Being upbeat about Brexit.

[Nearly Sane]

Yep - should there be, perhaps for legal reasons, a re-run (probably unlikely I know) I wouldn't be surprised if some Leave voters didn't change their minds given the apparent absence of there being any credible plans and the nauseating characters who are, allegedly, driving the Brexit bus.

and vice versa, those who don't see any real leadership on the Remain side in England, and those who think it 's just another nightmare if we vote against any deal because there isn't a let's forget about the negotiation choice coming from the EU.

[ProfessorDavey]

You are assuming that people won't change their vote as they get older despite saying you have no idea what will happen as time passes. This is an assumption , and one which your own posts contradict. And that's leaving aside the basic assumption that the votes don't change on the basis of  changed circumstances, never mind changed ages. You can't actually make any calculation without a raft of assumptions here.

The point, in a way, is about whether the vote was clearly the sure and settled view of the British people. For so many reasons it is unsafe to think it is. And demographics is just one of the reasons - there are certain circumstances where you can be pretty confident that demographics will shift perhaps a wafer thin majority into a more and more secure majority over time. This isn't one of those situations - demographics turns an already wafer thin majority into an even more marginal one and thence to a thin majority in the other direction.

And that's before you add in any assumptions about people changing their minds.

[Nearly Sane]

The point, in a way, is about whether the vote was clearly the sure and settled view of the British people. For so many reasons it is unsafe to think it is. And demographics is just one of the reasons - there are certain circumstances where you can be pretty confident that demographics will shift perhaps a wafer thin majority into a more and more secure majority over time. This isn't one of those situations - demographics turns an already wafer thin majority into an even more marginal one and thence to a thin majority in the other direction.

And that's before you add in any assumptions about people changing their minds.

Oh you can be 'pretty sure' with 'no idea' of what will happen while making 'no assumptions'?  How does that work then?

[ProfessorDavey]

Oh you can be 'pretty sure' with 'no idea' of what will happen while making 'no assumptions'?  How does that work then?

That's how demographic predictions of all sorts work my friend.

You make a couple of assumptions neither of which I think are controversial - first that over time people die, and those that tend to die the most are those that are the oldest.

Secondly that youngsters get older and every so often one of them (or many) has their 18th birthday and becomes eligible to vote.

The only other assumption is that the old people who die are like the other old people in their voting patterns, and the young people who become eligible to vote are like other young people in their voting patterns.

Why is that such a challenge to you NS.

[jakswan]

In what way am I 'spinning stats' Jakswan.

All I did was point out the relationship between age and likelihood of voting leave - and then provided evidence to back up my point. No spinning whatsoever.

The further point is at what point in the future does the cross-over occur. Effectively at what point will the loss of the elderly predominantly leave voters and appearance of new young voters attaining 18 who predominantly support remain be such that the tiny majority in favour of leaving vanishes, even if no-one who voted in 2016 changes their mind. Will it be before we actually leave the EU?

What % of the 18-24 age group actually voted remain. I can infer from your stats that 63% of those that voted went remain, however if the turnout in that age group is less than 50% then we could spin it to say only 31% voted remain.

I have heard of people, as they get older, have a tendency to become more conservative, no idea if this would translate to views with regard to Brexit.

Your assumptions (both unsafe):-

1) Turnout remains the same regardless of age
2) Voting intention remains the regardless of age

[ProfessorDavey]

What % of the 18-24 age group actually voted remain. I can infer from your stats that 63% of those that voted went remain, however if the turnout in that age group is less than 50% then we could spin it to say only 31% voted remain.

Wrong the turnout for 18-24 years olds was 64%, for the over 65s it was 90% - those are the assumptions I've used.

I have heard of people, as they get older, have a tendency to become more conservative, no idea if this would translate to views with regard to Brexit.

You need to prove that with regard to Brexit - this is an assumption people (wrongly) assume for religion - i.e. that individuals get more religious as they get older. But there is no evidence for this, indeed the reverse seems to be slightly the case. The reason why churches are full of old people is because people born in the 1930s and 1940s always had a way higher level of religiosity than those born in the 1960s or 70s.

And I'm only talking about time-spans of a couple of years - most assumptions about people getting more conservative as they get older is based changes over decades.

Your assumptions (both unsafe):-

1) Turnout remains the same regardless of age

Nope I've factored in differential turnout with age

2) Voting intention remains the regardless of age

Which is of course the safe assumption unless you can prove otherwise. But you are actually rather shooting yourself in the foot, as the demographic shift is on the basis of people dying (and those are most likely to be predominantly the very oldest) and people attaining 18 (who are definitely the youngest voters) - so using your 'get more conservative (i.e.g Brexit) as you get older view would suggest that those dying (and therefore no longer voting) would be biased towards the most Brexit end of the 65+ voting profile, while those attaining 18 would be at the extreme remain end of the 18-24 profile.

