliberately blurring  the distinction between) statement of research questions and the actual results of the research. The summary / analysis, which, again, DIRECTLY FOLLOWS, has the researchers concluding such concerns to be largely unfounded.

[Ugly Jinn]

kadhim, on 19 July 2012 - 03:58 PM, said:

Wow, you seriously shouldn't quote from papers you either didn't or can't read.
The WPO paper mentions a number of polls from both inside and outside Iran.
As I quoted above, comparisons were made by the WPO researchers between results from polls conducted inside and outside Iran. No significant differences were found.
The researchers also explicitly mention having analyzed the in-Iran polls for signs of fraud. They didn't actually find any.
Page 4 and 5 of the report.

The study clearly states that 'fear of consequences' has an impact. Read carefully. And speaking of fraud, I'm not speaking of elections, read below.

Quote

Wow. This is a statement of a research question. The summary/analysis which DIRECTLY FOLLOWS concludes that it WAS feasible to conduct such polls, and that Iranians CAN express their views honestly.

Read the summary/analysis which DIRECTLY FOLLOWS:

As we shall see, polls conducted during the three months after the election did find a smaller number willing to say that they voted for Mousavi and, in the one conducted three months after the election, a larger number declining to answer—something that could be attributed to self-censorship.  

Quote

Then you reject the existence of the branch of math known as statistics. Which makes you an idiot.

No, I reject an idiot applying math and statistics to tainted data.

Quote

Again, you're confusing (or deliberately blurring  the distinction between) statement of research questions and the actual results of the research. The summary / analysis, which, again, DIRECTLY FOLLOWS, has the researchers concluding such concerns to be largely unfounded.

Results are tainted because of the settings.

------------

And you conveniently skipped point 2. I'll just add some more:


Concerns about government fabrication or data-tampering can however be raised in connection with the series of polls conducted by the survey unit at the University of Tehran.  While the university is a respected academic institution and is generally seen as being much more closely aligned with the opposition than with the Ahmadinejad administration, it is possible that the government stepped in and forced the researchers to put forward fabricated or falsified data.  The same can be said for the GlobeScan poll that was conducted by a fielding agency in Iran through telephone interviews.  Page 5

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 19 July 2012 - 04:22 PM.

[kadhim]

Point 2 addressed elsewhere same post. The paper reviews polls from inside and outside the country and finds no significant differences.

I wasn't talking about electoral fraud either. The WPO sees no evidence the polls from inside Iran insiders fraudulent. They devote considerable space in fact to refuting the notion.

In short, cohesive reading of the summary and conclusions as a whole does not support what you are saying in the least. In fact, quite the opposite. I conclude you either can't understand what you are reading or are deliberately trying to mislead.

Edited by kadhim, 19 July 2012 - 04:47 PM.

[kadhim]

To add: for those interested in gauging the overall sense of the researchers comments on  Iranians' willingness to  speak and on assessments of likelihood of fraudulent poll data, I  quoted the relevant sections in entirety in post 159 above. Relevant  sections with author conclusions bolded.

[Ugly Jinn]

The study clearly states the variables involved when conducting the study, while certain variables seemed to not have any effect, other variables still remained a factor, which I've quoted a few. The issues I've stated were raised in the study itself.

That fact that people are clinging to this lone poll, derived by 4 guys, in Feb 2010 (things are worse now), certain polls conducted by government funded institutions, just shows how pathetic the situation in Iran is. And as a teacher of Statistics/Polls you should be appalled. Iran is a different animal, it's not a free society where such polling can be executed, which is a prerequisite for such polls, there are variables which numbers cannot tell.

It's also very convenient to dismiss all polls/reports which are against IRI and cling to selective few which support it. IRI will not allow such polls to take place where it goes against there agenda. I've posted a recent poll which was replaced because it was against the regime's strategy. http://www.telegraph...me-stopped.html

Goto Azadi Square and start a poll, start asking random people walking by if they want to see the regime fall or not. And see the response you get and wait what happens to you in 15 minutes.

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 19 July 2012 - 06:03 PM.

