> Marvin wrote-
> I recently began reading Benford's _Foudation's Fear_. Reading about
> Nick's Arnet's career projects and watching all the commercials during the
> Superbowl yesterday brought me to a conclusion. Psychohistory, or some
> form of predictive sociology, will be developed by advertisers and
> lobbyists who are constantly looking for ways to change mass behaviors to
> their own advantage. That's because advertising gets all the big bucks,
> and because to reliably change future behavior you have to be able to
> predict responses to stimuli.
Nick wrote
The ones who were most interested were Wall Street, politicians and
Hollywood. Politicians got the idea faster than anyone else. Of course,
there's a problem with any kind of forecasting for politicians -- in the
long run, they will only pay for forecasts that tell them what they want to
hear. That's apparently well documented, at least according to a social
networks researcher with whom we collaborated.
Dee asks
How would you say that psycohistory differs from political science? Isn't
Nick suggesting that politicians might make the leap if they can see
where they are getting bogged down?
