Noted in the live stream from this TV station This is the "Local2 News" live tv stream (which has been pointed to in three previous MeFi threads about other news stories. Currently they've from time to time been showing storm track predictive models (which they say are their own development). I'd rather have pointers to more models than the TV station's occasional glimpses, but, this is the most varied set of storm track predictions I've seen. Anyone know where they're getting them?
posted by hank on Sep 22, 2005 - 24 comments

Why Stock Markets Crash : Critical Events in Complex Financial Systems. Professor Didier Sornette of UCLA has some very interesting things to say about stock markets. In his book, he explains how his "theory of cooperative herding and imitation [...] has detected the existence of a clear signature of herding in the decay of the US S&P500 index since August 2000 with high statistical significance, in the form of strong log-periodic components." Although his timing has been just a bit early, the theory, the predictions to date and the pictures are all pretty uncanny. This is easily the most interesting book on the stock market I have ever read and provides interesting and believable hypotheses about things I never imagined could have rigorous explanations. For an overview, here is an interview with the author.
posted by muppetboy on May 14, 2004 - 19 comments

Aids in Africa - you know the facts right? Well perhaps not, what you know are the predictions of a Computer Model. Rian Malan in today's Spectator highlights how alarmingly inaccurate such models are proving. Paul Henman illustrates how common it is to build political assumptions into a model and then hide them under layers of complexity and apparent objectivity. Think global warming. How do we challenge the models that increasingly determine our opinions and priorities?
posted by grahamwell on Dec 12, 2003 - 15 comments

Like tarot or astrology in that it's a tool for introspection, only without the occult trappings. Kinda fun to play with, though. Or maybe not. (Warning: annoying The Weakest Linkesque music.)
posted by alumshubby on Mar 5, 2002 - 20 comments

Doggie-bag use is up - Must be an economic downturn (via Fark). Want to know what the Fed is up to before everyone else? Have a look at the Greenspan briefcase theory. Takeout orders in Washington DC are up? Must be a war!

Anyone know of other 'indicators' like these? No, Groundhog Day doesn't count.
posted by jwells on Aug 28, 2001 - 10 comments

Miracles of the Next Fifty Years -- a reprint of an article from the February 1950 issue of Popular Mechanics. At times laughably naive, other times pretty accurate (the author predicts that cancer won't be cured by 2000, but it won't be far off), it's a fun piece of George-Jetson-meets-Ozzie-and-Harriet gee-whizness.
posted by RylandDotNet on Jun 2, 2001 - 14 comments

"I think it's dead. I think it's over with; it's gone. There is no long-term prognosis. The patient has died. There is no future." That's the web as content medium he's talking about. [more inside]
posted by rodii on Feb 3, 2001 - 27 comments

"Ferociously proud and somewhat vain, you like to be impressive and seen as Somebody Special." It's George W. Bush's natal horoscope, interpreted by some anonymous folks at Astrozine/iVillage. The many screenfuls include this statement: "An innate clairvoyant tendency could also be developed quite easily by you." Via the frequently wonderful Guardian Weblog.
posted by jhiggy on Dec 14, 2000 - 2 comments