[extropy-chat] Futures Past

[Brett Paatsch]

Robin Hanson wrote:

> At 02:04 AM 10/10/2005, Harvey Newstrom wrote:
>>>>My real interest is whether transhumanists have been better at 
>>>>predicting the future than mainstream predictors.
>>>
>>>If this is your interest there is really no practical substitute 
>>>for the sort of data analysis I proposed earlier today.  You need 
>>>to collect predictions by transhumanists and by others and look at 
>>>the coefficient on TRANSHUMANIST? when accuracy is the dependent 
>>>variable.  I know it is more fun to flame and bait, selectively 
>>>recalling the predictions one got right and others got wrong ...
>>
>>Why do you think I am asking for examples?  Why do you think Robert 
>>posted his early claims and compared them with actual results?  ... 
>>So far, everybody seems to be having a cordial and accurate recall 
>>of our past.  ... Come on, and join in the fun.
> 
> I didn't mean to imply that people were not enjoying themselves, nor 
> that the examples being recalled could not be included in such an 
> analysis.  I meant to call attention to the difference between such 
> informal conversation and the sort of systematic analysis needed.

This is getting surreal to the point of becoming funny.  It was Greg not
Robert that posted "his early claims".

Robin offered to add a bit of method to an exercise, which would I
expect, had added some enjoyment to it for Robin in the next iteration.

I took a quick look at Greg's claims Robin. I think they'd take a bit
of work to put into a form that could be operationalised the way you
want. It would be possible but I'm not personally keen to do it.  

If I was going to spend time on *that* exercise I'd be kicking myself
for not spending the time trying to make your for real money betting
idea move along a bit further. 

On the other hand if someone else puts the work into forming the
claims into something that can elicit easy, sensible measurable 
responses I might be interested in making some guesses as just
guesses. 

My feeling is that I can do good analytic work and make good 
predictions only if I am motivated to do some real research and
to think seriously about the issues. I'd be keen to do that and to
test my predictive powers against those of others but it wouldn't
be much fun to do if there wasn't some prospect of also building
a betting market. I want the added value of seeing something 
useful built. 

Brett Paatsch