Aristotle on Torture

I was just reading through Aristotle's Rhetoric and found Aristotle discussing judicial torture. He doesn't apparently take sides about evidence extracted under torture (since this is a book about rhetoric), but nonetheless shows a fairly critical attitude. In the context he is pointing out arguments that, in a law court, could be used to both promote or dismiss such evidence. He ends up pointing out more extensively why such evidence is untrustworthy, saying: "we can destroy [evidence extracted under torture's] value by telling the truth about all kinds of torture generally; for those under compulsion are as likely to give false evidence as true, some being ready to endure everything rather than tell the truth, while others are equally ready to make false charges against others, in the hope of being sooner released from torture"(1377a2-6). What's interesting is that cases of false information extracted under torture were apparently well enough known, even in Aristotle's day, that a person could cite several examples.

This issue has come up recently because some information extracted under the torture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed eventually led to the discovery of the hiding place of Osama bin Laden. Some people have used this as evidence that torture can have its value. The argument for torture is a form of Utilitarian argument, basically stating that, in certain circumstances torture is justifiable when the benefit of information extracted under torture vastly outweighs the evils of torture. For example, if you torture someone to get information to stop a terrorist plot that will kill thousands of people, then it's justified. Such argument might be a bit tenuous in this case, since it's not clear that Killing Osama will undermine Al Qaeda or make a dent on the threat of terrorism, but there still might be some cases where it applies.

Steve Chapman over at Reason writes about the weakness of this argument. The problem is that this argument relies on a couple key assumptions, that information extracted under torture is reliable and that torture is the best way to extract information. But, the unreliability of torture has been known at least as far back as Ancient Greece. Since it's all too common for innocent people who know nothing to be tortured into giving false information to get the torture to stop, about the only circumstance that torture might be reliable is if you have a suspect that you know is holding some information, but who refuses to divulge.

Even here, torture doesn't appear to be the best strategy. People are human and are generally willing to divulge information with people they trust and bond with. If Stockholm Syndrome is real, then you can gain the trust and empathy even of prisoners and get them to willingly speak openly about what they know. In fact, it can work even for people who really don't feel empathy. Remorseless serial murderer Pedro Lopez confessed to his several hundred murders after police mercilessly beat him into subm... Oh wait. No, they didn't do that. They just put a priest in the cell with him, and the priest earned his trust, and Pedro Lopez confessed. He even took police out to show them all the burial places of the victims he'd killed in the area. Steve Chapman points out that that gaining trust is probably more productive, since it'll lead the subject to divulge more volubly, whereas under torture subjects will try to give as little information as possible. In other words, if you try to torture some kernel of information out of a guy, he might finally divulge it, but he'll completely close up his mouth from then on. Gaining someone's trust and bonding with them does require a bit more finesse and creativity, but it's worth the effort and will generally lead to more information extracted.

The case that torture is horrible and unethical is a pretty easy case to make, but it's sometimes justified on Utilitarian grounds, arguing that there are cases where the ends justify means. Unfortunately, even these arguments seem highly doubtful and should lead us to conclude that torture is something that is never justifiable.

I was just reading through Aristotle's Rhetoric and found Aristotle discussing judicial torture. He doesn't apparently take sides about evidence extracted under torture (since this is a book about rhetoric), but nonetheless shows a fairly critical attitude. In the context he is pointing out arguments that, in a law court, could be used to both promote or dismiss such evidence. He ends up pointing out more extensively why such evidence is untrustworthy, saying: "we can destroy [evidence extracted under torture's] value by telling the truth about all kinds of torture generally; for those under compulsion are as likely to give false evidence as true, some being ready to endure everything rather than tell the truth, while others are equally ready to make false charges against others, in the hope of being sooner released from torture"(1377a2-6). What's interesting is that cases of false information extracted under torture were apparently well enough known, even in Aristotle's day, that a person could cite several examples.

This issue has come up recently because some information extracted under the torture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed eventually led to the discovery of the hiding place of Osama bin Laden. Some people have used this as evidence that torture can have its value. The argument for torture is a form of Utilitarian argument, basically stating that, in certain circumstances torture is justifiable when the benefit of information extracted under torture vastly outweighs the evils of torture. For example, if you torture someone to get information to stop a terrorist plot that will kill thousands of people, then it's justified. Such argument might be a bit tenuous in this case, since it's not clear that Killing Osama will undermine Al Qaeda or make a dent on the threat of terrorism, but there still might be some cases where it applies.

Steve Chapman over at Reason writes about the weakness of this argument. The problem is that this argument relies on a couple key assumptions, that information extracted under torture is reliable and that torture is the best way to extract information. But, the unreliability of torture has been known at least as far back as Ancient Greece. Since it's all too common for innocent people who know nothing to be tortured into giving false information to get the torture to stop, about the only circumstance that torture might be reliable is if you have a suspect that you know is holding some information, but who refuses to divulge.

