Hi, Roger.
That was some hurricane, huh? I thought of you in Boston Harbor, battened against the lashing gales. Speaking of analytics, I was struck by the notion of having a prediction without a theory. I am wondering if that is actually possible. I know that theories are really useful for making predictions, but can one actually make a prediction without one? Perhaps meteorology would be a good domain in which to think this through. The lowest level of prediction (and one that works remarkably and embarrassingly well) is to predict that tomorrow’s weather will be the same as todays …. “persistence forecasting.” But even that entails a theory that the weather is stable. Then one can have dynamic persistence theories, which one would apply to the stuff floating down a river ... the river will continue to flow down to me. The jet stream is sometimes like that. And jet “stream” is, after all, a metaphor. And this is making me think that we ought perhaps to talk about “levels of theory”, rather than “theory/non-theory”, persistence forecasting being the application of a VERY low level theory. Anyway, I am probably bending this thread horribly. Off on my own cloud. Age has addled my brain, and now the heat has cooked it. I am an omelet. Take care and keep afloat. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ From: Friam [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Roger Critchlow Sent: Thursday, September 08, 2016 7:21 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] speaking of analytics See the result of the AI judged beauty contest? Apparently the training set needed more curation. Very teachable moment. -- rec -- On Sep 8, 2016 7:10 PM, "Marcus Daniels" <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: Racial profiling is a single dimensional predictor. It's bad because it is regressive, not because race is a useless predictor. There are lots of attributes like that, and big data is just puts them together to predict aggregate behaviors about people without really having a theory of mind of that individual or a theory of mind at all. Like trying to learn from Google without understanding the reading and writing of human language. I think the FOIA type concerns should be fixable in principle. But in practice, these databases and algorithms are tightly held intellectual property that the government licenses from companies. Without sweeping legislation, the government can't get their hands on it, and the people interested in applying these systems, like law enforcement, aren't necessarily the most curious people in the world to begin with. Push a button and get an authoritative answer. What could be better? You're guilty because the system said so. -----Original Message----- From: Friam [mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] On Behalf Of glen ? Sent: Thursday, September 08, 2016 4:54 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > Subject: [FRIAM] speaking of analytics The case against big data: "It’s like you’re being put into a cult, but you don’t actually believe in it" http://www.salon.com/2016/09/08/the-case-against-big-data-it-is-like-youre-being-put-into-a-cult-but-you-dont-actually-believe-in-it/ > But it’s opaque right? Which is also what a lot of these things have in > common. > > It’s opaque, and it’s unaccountable. You cannot appeal it because it is > opaque. Not only is it opaque, but I actually filed a Freedom of Information > Act request to get the source code. And I was told I couldn’t get the source > code and not only that, but I was told the reason why was that New York City > had signed a contract with this place called VARK in Madison, Wisconsin. > Which was an agreement that they wouldn’t get access to the source code > either. The Department of Education, the city of New York City but nobody in > the city, in other words, could truly explain the scores of the teachers. > > It was like an alien had come down to earth and said, "Here are some scores, > we’re not gonna explain them to you, but you should trust them. And by the > way you can’t appeal them and you will not be given explanations for how to > get better." -- ☣ glen ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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