[Nearly Sane]

That's how demographic predictions of all sorts work my friend.

You make a couple of assumptions neither of which I think are controversial - first that over time people die, and those that tend to die the most are those that are the oldest.

Secondly that youngsters get older and every so often one of them (or many) has their 18th birthday and becomes eligible to vote.

The only other assumption is that the old people who die are like the other old people in their voting patterns, and the young people who become eligible to vote are like other young people in their voting patterns.

Why is that such a challenge to you NS.

it isn't a challenge to me, I only used words from your own posts which you seem confused by.

[jeremyp]

Dear Jeremyp and ProfDavey,

The hole that needs filling, where do we start, what about this country and then we might look further afield.

Church of England, how would you fill that hole? And before anyone answers, please think very carefully about what that encompasses, you can start at the top and work your way down ( Her Majesty ).

The Sally Ann, how do you fill that hole?

Barnado's, how do you fill that hole, and please remember that our own government uses that charity for help and advice, actually when I think about it, this country would be in a very poor state if we didn't have the likes of the CoE, CoS, Sally Ann, Barnado's.

Wouldn't all the people in those organisations still be doing charitable work?

Remembrance day, how do you fill that hole?

There's no reason to treat Remembrance Day as a religious event. We can still have it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25465210

Is it your hope that one day all the above in the link will just be tourist attractions.

Nine out of ten of those already are tourist attractions and even Canterbury probably has more tourist visitors than Christians.

In fact, in seven cases, the religions that set up the sites (if they were religions) are already long gone. Their holes don't seem to stop us from appreciating the sites.

Then we need to consider our kids education, and no I am not talking about the three R's, morality, ethics, compassion, these are far more important than the three R's, and please don't say these are subjects that should be taught at home, in this disjointed country of one parent families or Mom and Dad out working all hours.

But you don't need religion to teach morality, ethics or compassion either at home or at school. In fact, I find it quite offensive that you must believe me to be lacking in all three.

Gentlemen, you have a massive hole to fill

If you have excised a tumour, you don't fill the hole with another tumour.

[jeremyp]

Interestingly, I have many friends over 60 (with political view across the spectrum) and the vast majority voted Remain. The one exception who voted Leave just hates Poles . . . and he's not the 'sharpest knife in the box'.

Of my circle of friends and acquaintances, only four voted to leave (unfortunately, two of them were my parents) which means that if my experience is a good indication of demographics, Remain absolutely crushed Leave by more than 90%.

Anecdotes are not evidence.

[jeremyp]

You are assuming that people won't change their vote as they get older despite saying you have no idea what will happen as time passes. This is an assumption , and one which your own posts contradict. And that's leaving aside the basic assumption that the votes don't change on the basis of  changed circumstances, never mind changed ages. You can't actually make any calculation without a raft of assumptions here.

We don't know what individuals will do, but we are talking about large cohorts of the populace here. It's a reasonable assumption that on average their views will remain the same unless there is some systematic influence at work.

[jeremyp]

and vice versa, those who don't see any real leadership on the Remain side in England,

The Remain side lost. They have no obligation to lead Britain anywhere.

[Nearly Sane]

The Remain side lost. They have no obligation to lead Britain anywhere.

Strawman,but in a new vote you need something to vote for

[ProfessorDavey]

We don't know what individuals will do, but we are talking about large cohorts of the populace here. It's a reasonable assumption that on average their views will remain the same unless there is some systematic influence at work.

I think that is correct, hence my quite reasonable assumptions, which were actually focussed on demographic effects.

Now you talk about systematic influences at work and there is one that is relevant - that being that there are a block of people who are resistant to change and therefore will tend to opt for the status quo. So they might have been against a Scottish parliament, preferring the status quo, at the time of that referendum. But once the parliament is established and is the 'norm' then they'd be in favour as it is now the status quo and would resist change aimed at abolishing it.

Now you might say that this will mean that a block of remain voters will jump ship to leave, but the difference with brexit compared to the changes enacted via other referendums is that we will be in a state of flux for years and years and a brexit settlement will perhaps take a decade or more before we return to stability and that situation seems 'normal'. So I'd argue that for all that time rather than wanting to retain the new status quo (because there won't be a status quo, only flux) the 'let's not change' brigade will hark back to the earlier stability and status quo of being in the EU.

[ProfessorDavey]

Strawman,but in a new vote you need something to vote for

So are you suggesting we should have a second referendum - presumably on the terms of the agreed brexit settlement?

[Nearly Sane]

So are you suggesting we should have a second referendum - presumably on the terms of the agreed brexit settlement?

no

[ProfessorDavey]

Wouldn't all the people in those organisations still be doing charitable work?