Even here, torture doesn't appear to be the best strategy. People are human and are generally willing to divulge information with people they trust and bond with. If Stockholm Syndrome is real, then you can gain the trust and empathy even of prisoners and get them to willingly speak openly about what they know. In fact, it can work even for people who really don't feel empathy. Remorseless serial murderer Pedro Lopez confessed to his several hundred murders after police mercilessly beat him into subm... Oh wait. No, they didn't do that. They just put a priest in the cell with him, and the priest earned his trust, and Pedro Lopez confessed. He even took police out to show them all the burial places of the victims he'd killed in the area. Steve Chapman points out that that gaining trust is probably more productive, since it'll lead the subject to divulge more volubly, whereas under torture subjects will try to give as little information as possible. In other words, if you try to torture some kernel of information out of a guy, he might finally divulge it, but he'll completely close up his mouth from then on. Gaining someone's trust and bonding with them does require a bit more finesse and creativity, but it's worth the effort and will generally lead to more information extracted.

The case that torture is horrible and unethical is a pretty easy case to make, but it's sometimes justified on Utilitarian grounds, arguing that there are cases where the ends justify means. Unfortunately, even these arguments seem highly doubtful and should lead us to conclude that torture is something that is never justifiable.

Aristotle on Torture

Smart People

Humorous article at cracked today about the downsides of being smart. The one I found the most interesting is #2: Smart People are More Likely to Believe Bullshit.

The basic reasoning behind why this is smart people are overconfident in their intelligence and thus are overconfident in their own opinions. This can lead them to dismiss other opinions or evidence, even in cases when they should advert to them. This is most principally true is cases where one is stepping outside one's area of expertise. A person who's a deeply knowledgeable expert on, for example, biology, might come to the conclusion that since they can be an expert in one subject, they can be an expert in all subjects. So, they think that they know a whole bunch about, say, economics and starts pontificating about that, when probably they should just be submitting to the opinion of real experts in economics. Since, less smart people aren't so overconfident, they do more often submit to the consensus of experts, and, though the consensus of experts is not guaranteed to be right, it's more likely to be right than a single persons inexpert opinion.

Nonetheless, experts can even make bad judgments within their own field of expertise. There are surprisingly many ridiculous ideas that one comes forward when you study the thinking of deceased geniuses. These people subscribed to some ridiculous ideas that can't simply be explained away as being a symptom of their times.

I think there a couple of reasons for this. The first, I think, is that smart people are attracted to more sophisticated ideas. If Ockham's razor is true and simpler ideas are more likely to be correct (because they rely on fewer assumptions), then one's smarts can lead one away from simpler and more probable explanations. Ockham's razor does not say that the simplest explanation is always the most correct, but it does mean that the simplest explanation that can explain the available data is most likely correct. But smart people more often prefer the idea that is the most complicated, the one that's the most intellectually challenging and interesting. For a recent example, over at Inside Higher Ed, a some 1200 word essay was penned to explain why it is that students were partying to celebrate the death of Osama bin Laden, citing a few experts and offering much opinion. Clearly, this was overkill, which some commenters rightly made fun of, one noting: "Or, we could spare the world our half-baked analyses of the spontaneous outpouring of emotion, and read it for exactly what it is: 'We got the bad guy. Woot!'" But smart people like to give sophisticated explanations: it's more intellectually stimulating and exciting.

Another explanation is that smart people are very difficult to persuade out of their beliefs because they are very good at coming up with reasons for believing them. In other words, if you get into an argument with a less intelligent person, you can probably persuade them with strong evidence, which they'll submit because they don't know better and have no reason to think they know better. But a smart person will find ways to weasel out of even the best evidence. In short smart people have sophisticated, well thought out reasons to back up even their stupidest ideas. One would be quite amazed for example to see the detail and sophistication of arguments defending the moon conspiracy hoax.

As a person who's completing a PhD I think I can say with some confidence that I'm probably at least a little bit smarter than the average bear, and I can definitely attest to the fact that I have been more than once duped by rather ridiculous ideas and opinions that I have later reversed. This doesn't mean I don't have any stupid opinions now, just that I don't know what they are, but definitely do know I've held some in the past.

Humorous article at cracked today about the downsides of being smart. The one I found the most interesting is #2: Smart People are More Likely to Believe Bullshit.

The basic reasoning behind why this is smart people are overconfident in their intelligence and thus are overconfident in their own opinions. This can lead them to dismiss other opinions or evidence, even in cases when they should advert to them. This is most principally true is cases where one is stepping outside one's area of expertise. A person who's a deeply knowledgeable expert on, for example, biology, might come to the conclusion that since they can be an expert in one subject, they can be an expert in all subjects. So, they think that they know a whole bunch about, say, economics and starts pontificating about that, when probably they should just be submitting to the opinion of real experts in economics. Since, less smart people aren't so overconfident, they do more often submit to the consensus of experts, and, though the consensus of experts is not guaranteed to be right, it's more likely to be right than a single persons inexpert opinion.

Nonetheless, experts can even make bad judgments within their own field of expertise. There are surprisingly many ridiculous ideas that one comes forward when you study the thinking of deceased geniuses. These people subscribed to some ridiculous ideas that can't simply be explained away as being a symptom of their times.

I think there a couple of reasons for this. The first, I think, is that smart people are attracted to more sophisticated ideas. If Ockham's razor is true and simpler ideas are more likely to be correct (because they rely on fewer assumptions), then one's smarts can lead one away from simpler and more probable explanations. Ockham's razor does not say that the simplest explanation is always the most correct, but it does mean that the simplest explanation that can explain the available data is most likely correct. But smart people more often prefer the idea that is the most complicated, the one that's the most intellectually challenging and interesting. For a recent example, over at Inside Higher Ed, a some 1200 word essay was penned to explain why it is that students were partying to celebrate the death of Osama bin Laden, citing a few experts and offering much opinion. Clearly, this was overkill, which some commenters rightly made fun of, one noting: "Or, we could spare the world our half-baked analyses of the spontaneous outpouring of emotion, and read it for exactly what it is: 'We got the bad guy. Woot!'" But smart people like to give sophisticated explanations: it's more intellectually stimulating and exciting.

