Tag: prediction
-
Prediction Markets for the Oscars, Golden Globes, Emmys, and More
Each year I get caught up in the big film and television awards, trying to watch as many as possible and speculating on the various winners. I just discovered Gold Derby, a fun site for following and predicting the Hollywood ‘races’ yourself. Gold Derby takes predictions on everything from the Oscars to RuPaul’s Drag Race,…
-
Predicting Our Behaviour
Other people are far superior than us at predicting our behaviour as their predictions are based primarily on observation and are not tainted by our psychological narrative. After reading Timothy Wilson’sĀ Strangers to Ourselves, Nick Southgate–faculty member at London’s The School of Life–discusses this idea thatĀ our friends and acquaintances are better than us at predicting our…
-
Computing and the Climate
In what appears to be a bit of an advertisement for climateprediction.net–a distributed computing project to test the accuracy of various computer models of climate change–The Economist looks at the impact of computing on the environment; specifically carbon dioxide emissions. According to a report published by the Climate Group, a think-tank based in London, computers,…
-
The Point of Economists
Following Queen Elizabeth’s question to the economistsāWhy did no one see the crisis coming?āthe Financial Times goes one further asking, What is the point of economists? If the economics profession could not warn the public about the credit crunch and the recession, what is the profession’s raison d’etre? Did this reflect, as some claim, that…
-
Weather Forecasts and Economic Development
The economic impact of meteorological forecasts is wide-ranging and, sometimes, unexpected. A few of these influences are described briefly before this (tongue-in-cheek, yet still somewhat logical) piece of advice is offered to developing countries: A study from the mid-1990s [ā¦] concluded that every dollar invested in weather forecasting services would save $10 in economic losses.…