Is there more to Bueno de Mesquita's algorithm than just mathematics?

[Rhine720]

So the history channel showed an hour or so long film about Nostradamus and some political science professor( claimed mathmetician and prophet). He claimed that his algorithm can help him predict the future based off of government decisions. Nostradamus predicted such events as the antichrists, Napolean and Hitler, as well as the twin tower crash and the distrubtion of peace amongst the US and Russia. Or so THEY said. The political scientist seems to convince the producers his algorithm predicts many "avoidable events" as does Nostradamus.

I honestly Can't help but be extremely skeptic. Nostradamus predicting a world war in the early 2000s and the rise of an arab empire.

Anyway does anyone else think that these ideas are flukes? While math is a very powerful too it's direction can be misguided (like a lot of skeptic scientists think about the mathematicians coming up with 11 dimensions) without expiremental fact.

While Nostradamus's predictions seem to be true it may only because they are interpretting to make it fit into what has happened. Or being as famous as he was maybe the antagonists ha has written of even got a hold of his scripts and inspired themselves to become these predicted figures. Which means Nostradamus wasn't quite careful about being vague.

Anyway what are your opinions?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Since the primary claim is that a mathematician can predict the future using mathematics, we would need a published paper that presents evidence supporting the claim. Otherwise, it is just another wild claim with no supporting evidence. For the purposes of discussion here, this claim is void.

Next, there is no convincing evidence that Nostradamus could predict the future. For example, while he references the river Hister [the Danube] in one quatrain, the believers claim that he referenced Hitler. Was he talking about a river or a man? Other allegedly prophetic quatrains only seem to be predictive if one is highly selective about the evidence. Was his reference to the New City, New York, or did he mean New Haven, or New Brunswick? Or, did he mean a city that is new? Of course his believers take it to mean New York, but they only do so in retrospect. No one has ever been able to predict [publically] a future event by using the work of Nostradamus.

 

[CEL]

The allegged prediction of the crash of the twin towers is not from Nostradamus. It was a work of a Canadian student, that composed a very obscure quatrain about the fall of twin brothers and said that some day it could be interpreted as true. This was done to debunk Nostradamus.
It didn't take centuries, but a few years to the "prophecy" to become true.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

The allegged prediction of the crash of the twin towers is not from Nostradamus. It was a work of a Canadian student, that composed a very obscure quatrain about the fall of twin brothers and said that some day it could be interpreted as true. This was done to debunk Nostradamus.
It didn't take centuries, but a few years to the "prophecy" to become true.

Do you have a source for this?

 

[Pengwuino]

Do you have a source for this?

http://snopes.com/rumors/nostradamus.asp

Made me laugh the first time I saw it

 

[Insanity]

This is the gentleman you are referring to, the article also mentions the show.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Bueno_de_Mesquita

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Do we have anything that shows a definitive date on the referenced essay? I couldn't find a copyright or publication date to show that it was public information before the Nostradamus claims were made.

Note that neither Snopes or Wiki are acceptable as definitive sources.

 

[CEL]

Do we have anything that shows a definitive date on the referenced essay? I couldn't find a copyright or publication date to show that it was public information before the Nostradamus claims were made.

Note that neither Snopes or Wiki are acceptable as definitive sources.

The essay was online, but the author took it away.

 

[russ_watters]

Please note: Nostradamus predicted nothing. A prediction is something done in advance of an event. All of Nostradamus's supposed predictions were interpreted to match historical events after they happened.

Many people have tried to use Nostradamus's writings to make actual predictions, and none have ever succeeded.

 

[Phrak]

This is the gentleman you are referring to, the article also mentions the show.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Bueno_de_Mesquita

Probably, Insanity. I watched a program on the science channel, I believe, that involved a surreal admixture of both Nostradams and Bueno de Mesquita.

Note. This should be interesting, give the current state of afairs in Iran.
http://nextbigfuture.com/2009/06/bruce-bueno-de-mesquita-predictions-on.html"

 

[Rhine720]

Please note: Nostradamus predicted nothing. A prediction is something done in advance of an event. All of Nostradamus's supposed predictions were interpreted to match historical events after they happened.

Many people have tried to use Nostradamus's writings to make actual predictions, and none have ever succeeded.

Exactly for my skeptism =]

Yes Phrak I believe we have watched the same thing that spurred me to create this thread. My REAL skeptism is his algorithms ability to correctly predict future events. His "predictions" seem to be more acute in details then our vague friend Nostradamus. Would it be possible to know if he did open up his algorithm to be viewed? From what I saw he's the only person whos actually seen it.

 

[Insanity]

Exactly for my skeptism =]

Yes Phrak I believe we have watched the same thing that spurred me to create this thread. My REAL skeptism is his algorithms ability to correctly predict future events. His "predictions" seem to be more acute in details then our vague friend Nostradamus. Would it be possible to know if he did open up his algorithm to be viewed? From what I saw he's the only person whos actually seen it.

From what I recall for the show and from reading wikipedia, he has kept his algorithm a secret.

 

[Phrak]

Exactly for my skeptism =]

Yes Phrak I believe we have watched the same thing that spurred me to create this thread. My REAL skeptism is his algorithms ability to correctly predict future events. His "predictions" seem to be more acute in details then our vague friend Nostradamus. Would it be possible to know if he did open up his algorithm to be viewed? From what I saw he's the only person whos actually seen it.

What Bueno de Mesquita does is more than just mathematics. It's a methodology. The mathematics is a computational algorithm of game theory. His methods also involve information gathering from printed sources to personal interviews--interviews that the rest of us would be hard pressed to obtain. The interviews come with the skill of good bedside manners. The intent of data mining and interviews is not to gather facts, but rather to associate statements with players in the game making the statements.

Bueno de Mesquita has claimed that the students in one of his classes have come to the same conclusion on the direction of Iran, by data mining the printed word, as he obtained with addtional inside information. That this would be generally true, I doubt.