Another explanation is that smart people are very difficult to persuade out of their beliefs because they are very good at coming up with reasons for believing them. In other words, if you get into an argument with a less intelligent person, you can probably persuade them with strong evidence, which they'll submit because they don't know better and have no reason to think they know better. But a smart person will find ways to weasel out of even the best evidence. In short smart people have sophisticated, well thought out reasons to back up even their stupidest ideas. One would be quite amazed for example to see the detail and sophistication of arguments defending the moon conspiracy hoax.

As a person who's completing a PhD I think I can say with some confidence that I'm probably at least a little bit smarter than the average bear, and I can definitely attest to the fact that I have been more than once duped by rather ridiculous ideas and opinions that I have later reversed. This doesn't mean I don't have any stupid opinions now, just that I don't know what they are, but definitely do know I've held some in the past.

Smart People

Causation and Correlation

A new study has been published in JAMA showing that the supposed correlation between salt consumption and heart disease actually works in reverse. In other words, the more salt you ingest, the lower your risk of heart disease. It's been getting a bit of coverage (NYtimes, USA Today, CNN).

The study raises two important points. The first is that the authors only looked at a group with relatively low risk of high blood pressure. This leads to the plausible recommendation that if you're a person with high blood pressure or high risk of high blood pressure, then consuming high amounts of salt might still be considered risky, but if you're a person with normal to low pressure, then consuming more salt might be beneficial. Additionally, they note that people of African descent are more sensitive to sodium, and thus should also curb their salt intake. Too often health advice is framed in terms of "all people should do x," but there needs to be more emphasis on the different dietary needs among people. This one study is insufficient to prove that people with low blood pressure should maintain high salt consumption, whereas those with high blood pressure should curb their salt intake, but it raises the possibility.

The second important point is that it's not at all clear how strong the causal connection between sodium and heart disease is. Increased salt intake increases blood pressure. This is uncontroversial. People with higher blood pressure are at a higher risk of heart disease. This also is uncontroversial. But, the question is: is there a causal relationship between high blood pressure and heart disease. Namely, if your blood pressure rises for whatever reason, is your chance of getting a heart attack increased? Or is it perhaps the case that some underlying factor or set of factors increases your risk of heart disease and increases your blood pressure and that increases in blood pressure by some means (for example, consuming more salt) have no effect on heard disease risk? It's instructive that Ralph Sacco, who disagrees with this new study and thinks we should restrict salt intake, responds by saying "There are good randomized, controlled studies the gold standard of scientific studies that show a lower sodium diet has a meaningful effect on blood pressure." He doesn't say there are randomized controlled trials showing that increasing your salt intake increases your risk of heart disease, because there are aren't. The NY times article points out that the research on this question is mixed, and that such a study would be necessary to resolve the debate. In fact, Dr Alderman in his own study, according to the NY Times article, showed that even people with high blood pressure had a higher risk of mortality from all causes on a low salt diet.

At the end of the day we have to admit we just don't have strong evidence. Many groups will continue to advocate low salt diets and, though you should take their recommendation with a grain of salt (pun intended), you might want to follow their advice nonetheless.

A new study has been published in JAMA showing that the supposed correlation between salt consumption and heart disease actually works in reverse. In other words, the more salt you ingest, the lower your risk of heart disease. It's been getting a bit of coverage (NYtimes, USA Today, CNN).

The study raises two important points. The first is that the authors only looked at a group with relatively low risk of high blood pressure. This leads to the plausible recommendation that if you're a person with high blood pressure or high risk of high blood pressure, then consuming high amounts of salt might still be considered risky, but if you're a person with normal to low pressure, then consuming more salt might be beneficial. Additionally, they note that people of African descent are more sensitive to sodium, and thus should also curb their salt intake. Too often health advice is framed in terms of "all people should do x," but there needs to be more emphasis on the different dietary needs among people. This one study is insufficient to prove that people with low blood pressure should maintain high salt consumption, whereas those with high blood pressure should curb their salt intake, but it raises the possibility.

The second important point is that it's not at all clear how strong the causal connection between sodium and heart disease is. Increased salt intake increases blood pressure. This is uncontroversial. People with higher blood pressure are at a higher risk of heart disease. This also is uncontroversial. But, the question is: is there a causal relationship between high blood pressure and heart disease. Namely, if your blood pressure rises for whatever reason, is your chance of getting a heart attack increased? Or is it perhaps the case that some underlying factor or set of factors increases your risk of heart disease and increases your blood pressure and that increases in blood pressure by some means (for example, consuming more salt) have no effect on heard disease risk? It's instructive that Ralph Sacco, who disagrees with this new study and thinks we should restrict salt intake, responds by saying "There are good randomized, controlled studies the gold standard of scientific studies that show a lower sodium diet has a meaningful effect on blood pressure." He doesn't say there are randomized controlled trials showing that increasing your salt intake increases your risk of heart disease, because there are aren't. The NY times article points out that the research on this question is mixed, and that such a study would be necessary to resolve the debate. In fact, Dr Alderman in his own study, according to the NY Times article, showed that even people with high blood pressure had a higher risk of mortality from all causes on a low salt diet.

