A review of Tetlock’s ‘Superforecasting’ (2015)

Spectator Review, October 2015
















7 thoughts on “A review of Tetlock’s ‘Superforecasting’ (2015)



  3. I am late to this but came across it reading about Tetlock elsewhere…

    An area of HMG policy where this seems to apply particularly well is climate change. The climate could not be more complex or multi-disciplinary, so Tetlock’s findings tally precisely, in that the climate has not done what experts told us for decades that it would. But it’s easier to be a hedgehog and pay great heed to the idea of ‘climate change.’ Hence we are throwing phenomenal amounts of money around on what looks increasingly to be a non-issue.

    This links which what this blog has outlined elsewhere, especially in the Brexit post, where evidence and rationality is put to one side in favour of moral grandstanding.



  5. I am intrigued by the parodies in so much of your work.

    I would urge you to note the effects of social media use with cognitive dissonance and the effective rise in preventable infectious diseases through anti-vaxxers spreading false information and pseudo-science. This is a middle-class epidemic, rather than the assumed ‘hippy’ base, where a little knowledge and wealth to spend on unregulated holistic therapies has opened Pandora’s box.

    Much like Brexit, computer algorithms can speed up and target the worst of human nature, as human nature is in itself, more complex and changeable than computers. Even with AI and predictive evolutionary learning, a single human can upset the applecart. Although admittedly this would be temporary before the AI caught up and recalibrated, the idea that an omnipotent computer-based algorithm could generate the future of civilisation has been dramatised in the show Travellers (Netflix). The Travellers in the show had the benefit of time travel to ‘re-do’ the errors within the system based on human fallacy.

    I am concerned that you note that systems are rotten – agreed – yet feel another system is the answer. Not merely that but a system that isn’t answerable to anyone (or will the AI have programmes for compassion and empathy for the ‘human condition’?) and those that control it will have a vested interest to manipulate outcome on a grander scale than anything current governments can conceive. Granted many ideas and inventions are overlooked because of short-sighted fat cats/middle manager types looking to uphold the status quo and as a business venture with tight controls in various sectors. I am particularly interested in public health and the field of epidemiology. The ability to cross-reference products or environments that may have negative impacts on mental and physical health on a scale unprecedented to date is fascinating. Would the conglomerates controlling the AI want this to happen, I wonder? Algorithms that can look into biopsychosocial aspects of health and predict illnesses within families and offer guidance, for example. Even though such enterprises can be manipulated for insurance billionaires to take over, weighing up the potential health benefits makes that attractive (while we have the NHS, it is imperative to note). An AI that can record someone who has a fatal diagnosis’ wish for euthanasia and effect this on behalf of the patient once the disease reaches it’s climax (looking forward to a time when a change in the law allows for this, such is the strain on the NHS). Such ideas can eliminate the risk practitioners take on ethically and be truly ‘patient-led’. Ethics is largely the reasoning behind so much of what is troublesome to the NHS, yet it is also the most basic part of being human; being humane. If AI can format to similar frameworks for biomedical ethics, you reboot the old system, as you have said.

    However, the application of this in a larger, over-arching manifestation – such as the Brexit vote – has meant this thrust of your argument has been lost. Instead the public and politicians will more likely be fearfully instigating an AI ‘arms race’ for want of a better phrase, to ensure their place in power is unchallenged in forthcoming elections. Frankly, you’ve given them the keys to the castle. Now we look forward to a future where the richest will win, as they can pay for the AI they require and do as little in the public interest as is possible. We can already see where the spending has been going since Brexit (which has now cost us more in FSTE damage alone than we have paid into it in 45 years) and it certainly isn’t on “the people” or education.


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