[kadhim]

Quote

The study clearly states the variables involved when conducting the study, while certain variables seemed to not have any effect, other variables still remained a factor, which I've quoted a few. The issues I've stated were raised in the study itself.

No, the study mentions these issues as research questions to explore. They listed a bunch of critiques people sling against the polling in Iran that they wanted to examine in depth. It was a statement of questions they were going to ponder. When they did their study, they concluded, in brief, "nothing to see here."
But why am I even bothering to explain this to you? You don't even understand the basic concept of estimating from a sample. What hope could you ever hope to have in interpreting research results?
(Answer: none)

Quote

Iran is a different animal, it's not a free society where such polling can be executed, which is a prerequisite for such polls, there are variables which numbers cannot tell.

You keep mindlessly repeating this. Is there evidence of that? No. Rather the opposite. Mindlessly repeating garbage doesn't make it true.
You brought the WPO paper to the discussion. It's Western researchers. They looked at the data, did some of their own polls to compare, and found reason to believe that, no, Iran is not a "different animal."

Let me tell you something else from my own experiences, looking at the methodology section of the WPO's own poll. They got, in the time period around the demonstrations and crackdown, 1000 respondants from around 2000 phone numbers, if I recall correctly. At a sensitive time, with questions asking participants to critique their government. I used to work too as a survey phone interviewer during my graduate degree, to help pay the bills. 1000 from 2000 is an amazing response. You'd probably never, ever, ever get that in Canada or the US for a survey. This is not a people afraid to give their opinion.

Quote

It's also very convenient to dismiss all polls/reports which are against IRI and cling to selective few which support it. IRI will not allow such polls to take place where it goes against there agenda. I've posted a recent poll which was replaced because it was against the regime's strategy. http://www.telegraph...me-stopped.html

Classic. You try to wave away actually rigorous surveys with proper representative, stratified random samples and demographic tabulations, and then you turn around and mindlessly boost for a fricking internet poll.

[Ugly Jinn]

kadhim, on 19 July 2012 - 07:31 PM, said:

No, the study mentions these issues as research questions to explore. They listed a bunch of critiques people sling against the polling in Iran that they wanted to examine in depth. It was a statement of questions they were going to ponder. When they did their study, they concluded, in brief, "nothing to see here." But why am I even bothering to explain this to you? You don't even understand the basic concept of estimating from a sample. What hope could you ever hope to have in interpreting research results? (Answer: none)

And those questions have been explored and analysed. As for one, I mentioned University of Tehran is funded by the government, hence conflict of interest, hence lost credibility, hence mentioned in the study clearly. There is no way out of this even if these 4 researchers said otherwise (which they didn't regarding the university).

Quote

You keep mindlessly repeating this. Is there evidence of that? No. Rather the opposite. Mindlessly repeating garbage doesn't make it true.
You brought the WPO paper to the discussion. It's Western researchers. They looked at the data, did some of their own polls to compare, and found reason to believe that, no, Iran is not a "different animal."

My evidence is that people are thrown in jail for expressing their views (with references), then you say "where is your evidence?" . I keep repeating the same stuff because you obviously are ignoring the evidence.

Polls are dime a dozen, and they contradict each other all the time.

Greek Election Polls Contradict Each Other as Ban Nears
http://www.cnbc.com/...er_as_Ban_Nears (last month)

Quote

Let me tell you something else from my own experiences, looking at the methodology section of the WPO's own poll. They got, in the time period around the demonstrations and crackdown, 1000 respondants from around 2000 phone numbers, if I recall correctly. At a sensitive time, with questions asking participants to critique their government. I used to work too as a survey phone interviewer during my graduate degree, to help pay the bills. 1000 from 2000 is an amazing response. You'd probably never, ever, ever get that in Canada or the US for a survey. This is not a people afraid to give their opinion.

The issue is not about the method, it's about the subjects.

You keep missing the fundamental point.

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 19 July 2012 - 08:43 PM.

[Lanatin]

So what's the verdict?