At the end of the day we have to admit we just don't have strong evidence. Many groups will continue to advocate low salt diets and, though you should take their recommendation with a grain of salt (pun intended), you might want to follow their advice nonetheless.

Causation and Correlation

Romance novels & Porn

I had a girlfriend once who told me that women enjoy porn just as much as men; it's just that the female version of porn is the romance novel. I've never found reason to doubt her on that. Men are more aroused by visual imagery whereas women are aroused by, not so much story, as by character. Research by Ogi Ogas & Sai Gaddam confirms this intuition. They looked at web searches and web content and found consistently that women prefer stories with men who have sexy or romantically desirable character traits. They give an evolutionary psychology interpretation of the difference, saying that women, throughout the long history of our evolution, have had to be more careful about finding a man that will stick around the raise the children. So, if you want to write a story appealing to women, make your characters more like that romantic, emotionally-available, trustworthy, devoted, ambitious and successful (and on and on) type that women love.

If male-oriented porn and romance novels are correlative, it gives new meaning to the old 19th paranoia about the immoral influence of novels upon women.

I had a girlfriend once who told me that women enjoy porn just as much as men; it's just that the female version of porn is the romance novel. I've never found reason to doubt her on that. Men are more aroused by visual imagery whereas women are aroused by, not so much story, as by character. Research by Ogi Ogas & Sai Gaddam confirms this intuition. They looked at web searches and web content and found consistently that women prefer stories with men who have sexy or romantically desirable character traits. They give an evolutionary psychology interpretation of the difference, saying that women, throughout the long history of our evolution, have had to be more careful about finding a man that will stick around the raise the children. So, if you want to write a story appealing to women, make your characters more like that romantic, emotionally-available, trustworthy, devoted, ambitious and successful (and on and on) type that women love.

If male-oriented porn and romance novels are correlative, it gives new meaning to the old 19th paranoia about the immoral influence of novels upon women.

Romance novels & Porn

Kiss my feet

I had two friends that were dating when I was a senior in college named Ridg and Christy. Ridg I'd known since Freshman year. He was the son of two psychology professors who was pursuing a degree in political science and had aspirations of entering the world of politics; he was well-read, well-spoken and a charming and seductive individual. Christy, on the other hand, was an artist: she was a skilled photographer and a dabbler in other forms of artistic expression. I'd only known her since the beginning of that senior year, but I'd fallen in love with her immediately: she was lively, exciting, fun, and beautiful too. I was never quite sure whether she realized how much I liked her, since I was rather shy and unexpressive. Ridg didn't initially realize I was interested when he embarked on his relationship with her a month or so into the first semester, but I later told him I had been interested in her after they started dating.

Their relationship only lasted maybe two or three months, unsurprisingly, since it became a rather stormy relationship. The storm clouds emerged quite of a sudden some weeks in. All of us surrounding Ridg and Christy became worried, and talked concernedly amongst ourselves. It's not clear exactly what started it, but it was pretty clear that I was somehow the catalyst. They only acted up when the two of them were together in my presence. Ridg told me that things went quite calmly when I wasn't around, and I remember meeting up with them one evening so we could all go down to the dining hall together for dinner and observing the transformation. When I swung by Christy's room to walk down to the dining hall, the two of them were talking quietly, but as the three of us walked toward the dining hall, the quiet discussion escalated until it was their usually stormy conversation.

To clarify, these stormy conversations weren't really fights. It wasn't your typical lover's spat or the argument of an old married couple. It was more competitive than that, like a game. Before I was there, they would have agreeable, easy-going conversations about the typical things college students talk about, then when I entered the picture it was suddenly this contest of oneupmanship.

I can probably best illustrate this with one evening when I was talking with the two of them in Christy's room. I believe Christy was trying to prove to Ridg how persuasive she was. To prove it, she would persuade Ridg to kiss her feet. Hence, the rules of the game were simple: if Ridge kissed her feet, she won; if he didn't kiss her feet, he won; there was no time limit (she could try and try until she gave up). Quite startlingly, Ridg won this round, but it wasn't for lack of trying. Christy tried a whole array of tricks: she tried to be assertive and forceful; she tried to be seductive and promised rewards; she tried to be mean. She even tried to use me against him, presenting her foot to me and asking me to kiss it (which I was immediately going to do), and then taking it away saying "No, I know Joe would willingly do it for me, unlike you." In the end she broke down, quite upset (or so I thought) that Ridg could be so cruel as not to do such a simple thing for her. But Ridg saw through this attempt to make him feel guilty, and she finally gave up and conceded defeat. Ridg told her that her acting was pretty good, but that he still could tell she was acting. For me, the thing was quite exhausting, since I was much more malleable and easily manipulated than Ridge and would've given in at the first moment. But Ridg stood firm.

This strategy was probably not the best way to build a long term stable relationship, but I can't deny it was interesting to be in the middle of it. Just as I had been friends with the two of them during the relationship, I remained friends with them afterwards, but I always remember fondly that stormy first semester of Senior year.

