Sunday, September 09, 2012

Wait, if tomorrow's rainfall forecast is "deliberately biased high", how do we know that the 2050 high temperature forecast isn't "deliberately biased high"?

The weatherman is not a moron | Climate Etc.
The article provides some interesting examples on how forecasts are framed in the context of perceived user biases and sensitivities. The Weather Channel’s rainfall forecast example is an interesting one, where probabilities are deliberately biased high. If you carry an umbrella and it doesn’t rain, no big deal. But if it rains and you get caught without an umbrella, then that hurts. So the rainfall forecasts have a precautionary bias, based upon user sensitivity.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for linking to this and with a great headline (see judith curry links are of great value, stephen goddard links are of unknown (negative) value.

How much are my comments worth: check out the word verification: http://i.imgur.com/RwnVa.jpg