Indeed.

Actually it would be an appalling indictment of the motivations of people who work for religious charities to suggest that they'd cease to help others and engage in charitable work if the charity they were supporting didn't say 'Christian' on the tin.

Sadly I do know some people like this, whose motivation to do charitable work seems to be merely to make their religion look good and to make themselves feel more worthy in a religious context. Fortunately those people are in a very small minority in my experience.

[ProfessorDavey]

no

Then why did you say that in a new vote you need something to vote for.

But to answer your question, presumably any second referendum would stack up an agreed brexit settlement against remaining (given that you couldn't simply reject the settlement and be left in complete limbo) so we would have something to vote for.

[Nearly Sane]

Then why did you say that in a new vote you need something to vote for.

But to answer your question, presumably any second referendum would stack up an agreed brexit settlement against remaining (given that you couldn't simply reject the settlement and be left in complete limbo) so we would have something to vote for.

Because I was talking about the need for a clear view  of what you vote for, not a specific justification of a second vote.  There is no option for just remaining unless you say that currently the EU spokespeople are just lying.

[jakswan]

Wrong the turnout for 18-24 years olds was 64%, for the over 65s it was 90% - those are the assumptions I've used.

So we have 62 remain, 37 leave and 34 abstain. So 18-24s 46% voted remain.

You need to prove that with regard to Brexit - this is an assumption people (wrongly) assume for religion - i.e. that individuals get more religious as they get older. But there is no evidence for this, indeed the reverse seems to be slightly the case. The reason why churches are full of old people is because people born in the 1930s and 1940s always had a way higher level of religiosity than those born in the 1960s or 70s.

First you are making the claim you have the burden of proof. I made no such assumption there is evidence.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/03/do-we-become-more-conservative-with-age-young-old-politics

And I'm only talking about time-spans of a couple of years - most assumptions about people getting more conservative as they get older is based changes over decades.

Read the link.

Nope I've factored in differential turnout with age

I don't think your link that you based your claim on does.

Which is of course the safe assumption unless you can prove otherwise. But you are actually rather shooting yourself in the foot, as the demographic shift is on the basis of people dying (and those are most likely to be predominantly the very oldest) and people attaining 18 (who are definitely the youngest voters) - so using your 'get more conservative (i.e.g Brexit) as you get older view would suggest that those dying (and therefore no longer voting) would be biased towards the most Brexit end of the 65+ voting profile, while those attaining 18 would be at the extreme remain end of the 18-24 profile.

Eh? First if you are making a claim based on assumptions its up to you to prove them safe or not. Secondly its not simply a case of next year the population will change to be proportionally more 18-24s than over 65s, we have an ageing population.

[Nearly Sane]

We don't know what individuals will do, but we are talking about large cohorts of the populace here. It's a reasonable assumption that on average their views will remain the same unless there is some systematic influence at work.

Except Prof D said he had 'no idea' about what would happen

[ProfessorDavey]

So we have 62 remain, 37 leave and 34 abstain. So 18-24s 46% voted remain.

Not the way I worked it out.

We have about 750k new voters added to the electoral roll each year as the become 18. Of these 64% vote - in other words 480k - of those 73% or 350k vote remain, the remainder or 130k vote leave - so that is a net gain for remain of 220k per year.

You can do the same at the other end for the 600k over 65's dying. Overall it gives a net gain per year for remain of between 350-400k, which wipes out the 1.3m majority in less than 4 years.

[jakswan]

Not the way I worked it out.

We have about 750k new voters added to the electoral roll each year as the become 18. Of these 64% vote - in other words 480k - of those 73% or 350k vote remain, the remainder or 130k vote leave - so that is a net gain for remain of 220k per year.

You can do the same at the other end for the 600k over 65's dying. Overall it gives a net gain per year for remain of between 350-400k, which wipes out the 1.3m majority in less than 4 years.

Please link where you posted that before.

According to ONS deaths 2015 was just over 600k.

[jeremyp]

Strawman,but in a new vote you need something to vote for

What do you mean by "straw man"? I made a statement of fact. There is currently no obligation for the remainers to lead us anywhere since the referendum voted against the direction in which they want to go.

I do agree that, in a rerun of the referendum that the remainders won, they would have to lead us out of this mess.

[jeremyp]

  There is no option for just remaining unless you say that currently the EU spokespeople are just lying.

Why not? Were we to change our minds at the end of the process, it would be in everybody's interest to let us stay.

[ProfessorDavey]

Please link where you posted that before.

According to ONS deaths 2015 was just over 600k.

I didn't but no-one asked.

Yes 600k deaths in 2015 - the vast, vast majority are over 65, hence using that figure.