I had two friends that were dating when I was a senior in college named Ridg and Christy. Ridg I'd known since Freshman year. He was the son of two psychology professors who was pursuing a degree in political science and had aspirations of entering the world of politics; he was well-read, well-spoken and a charming and seductive individual. Christy, on the other hand, was an artist: she was a skilled photographer and a dabbler in other forms of artistic expression. I'd only known her since the beginning of that senior year, but I'd fallen in love with her immediately: she was lively, exciting, fun, and beautiful too. I was never quite sure whether she realized how much I liked her, since I was rather shy and unexpressive. Ridg didn't initially realize I was interested when he embarked on his relationship with her a month or so into the first semester, but I later told him I had been interested in her after they started dating.

Their relationship only lasted maybe two or three months, unsurprisingly, since it became a rather stormy relationship. The storm clouds emerged quite of a sudden some weeks in. All of us surrounding Ridg and Christy became worried, and talked concernedly amongst ourselves. It's not clear exactly what started it, but it was pretty clear that I was somehow the catalyst. They only acted up when the two of them were together in my presence. Ridg told me that things went quite calmly when I wasn't around, and I remember meeting up with them one evening so we could all go down to the dining hall together for dinner and observing the transformation. When I swung by Christy's room to walk down to the dining hall, the two of them were talking quietly, but as the three of us walked toward the dining hall, the quiet discussion escalated until it was their usually stormy conversation.

To clarify, these stormy conversations weren't really fights. It wasn't your typical lover's spat or the argument of an old married couple. It was more competitive than that, like a game. Before I was there, they would have agreeable, easy-going conversations about the typical things college students talk about, then when I entered the picture it was suddenly this contest of oneupmanship.

I can probably best illustrate this with one evening when I was talking with the two of them in Christy's room. I believe Christy was trying to prove to Ridg how persuasive she was. To prove it, she would persuade Ridg to kiss her feet. Hence, the rules of the game were simple: if Ridge kissed her feet, she won; if he didn't kiss her feet, he won; there was no time limit (she could try and try until she gave up). Quite startlingly, Ridg won this round, but it wasn't for lack of trying. Christy tried a whole array of tricks: she tried to be assertive and forceful; she tried to be seductive and promised rewards; she tried to be mean. She even tried to use me against him, presenting her foot to me and asking me to kiss it (which I was immediately going to do), and then taking it away saying "No, I know Joe would willingly do it for me, unlike you." In the end she broke down, quite upset (or so I thought) that Ridg could be so cruel as not to do such a simple thing for her. But Ridg saw through this attempt to make him feel guilty, and she finally gave up and conceded defeat. Ridg told her that her acting was pretty good, but that he still could tell she was acting. For me, the thing was quite exhausting, since I was much more malleable and easily manipulated than Ridge and would've given in at the first moment. But Ridg stood firm.

This strategy was probably not the best way to build a long term stable relationship, but I can't deny it was interesting to be in the middle of it. Just as I had been friends with the two of them during the relationship, I remained friends with them afterwards, but I always remember fondly that stormy first semester of Senior year.

Kiss my feet

Prognostication

Mostly people have the perception of weather forecasters as horribly and habitually inaccurate, but this is mistaken. The simple fact is that predicting the weather is hard and there is bound to be degrees of uncertainty, but what weather forecasters have done that has made them vastly more accurate is they've tried to quantify the uncertainty. They don't just say it's going to rain tomorrow; they say that there's an 80% chance of rain or a 60% chance of snow. When we look at how accurate they are on these predictions by this standard of uncertainty, we find that weather forecasters are very accurate. In other words, if you look at all the times that a weather forecaster says "there's an 80% chance of rain tomorrow" you find that they're right about 80% of the time. Weather forecasters, of course, are constantly seeking to improve their predictions so that they predict things with higher degrees of certainty, but just being able to quantify the uncertainty is a big help, especially for people who vitally depend on good predictions, like farmers.

I mention this because I was just reading about a survey (ht) of the accuracy of the predictions of political commentators. Political pundits aren't that good at predicting the future. Part of the problem is that they're rewarded (in the form of attention and ratings) for being more partisan and simplistic, and also another part is that they don't really don't get accurate feedback (they don't check the accuracy of their own predictions). But perhaps they could also they could improve by couching their predictions in terms of degrees of uncertainty.

Arnold Kling, who blogs over at Econlog is a big fan of betting on future outcomes, instead of just predicting. The reasoning is that putting money on the line really incentivizes a person to contemplate and investigate their predictions more carefully, and it encourages people who don't really know what they're talking about to back away and make room for people who really know what they're talking about. When many of these bets are aggregated, predictions as accurate as a good weather predictions can emerge, for example at a site like intrade, an Irish site where people can wager money on various future events. The aggregation of many people's bets (which pay out based on whether an event happens as well as the odds when you place the bet) gives an overall bet on how likely an event is to happen. The more people tend to bet on a particular event, the more accurate the predictions tend to become. This can give a good picture of the certainty, at least so far as things look now (unsurprisingly the accuracy of the bets improves as the event approaches, but such is the case with all predictions). You can see how probable it is that various persons will get the Republican nomination for president in 2012 (Romney leads right now with 23.3%), who will win American Idol (James Durbin leads with 39.5%), whether the AV reform will pass in Britain (50% right now).

In fact, betting odds have been used in sports betting long before they were used by weather forecasters, leading to the surprising fact that we've long been much better at predicting the outcome of sporting events than we have at predicting the weather.

But the main point is that these predictions markets and this quantification of uncertainty provide much better models for predicting the future. The future will always be hazy and there will always be uncertainty, so whatever tools we can use to quantify that uncertainty will help us foresee future events with better clarity.

