[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Michael Tobis wrote:
> I'd be interested to know what the longest time scale is that
> economists can generally agree on a prediction, compared to the time
> constants of the system.
Well in one sense it depends on the prediction. A prediction that in
one hundred years a combination of sin taxes and carbon trading will be
a cheaper way to reduce emmissions than a raft of subsidies and fines.
This is a long term prediction economists are very confident in. Even
though it is conceivable many facets of economic theory will change,
some things that were discovered at the inception of economic theory
are still valid today. I don't think this is what you are talking about
however. Predictions of economies based on demographic change ought to
be very useful for long range forecasts. For instance the dependency
ratio in China will substantially affect growth prospects. The pattern
of growth there should approximate Japan's when Japan was at the same
point of the demographic cycle. Basically, growth will mysteriously
stall when the dependency ratio curves upwards (I am not sure exactly
when this is going to happen but it will happen, I would lay money on
it)
There is some hope that robots will repeal this law about the impact of
the dependency ratio on growth.
Predicition is hard. I heard an NPR program a while back were the
moderator challenged a couple of tech experts (one in biology, the
other from Microsoft) to make futurist predictions. The came up with
predicitions limited to the next 5 years. The Microsoft guy predicted
capability to view movies at high resolutions. This is probably the
horizon for non-wild-eyed predicition in high tech. A bit of a
problem, perhaps, since any city has to initiate some
transportation/infrastructure projects a decade or more in advance.
I'd say that our ability to predict the future of technology has been
going down hill fast in the last century or more. The problem started
shortly after Bacon wrote "[Scientific] Knowledge is [National] Power",
the best prediction ever, made while they were still burning witches.
Bacon was history's best futurist, IMO.
Verner Vinge maintains that there is a horizon at about 30 after which
there is no limit on technological predictions. He came up with this
idea while trying to come up with plausible plots for science fiction.
I seem to recall that he says that it is problem generally recognized
by science fiction writers. Vinge's idea is perhaps too compelling,
it's practically spawned a religion.
I predict that every prediction that I have just made beyond 5 years
will be viewed wild-eyed on this newgroup, thereby making my point. Of
course, I could have taken Tobis' route (see above) and confidently
predicted some version of "the future resembles the past". He sounded
so sober when he did that, not wild-eyed at all.
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