OPINIONISTA: Power of Prediction: Why the Fourth Industrial Revolution won’t happen By Alex Broadbent
Psychologist Philip Tetlock has an ongoing project with thousands of subjects to assess human predictive powers on a wide range of topics in the broad social, economic and political sphere, such as “Will Russia annex additional territory in the next three months?” or “Will any country withdraw from the Euro Zone in the next year?”. Over time, as world events unfold, he scores predictive successes and failures.
Commentators on 4IR have offered wonderfully acute analyses of contemporary social and political trends, and of the way that technology is interacting with them. But I have not seen any of these commentators asking, for example, whether recent improvements in AI might be step improvements that are followed by a plateau of relatively slow progress. This is what happened with space travel between the 1960s and Elon Musk.
Or perhaps the scientific investigations underlying envisaged future technologies won’t yield the understanding we expect. Science is replete with false projections thatanswer is just around the corner. Perhaps, just as advances in physics succeeded only in uncovering deeper mysteries, so will advances in biology fail to unravel the supposed “algorithms” of the human brain.
I’m fully behind such prescriptions. But I doubt that many, if any, of the accompanying predictions will come true. And that matters, because these predictions are shaping policy decisions, research funding and even where we invest our hard-earned personal savings.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Tito and the fourth industrial revolutionFinance Minister Tito Mboweni has hinted that SA will need to adapt to the Fourth Industrial Revolution and that this will inform some of the decisions taken in the Budget.
Read more »
SA will cope with fourth industrial revolution, says David MabuzaSA has plans in place to cope with the fourth industrial revolution, Deputy President David Mabuza said on Wednesday. Responding to questions in the National Assembly , Mabuza said the Fourth Industrial Revolution Commission will co-ordinate the development of SA’s national response through a comprehensive action plan.
Read more »
Govt preparing youth for Fourth Industrial Revolution: Mabuza - SABC News - Breaking news, special reports, world, business, sport coverage of all South African current events. Africa's news leader.Deputy President David Mabuza says government is currently preparing young people for the Fourth Industrial Revolution through various partnerships with the information, communication and technology sectors.
Read more »
We need African appsNewsletter| How do South Africans exploit fourth industrial revolution business opportunities? We should be creating African apps, writes Tshilidzi Marwala
Read more »
David Mabuza: 'The shortage of electricity is a sign of growth'Deputy President David Mabuza was responding to questions in the National Assembly on youth unemployment and the country’s preparedness for the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
Read more »
Pastor in court after girlfriend plummets to her death from fourth-storey flatA Durban pastor charged with the murder of his girlfriend at their Glenwood flat last week says he was acting in self defence - and he has the stab wounds to prove it.
Read more »
Pastor in court after girlfriend plummets to her death from fourth-storey flatA Durban pastor charged with the murder of his girlfriend at their Glenwood flat last week says he was acting in self defence - and he has the stab wounds to prove it.
Read more »
Fourth person dies following Durban CBD shootingA fourth person has died in hospital following a shooting in the Durban CBD that involved a metro police officer, police spokesperson Colonel Thembeka Mbele says.
Read more »
Fourth person dies following Durban shootingOn Monday, three people dies including a metro policeman who is believed to have opened fire before turning the gun on himself.
Read more »
UPDATE: Second man arrested for Edenvale High robberyRobbers targeted the school office on Thursday morning, resulting in a shootout.
Read more »