[kadhim]

Quote

for one, I mentioned University of Tehran is funded by the government, hence conflict of interest, hence lost credibility, hence mentioned in the study clearly. There is no way out of this even if these 4 researchers said otherwise (which they didn't regarding the university).

No, that doesn't follow. Not without actual evidence of cooking the poll results.
And in fact, the WPO researchers examined the results of the University of Tehran polling, examined the data internally, and compared to data sets collected by firms outside Iran where possible. The researchers found no convincing evidence of manufactured results. To quote (from an already quoted section in pp 4-5 of the report):

Quote

we shall see, the top-line answers to the key questions are largely consistent between the poll
that was conducted from outside Iran and those conducted inside Iran.

Further, substantial efforts were made to determine whether such fabrication or data-tampering
occurred. It should be noted that, while it is easy to manufacture findings for a single question, it not
easy to produce a credible dataset that includes multiple questions. There are logical relations
between answers on different questions, and one would expect to find these patterns reappearing
across different polls. In examining the patterns of relations between question answers within
specific polls, between polls conducted within Iran, and between polls conducted within Iran and
from the outsi
de, we found that the patterns of responses were largely consistent.

As we shall see, the top-line findings from the various polls vary across time. Another effort,
discussed below, was to determine if these variations had any logical relation to external events over
the course of the election. As we shall see, we found that they did.

Edited by kadhim, 20 July 2012 - 08:23 AM.

[Ugly Jinn]

kadhim, on 20 July 2012 - 07:57 AM, said:

No, that doesn't follow. Not without actual evidence of cooking the poll results.

Yes, it does follow cause it clearly states it "can happen" and is "possible" even if there were no variances. And it wouldn't even matter, because the University lost credibility. You think a University inaugurating an International Center for Opinion Research which is funded by the regime would have a poll against the regime? This is called conflict of interest. You can try to justify all you want it will not change this fundamental flaw. That's as credible as King Abdullah University having a poll which favors the Saudi regime.

That being said, the main fundamental issue is that many test subjects do not risk voicing their opinion in Iran because many others have faced consequences for doing so.  

Anyways, we agree to disagree, there's nothing more to add on my end.

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 21 July 2012 - 04:49 AM.

[Asr]

In conclusion, iran has every right to its nuclear program and the sanctions are simply illegal.  End of.

[kadhim]

This is absurd. Surreal even. You need to understand how to read reasearch "Can" and "possible" mean simply that. Possible. Conceivable as a possibility to be looked into. Conceivable as a possibility prior to actual investigation to clear up yes/no either way. It doesn't mean an actual positive affirmation in advance that such a thing is actually true. I don't see what is so hard to understand about this. And, in fact, after they actually researched, they did not find anything awry. Point finale.

The issue of funding itself does not imply any loss of credibility of the university's researchers. This is a grave and unwarranted slander you make towards the professional researchers of this institution, and you should be ashamed of yourself for making it.
Universities in any number of countries are publically funded. Actually, this is a reality in more countries than not. In my own nation, the universities are government funded. Does this automatically imply that their research is in question if it touches government? No. Pick a consistent set of principles and stick to them instead of being such a blind ideologue.

Again, there is no evidence of Iranians avoiding voicing their opinion; in point of fact, as said before, this paper shows extremely healthy response rates for the opinion polls. A person can have many reasons to not participate in a survey, including "I'm busy," "I don't feel like it," etc.
You can't just assume if someone doesn't choose to participate, they are "afraid." This is so obvious, I shouldn't have to say it, but, clearly some people lack common sense.

And, no. There is no agree to disagree. It is not a subjective matter. Objectively, you are wrong. Good day.

Edited by kadhim, 21 July 2012 - 01:04 PM.

[Ugly Jinn]

kadhim, on 21 July 2012 - 12:29 PM, said:

The issue of funding itself does not imply any loss of credibility of the university's researchers.

I don't know if you are doing this intentionally or you really are lost of what conflict of interest means.

IRI regime funds University of Tehran and funded the new department
The new department of University of Tehran executes a poll regarding IRI regime
The poll favors IRI regime

If you can't understand the simple breakdown above then I question your intelligence.

