NATE SILVER BECOMES AN ADVERB. I posted here about how Nate Silver has had such great success in political predictions that his name has been used as a verb. John Lanchester had a good article in the London Review of Books (January 3) on the difficulties of making an assessment of the current state of the British economy. At one point, he dismisses claims that the predictions of a new government agency would be influenced by the Treasury on the grounds that the staff of the new agency have a professional stake in making good predictions. He says:
“A wonk’s pride is a powerful thing, and just as wonks love being proved Nate Silverishly right, they equally hate being shown so publicly to be wrong.”