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posted by janrinok on Sunday December 17 2017, @07:11AM   Printer-friendly
from the that-sums-it-up dept.

The answer should be NO, but, do you think this would work ?

Good scientists are not only able to uncover patterns in the things they study, but to use this information to predict the future. Meteorologists study atmospheric pressure and wind speed to predict the trajectories of future storms. A biologist may predict the growth of a tumor based on its current size and development. A financial analyst may try to predict the ups and downs of a stock based on things like market capitalization or cash flow.

Perhaps even more interesting than the above phenomena is that of predicting the behavior of human beings. Attempts to predict how people will behave have existed since the origins of humankind. Early humans had to trust their instincts. Today, marketers, politicians, trial lawyers and more make their living on predicting human behavior. Predicting human behavior, in all of its forms, is big business. So, how does mathematics do in predicting our own behavior in general? Despite advances in stock market analytics, economics, political polling and cognitive neuroscience – all of which ultimately endeavor to predict human behavior – science may never be able to do so with perfect certainty.

[...] As technology develops, scientists may find that we can predict human behavior rather well in one area, while still lacking in another. It's very difficult to give an overall sense of the limitations. For instance, facial recognition may be easier to emulate because vision is one of many human sensory processing systems, or because there are only so many ways faces can differ. On the other hand, predicting voting behavior, especially based on the 2016 presidential election, is quite another story. There are many complex and not yet understood reasons why humans do what they do.

Still others argue that, theoretically at least, that perfect prediction will someday be possible. Until then, with any luck, mathematics and statistics may help us increasingly account for what people, on average, will do next.

https://theconversation.com/can-math-predict-what-youll-do-next-78892


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  • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday December 17 2017, @05:11PM (2 children)

    by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Sunday December 17 2017, @05:11PM (#611019) Homepage Journal

    What's the mathematical symbol for my morning coffee? I mean do they make up a fun, new one as mathematicians are wont to do or do they just use ☕?

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 17 2017, @07:35PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 17 2017, @07:35PM (#611055)

    Check out these guys --
    http://nautil.us/blog/the-limits-of-formal-learning-or-why-robots-cant-dance [nautil.us]

    In its first few decades, artificial intelligence research concentrated on tasks we consider particular signs of intelligence because they are difficult for people: chess, for example. It turned out that chess is easy for fast-enough computers. Early work neglected tasks that are easy for people: making breakfast, for instance. Such easy tasks turned out to be difficult for computers controlling robots.

    In the mid-1980s Phil Agre was talking about the theory of breakfast (we lived in the same communal warehouse space briefly), and how to get a robot to make breakfast -
      Put the cereal in the bowl first, measure the milk by how much of the cereal is covered.
      I'm sure there was something about coffee, but I've forgotten.

    • (Score: 2) by Zinho on Monday December 18 2017, @05:04PM

      by Zinho (759) on Monday December 18 2017, @05:04PM (#611465)

      Put the cereal in the bowl first, measure the milk by how much of the cereal is covered.

      Ans there was much hilarity when this algorithm was used on Cheerios or Froot Loops Depending on bowl geometry the milk may not be visible before the cereal bits start overflowing the rim.

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