Mostly people have the perception of weather forecasters as horribly and habitually inaccurate, but this is mistaken. The simple fact is that predicting the weather is hard and there is bound to be degrees of uncertainty, but what weather forecasters have done that has made them vastly more accurate is they've tried to quantify the uncertainty. They don't just say it's going to rain tomorrow; they say that there's an 80% chance of rain or a 60% chance of snow. When we look at how accurate they are on these predictions by this standard of uncertainty, we find that weather forecasters are very accurate. In other words, if you look at all the times that a weather forecaster says "there's an 80% chance of rain tomorrow" you find that they're right about 80% of the time. Weather forecasters, of course, are constantly seeking to improve their predictions so that they predict things with higher degrees of certainty, but just being able to quantify the uncertainty is a big help, especially for people who vitally depend on good predictions, like farmers.

I mention this because I was just reading about a survey (ht) of the accuracy of the predictions of political commentators. Political pundits aren't that good at predicting the future. Part of the problem is that they're rewarded (in the form of attention and ratings) for being more partisan and simplistic, and also another part is that they don't really don't get accurate feedback (they don't check the accuracy of their own predictions). But perhaps they could also they could improve by couching their predictions in terms of degrees of uncertainty.

Arnold Kling, who blogs over at Econlog is a big fan of betting on future outcomes, instead of just predicting. The reasoning is that putting money on the line really incentivizes a person to contemplate and investigate their predictions more carefully, and it encourages people who don't really know what they're talking about to back away and make room for people who really know what they're talking about. When many of these bets are aggregated, predictions as accurate as a good weather predictions can emerge, for example at a site like intrade, an Irish site where people can wager money on various future events. The aggregation of many people's bets (which pay out based on whether an event happens as well as the odds when you place the bet) gives an overall bet on how likely an event is to happen. The more people tend to bet on a particular event, the more accurate the predictions tend to become. This can give a good picture of the certainty, at least so far as things look now (unsurprisingly the accuracy of the bets improves as the event approaches, but such is the case with all predictions). You can see how probable it is that various persons will get the Republican nomination for president in 2012 (Romney leads right now with 23.3%), who will win American Idol (James Durbin leads with 39.5%), whether the AV reform will pass in Britain (50% right now).

In fact, betting odds have been used in sports betting long before they were used by weather forecasters, leading to the surprising fact that we've long been much better at predicting the outcome of sporting events than we have at predicting the weather.

But the main point is that these predictions markets and this quantification of uncertainty provide much better models for predicting the future. The future will always be hazy and there will always be uncertainty, so whatever tools we can use to quantify that uncertainty will help us foresee future events with better clarity.

Prognostication

Selection from The Secret History

Here is a sample of my novel, The Secret History,


That night I wasn’t the only person at the party who didn’t quite belong. There was a girl there named Briar who I was only tangentially familiar with. No one really knew how she’d ended up coming to the party. She’d pressured someone or bribed or cheated or blackmailed or begged someone, or perhaps she was just there by accident, and here she was. But no one seemed to really want her there.

I didn’t know enough about Briar to like or dislike her, but it was evident the rest of the people disliked her. People were clumping into groups of twos or threes for conversation and I would try to sit in on their conversations. The topic of Briar came up a few times. When I was listening in on a conversation between Kelly, Jill and Mike, they talked about how arrogant and bossy she was and related relevant stories, such as being on a group project with her and her bossing everyone around, or of her ordering someone to grab her pencil or calculator while in class. Mike said he didn’t like that Briar always acted like she was better than everyone else.

I began to notice what they were talking about. Briar moved and spoke haughtily. Though she didn’t fit in, and she was being overtly ostracized, she made quite a scene of herself, loudly complaining about things, and making demands nonetheless. She moved around with great confidence and pretension. Most everyone tried to ignore her, wishing she wasn’t there, but they couldn’t help talking about her ad nauseum.

After a while I noticed Margeaux available and I sidled over to talk with her. The conversation didn’t go very well. She didn’t find me very interesting, though she hid her boredom well. Mike, seeing her in distress, swooped in to save her by suggesting they grab another drink in the kitchen. The two of them walked off laughing while I was left alone again.

I walked around, and noticed Briar sitting in one of the bedrooms alone. She was talking on the phone. She’d called up her older sister and asked her if she could come pick her up from the party. The party was a ways away and her sister was reluctant, but she’d finally talked her into it, and then set down the phone. When Briar noticed me standing at the door, she invited me in and told me to sit down next to her on the bed.

Briar and I began to talk. She was an interesting girl, who’d seen and done many things for a girl her age, traveling to many other countries across the world, learning about the cultures and histories and dabbling in some of their languages. I quickly realized there was something far more to this girl. She was something totally different than what I’d expected. And yet, as fascinated as I was with her, she mostly wanted to hear about me, pressing to know more about my experiences, as I prevaricated and evaded, not thinking there was much of interest about myself to say.

We then started to talk about how our experiences had shaped us, and how we’d changed. She told me that she used to be quite a different girl, and that she couldn’t imagine how she would be without those experiences that she’d had. But soon again she steered the conversation back to me, and asked me about how I’d changed. I was vague and evasive and she pressed. In order to impel me to talk, she said, “Like, for example, what were you like in third grade? What did you look like? What did you wear? What were your friends like?”