Quote

Again, there is no evidence of Iranians avoiding voicing their opinion; in point of fact, as said before, this paper shows extremely healthy response rates for the opinion polls. A person can have many reasons to not participate in a survey, including "I'm busy," "I don't feel like it," etc.
You can't just assume if someone doesn't choose to participate, they are "afraid." This is so obvious, I shouldn't have to say it, but, clearly some people lack common sense.

Iranians do have major issues voicing their opinion. This is a fact and I've given you more than enough proof. And I'm going to give you more proof of the regime tampering with Universities and convicting those that express views against the regime.

"Iranian authorities should immediately free dozens of university students currently behind bars solely for peacefully expressing political opinions, and end harassment of student activists on university campuses throughout the country, Human Rights Watch said today.

Iran’s universities have increasingly become targets of government efforts to consolidate power and stifle dissent. Since 2005, Ahmadinejad’s administration has pursued a multi-phased campaign to neutralize dissent at universities and “Islamicize” higher education.

This campaign, spearheaded by the Ministries of Science and Intelligence, includes imprisoning student activists; barring politically active students from higher education; using university disciplinary committees to monitor, suspend, or expel students; increasing the presence of pro-government student groups affiliated with the basij (a hard-line Islamist paramilitary group); cutting or limiting social science curricula; and restricting the activities of student groups."

http://www.hrw.org/n...ed-speaking-out

You are obviously clueless about Iran and how the environment is and Universities connection with the regime and how the regime interferes with it. I keep providing proof with references and yet you turn a blind eye.

------------------

I'll just keep adding more to prove the state of 'freedom' in Iran:

The above signatories representing 17 human rights and student organizations express deep concern about the alarming state of academic freedom in the Islamic Republic of Iran, in particular violations of the rights to freedom of expression, association, and assembly on campuses; and institutionalized procedures that allow authorities arbitrarily to expel and suspend students, and fire graduate instructors on the basis of their political views or activities. Over six hundred students, as well as some university lecturers, have been arrested since 2009, many of whom have subsequently been imprisoned, and hundreds deprived of education, as a result of their political activities.
http://www.hrw.org/n...cademic-freedom

Edited by Ugly Jinn, 21 July 2012 - 05:16 PM.

[kadhim]

Quote

I don't know if you are doing this intentionally or you really are lost of what conflict of interest means.

IRI regime funds University of Tehran and funded the new department
The new department of University of Tehran executes a poll regarding IRI regime
The poll favors IRI regime

If you can't understand the simple breakdown above then I question your intelligence.

LOL. Yes, I am familiar with the concept of a conflict of interest. This, however, is not an example of one. I explained to you why it is not above.
You need to engage with what I said; it is insufficient to throw childish insults. Almost every university in the world receives public funding. Virtually all research relies fundamentally on public grant funding. The source of funding is in itself nothing. US universities get federal money, and do research on their government. Canadian universities get public money and do research about the Canadian government. It's a common thing. You can't  call "conflict of interest" without actually putting forward some proof of researchers being coerced to change their research or receiving threats linking continuation of their funding to producing certain results. You need to demonstrate some credible plausible mechanism.
You think you can get away with these lazy-ass, intellectually weak arguments because it's about Iran. And I think that's pathetic.

Quote

Iranians do have major issues voicing their opinion. This is a fact and I've given you more than enough proof. And I'm going to give you more proof of the regime tampering with Universities and convicting those that express views against the regime.

Let's pause here. This discussion started with you making outlandish claims that Iranians couldn't express their opinion, and that public opinion polling from inside Iran couldn't be trusted.
My participation in this thread has been to refute you on these specific incorrect claims. I'm not going to let you distract from your failures by expanding and diluting with all kinds of other tangential issues.

I'm finished with this discussion.

[aliasghark]

Ugly Jinn, on 21 July 2012 - 04:52 PM, said:

You are obviously clueless about Iran.

Yeah, kadhim, everyone except Ugly Jinn is obviously clueless about Iran, why is that so hard to understand?!