Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Computers and software have already made large improvements in medical
devices and diagnostic procedures, and even more exciting advances are technic-
ally possible.
Predictive Analytics
Predictive analytics, or using historical information to predict future trends, is
much older than the computer era. In fact, informal weather predictions and crop-
cycle predictions probably can be traced back more than a thousand years. Yet
modern weather prediction based on a mathematical and statistical model is sur-
prisingly recent.
Lewis F. Richardson was a mathematician and meteorologist who first formal-
ized the mathematics of weather prediction. His work on “Weather Prediction by
Numerical Process” was published in 1922, which is before the decades covered
in this topic, and also long before computers and software, although mechanical
calculators were available. Although Richardson was troubled by inaccurate data
reported by ground stations, his essential mathematics paved the way for modern
weather predictions.
Richardson was also a pacifist, and he wrote other interesting books that used
predictive analytics to analyze the outbreaks of wars. He studied more than 200
wars. He wrote two classic papers on the statistical origins of warfare: “Arms and
Insecurity” in 1949 and “Statistics of Deadly Quarrels” in 1950.
Richardson noted that countries locked in an arms race became a linked oscil-
lating system. He found that as annual costs for weapons and defense increased, at
some point, the costs would be so high that they could not go higher. Whichever
country reached the point of spending so much on weapons that it was damaging
its civilian economy would attack first. The reason for this aggression is that the
country knew its costs had reached a terminal limit, but it did not know whether or
not a rival had reached a limit.
Richardson's analyses from 1949 and 1950 sound like they could be applied
today to North Korea. North Korea has already reached a point where its spending
on weapons has damaged its civilian economy, which has never been very strong.
Probably one of the reasons North Korea is so aggressive is that it is at or near a
maximum for weapons. That could easily lead to an ill-conceived attack on South
Korea, whose economy is one of the strongest in Asia.
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