I said that my friends were sort of pricks that I didn’t like anymore, at which she blurted out, “Well that’s true,” and then I said that I don’t remember what I looked like. But I remembered that I dressed sort of conservatively, and very plainly. I didn’t quite fit in. She cut in at this point, “You’re too hard on yourself. It wasn’t like that. I remember you dressed better than all the other boys. You didn’t wear the stupid stuff that all the other boys wore. You stuck out not because you couldn’t fit in, but because you were more mature than them.”

“You remember this?” I asked. Briar then sort of blushed, and admitted, “You and I have been going to school together for a long time, even if you don’t remember.” I confessed that I didn’t realize we were in class together for so long.

She said, “You and I have been in the same year since second grade. I remember how in fifth grade you had that ridiculous spiky haircut, and started wearing those stupid t-shirts. Fortunately, you got over that quickly, smoothing yourself out and always wearing polos and jeans and those same tennis shoes every day. And you had new friends, more interesting, more intelligent, like you. I liked them better. You never had friends who were quite your equal, but at least you had more in common with them. Your greatest weakness was that you tried too much to fit in.”

Briar stopped abruptly, when she noticed that I was staring at her. There was a long pause and she waited, and her heart beat heavily. Then she leaned in, touched my cheek with one hand and kissed me on the lips. As she pulled away, she said, “I’ve been wanting to do that for so long.” It was the first time a girl had kissed me. She breathed heavy breaths, so excited and nervous. She leaned in to kiss me again, but this time I backed away. I then leapt from the bed, shouting, “Whoa, whoa! Wait, wait!”

I left the bedroom in a hurry returning to the living room where everyone was turned to look at me. Briar’s distinctive ruddy brown lipstick was visible on my lips. Everyone immediately saw it as quite amusing, cheering me on, applauding, shouting, “Joe and Briar.” I felt immediately compelled to defend myself: “Come on guys, this isn’t what it looks like. She threw herself at me. I don’t even like her. Too stuck up, and way too high and mighty for me,” as I wiped off my lips with my hand.

There was laughter around the room, and I sat down next to Margeaux, who for once had some questions she was curious to ask me, and we talked for a few minutes. I was rolling on a rush of confidence, and it showed.

While I was engaged in this conversation, something caught my eye in the distance. Through the window, through the reflection of the group of us sitting in the living room, a shape moved outside in the distance. A bright light lit up the whole sprawling backyard down to the small lake, and I could see a shape at the edge of the lake stepping onto the ice. I stood up to get a closer look. I could now see that it was Briar in the distance and she moved further out onto the lake.

Now everyone was standing behind me staring with astonishment. She moved slowly across the ice, still staying atop. Then suddenly she fell through, and a collective gasp and shout of fright sounded immediately among us. In an instant, I was through the door and running towards the lake at top speed. I sped across the ice and fell into the icy, black water.

The shock of the cold sapped all of my energy from me, but I was too determined to notice. As I reached under the water, my arms immediately wrapped around Briar and I pulled her towards the shore. I tried to push her up on top of the ice, but it broke. I then pushed further into the shore, smashing the ice with my arm, until I could finally touch the lake bottom, and then was able to pull myself out, dragging her behind me.

I hefted her up in my arms, shivering uncontrollably. She was looking up at me with her pale face and wide eyes as I carried her, coughing and shivering. People had come outside to help me but I ignored them and ran past them. I ran inside and went straight to the bathroom, and turned on the hot water in the shower and stepped beneath it, and I pulled her close against me as the water poured over us. The warm water felt like it burned upon me skin. She stared up at me, with the most pathetic, pleading eyes, which seemed as if they were eternally transfixed by me. She shivered and her lips were blue and her skin was pale. With her body so close to me and her eyes looking up at me so longingly, I couldn’t help but long for her too.

Finally, Mike and Margeaux entered the bathroom, with more of their wits about them and they insisted we needed to get out of our wet clothes. I was dragged out of the bathroom, and Mike helped me out of my clothes, dried me off and gave me fresh clothes. He put me in bed and covered me in blankets and brought me some hot tea.

Here is a sample of my novel, The Secret History,


That night I wasn’t the only person at the party who didn’t quite belong. There was a girl there named Briar who I was only tangentially familiar with. No one really knew how she’d ended up coming to the party. She’d pressured someone or bribed or cheated or blackmailed or begged someone, or perhaps she was just there by accident, and here she was. But no one seemed to really want her there.

I didn’t know enough about Briar to like or dislike her, but it was evident the rest of the people disliked her. People were clumping into groups of twos or threes for conversation and I would try to sit in on their conversations. The topic of Briar came up a few times. When I was listening in on a conversation between Kelly, Jill and Mike, they talked about how arrogant and bossy she was and related relevant stories, such as being on a group project with her and her bossing everyone around, or of her ordering someone to grab her pencil or calculator while in class. Mike said he didn’t like that Briar always acted like she was better than everyone else.

I began to notice what they were talking about. Briar moved and spoke haughtily. Though she didn’t fit in, and she was being overtly ostracized, she made quite a scene of herself, loudly complaining about things, and making demands nonetheless. She moved around with great confidence and pretension. Most everyone tried to ignore her, wishing she wasn’t there, but they couldn’t help talking about her ad nauseum.

After a while I noticed Margeaux available and I sidled over to talk with her. The conversation didn’t go very well. She didn’t find me very interesting, though she hid her boredom well. Mike, seeing her in distress, swooped in to save her by suggesting they grab another drink in the kitchen. The two of them walked off laughing while I was left alone again.

