In the introduction of The Signal in the Noise, the author, Nate Silver, provides evidence against a seemingly valid conclusion. He explains there is a preconceived notion, which states that the exponential growth of technological advances and mass amounts of computerized data has and will always successfully strengthen the world’s ability to conduct research and make predictions about many topics and situations. Silver relates in the introduction that this is not necessarily true. There is no doubt that technological advances have raised the standard of living almost worldwide and is the backbone to all sophisticated research today. Scientific research and “forecasting” has led the way for many important things such as medical discoveries.
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He merely wishes to point out that there is no guarantee of successful forecasting and research just because of this new influx seemingly perfect computerized technology. “This notion of forecasting was very much tied in to the notion of progress. All that information in all those books out to have helped us to plan our lives and profitably predict the world’s course.” With the flood of new information that is received every second today, there is room for error and unreliable, low quality data and incorrect assessments. “We had begun to use computers to produce models of the world, but it took us some time to recognize how crude and assumption laden they were, and that the precision that computers were capable of was no substitute for predictive accuracy. The numbers and data sets are only meaningful to people who weed out the useless information and interpret it correctly. Failed predictions are common even with this vast amount of data available today. The author states, “In 1971, for instance, it was claimed that we would be able to predict earthquakes within a decade, a problem that we are no closer to solving forty years late.” There is so much data being collected everyday it is becoming easier to pick the wrong data to focus on and make assumptions that may not be accurate. One has to know what is actually useful and “separate the noise from the
He merely wishes to point out that there is no guarantee of successful forecasting and research just because of this new influx seemingly perfect computerized technology. “This notion of forecasting was very much tied in to the notion of progress. All that information in all those books out to have helped us to plan our lives and profitably predict the world’s course.” With the flood of new information that is received every second today, there is room for error and unreliable, low quality data and incorrect assessments. “We had begun to use computers to produce models of the world, but it took us some time to recognize how crude and assumption laden they were, and that the precision that computers were capable of was no substitute for predictive accuracy. The numbers and data sets are only meaningful to people who weed out the useless information and interpret it correctly. Failed predictions are common even with this vast amount of data available today. The author states, “In 1971, for instance, it was claimed that we would be able to predict earthquakes within a decade, a problem that we are no closer to solving forty years late.” There is so much data being collected everyday it is becoming easier to pick the wrong data to focus on and make assumptions that may not be accurate. One has to know what is actually useful and “separate the noise from the