I have written about prediction a few times in the past – the main thrust of my argument is that it is –
1. Pointless
2. Experts dont have a friggen clue
This is a nice little podcast on Philip Tetlock one of the driving forces behind the pointlessness of experts philosophy.
So Tetlock took advantage of getting tenure to start a long-term research project now 18 years old to examine in detail the outcomes of expert political forecasts about international affairs. He studied the aggregate accuracy of 284 experts making 28,000 forecasts, looking for pattern in their comparative success rates. Most of the findings were negative— conservatives did no better or worse than liberals; optimists did no better or worse than pessimists. Only one pattern emerged consistently.
“How you think matters more than what you think.”
