This is some kind of spoof… umm…uh… right?
nothing on the DARPA site about it.
ABC ran a short story on it tonight.
Here is another article and I really doubt it’s a joke:
Looks real enough to me. Here’s their home page:
http://www.policyanalysismarket.org/
Yeah. Hmmm. Heck, I’m game…
Oh. And it appears it is sponsored by DARPA, the Economist Intelligence Unit (that’s associated with The Economist magazine) and and some other organization I’ve never heard of.
This stuff is really cool. The one you’re talking about is FutureMap, but every link on this page is worth reading.
In the book Blind Man’s Bluff, it’s revealed that two sunken US subs were found when one of the genuises in the Navy (seriously, the guy was a genius - I wish I could remember his name presently) started a Vegas-style betting pool amongst researchers as to where the subs were. Very gamelike and they were proven correct, as the Navy was (until then) searching some 600 miles away from where the boats were.
So, they’re counting on terrorists to give their plots away by betting on them? Absolute genius!
REX…
You’re referring to John P. Craven, and his use of Bayes’ theorem of subjective probability. It supposedly (per author quote) factors into an problem, subconscious information. He was two for two in his use of it in the book, 1 sub + 1 nuke bomb.
I was impressed. Funny thing, Bayes was my first thought when I saw the OP too. I’ll bet
You are right…
Well, bless Astro and the link providers.
I smell some profits.
I smell a rat. This whole thing smells fishy to me. Something about it just ain’t right.
What, it’s quite simple really, it’s a futures markets where those who believe they have advantageous market information can place bets on developments, or hedge against those developments.
It’s such a beautiful idea, it brings a tear to my eye. I can hardly wait.
ACtually this is something GD could use. Let me open this up.
This all sounds a bit like that movie “Rat Race” where all the rich guys are tired of traditional gambling and they wager on just about anything and everything. The only difference is that this is even more absurd than the movie.
But seriously, this is a bit scary. If something like this took off it could lead to all kinds of unintended consequences. Besides the obvious ones, I can imagine this leading to a scenario where just because a lot of people believe something is going to happen, it really does. There will be no way to tell if the “market” somehow influenced a particular event, or if it was going to happen anyway.
There’s just something a little wrong with making a horrible prediction, anticipating it, then profitting on it when it actually happens…It’ll be sort of like trading cards, I’ll trade you my “Full out nuclear war between India and Afghanistan” for your “Sadam Hussein deploys hidden stockpiles of VX gas in revenge for his sons’ death”.
May I be so bold as to suggest the General Question is now answered:
Please see my thread in the Great Debates for debating the character of the program:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=200888