I walked around, and noticed Briar sitting in one of the bedrooms alone. She was talking on the phone. She’d called up her older sister and asked her if she could come pick her up from the party. The party was a ways away and her sister was reluctant, but she’d finally talked her into it, and then set down the phone. When Briar noticed me standing at the door, she invited me in and told me to sit down next to her on the bed.

Briar and I began to talk. She was an interesting girl, who’d seen and done many things for a girl her age, traveling to many other countries across the world, learning about the cultures and histories and dabbling in some of their languages. I quickly realized there was something far more to this girl. She was something totally different than what I’d expected. And yet, as fascinated as I was with her, she mostly wanted to hear about me, pressing to know more about my experiences, as I prevaricated and evaded, not thinking there was much of interest about myself to say.

We then started to talk about how our experiences had shaped us, and how we’d changed. She told me that she used to be quite a different girl, and that she couldn’t imagine how she would be without those experiences that she’d had. But soon again she steered the conversation back to me, and asked me about how I’d changed. I was vague and evasive and she pressed. In order to impel me to talk, she said, “Like, for example, what were you like in third grade? What did you look like? What did you wear? What were your friends like?”

I said that my friends were sort of pricks that I didn’t like anymore, at which she blurted out, “Well that’s true,” and then I said that I don’t remember what I looked like. But I remembered that I dressed sort of conservatively, and very plainly. I didn’t quite fit in. She cut in at this point, “You’re too hard on yourself. It wasn’t like that. I remember you dressed better than all the other boys. You didn’t wear the stupid stuff that all the other boys wore. You stuck out not because you couldn’t fit in, but because you were more mature than them.”

“You remember this?” I asked. Briar then sort of blushed, and admitted, “You and I have been going to school together for a long time, even if you don’t remember.” I confessed that I didn’t realize we were in class together for so long.

She said, “You and I have been in the same year since second grade. I remember how in fifth grade you had that ridiculous spiky haircut, and started wearing those stupid t-shirts. Fortunately, you got over that quickly, smoothing yourself out and always wearing polos and jeans and those same tennis shoes every day. And you had new friends, more interesting, more intelligent, like you. I liked them better. You never had friends who were quite your equal, but at least you had more in common with them. Your greatest weakness was that you tried too much to fit in.”

Briar stopped abruptly, when she noticed that I was staring at her. There was a long pause and she waited, and her heart beat heavily. Then she leaned in, touched my cheek with one hand and kissed me on the lips. As she pulled away, she said, “I’ve been wanting to do that for so long.” It was the first time a girl had kissed me. She breathed heavy breaths, so excited and nervous. She leaned in to kiss me again, but this time I backed away. I then leapt from the bed, shouting, “Whoa, whoa! Wait, wait!”

I left the bedroom in a hurry returning to the living room where everyone was turned to look at me. Briar’s distinctive ruddy brown lipstick was visible on my lips. Everyone immediately saw it as quite amusing, cheering me on, applauding, shouting, “Joe and Briar.” I felt immediately compelled to defend myself: “Come on guys, this isn’t what it looks like. She threw herself at me. I don’t even like her. Too stuck up, and way too high and mighty for me,” as I wiped off my lips with my hand.

There was laughter around the room, and I sat down next to Margeaux, who for once had some questions she was curious to ask me, and we talked for a few minutes. I was rolling on a rush of confidence, and it showed.

While I was engaged in this conversation, something caught my eye in the distance. Through the window, through the reflection of the group of us sitting in the living room, a shape moved outside in the distance. A bright light lit up the whole sprawling backyard down to the small lake, and I could see a shape at the edge of the lake stepping onto the ice. I stood up to get a closer look. I could now see that it was Briar in the distance and she moved further out onto the lake.

Now everyone was standing behind me staring with astonishment. She moved slowly across the ice, still staying atop. Then suddenly she fell through, and a collective gasp and shout of fright sounded immediately among us. In an instant, I was through the door and running towards the lake at top speed. I sped across the ice and fell into the icy, black water.

The shock of the cold sapped all of my energy from me, but I was too determined to notice. As I reached under the water, my arms immediately wrapped around Briar and I pulled her towards the shore. I tried to push her up on top of the ice, but it broke. I then pushed further into the shore, smashing the ice with my arm, until I could finally touch the lake bottom, and then was able to pull myself out, dragging her behind me.

I hefted her up in my arms, shivering uncontrollably. She was looking up at me with her pale face and wide eyes as I carried her, coughing and shivering. People had come outside to help me but I ignored them and ran past them. I ran inside and went straight to the bathroom, and turned on the hot water in the shower and stepped beneath it, and I pulled her close against me as the water poured over us. The warm water felt like it burned upon me skin. She stared up at me, with the most pathetic, pleading eyes, which seemed as if they were eternally transfixed by me. She shivered and her lips were blue and her skin was pale. With her body so close to me and her eyes looking up at me so longingly, I couldn’t help but long for her too.

Finally, Mike and Margeaux entered the bathroom, with more of their wits about them and they insisted we needed to get out of our wet clothes. I was dragged out of the bathroom, and Mike helped me out of my clothes, dried me off and gave me fresh clothes. He put me in bed and covered me in blankets and brought me some hot tea.

Selection from The Secret History