There are also crime prediction and environmental prediction, prediction is really a discipline! Not only do we have knowledge in economic and military forecasting, but also in human prediction
Why is prediction a discipline? What is the difference between modern prediction and ancient divination? What are the applications of prediction today? Not long ago, Yan Yaojun, a professor at Tianjin University of Technology and director of the Institute of Public Crisis Management, shared his knowledge about prediction with everyone at the Shenzhen Civic Culture Lecture Hall. The following is the main content of the speech.
Professor Yan Yaojun in his speech
"Modern prediction is a science"
Firstly, let's talk about what prediction is.
The so-called prediction is to infer and deduce the development laws and even results of things based on known historical data. From ancient prediction techniques to modern prediction studies, prediction is often widely applied in various fields such as politics, economy, military, technology, culture, education, medicine, etc., playing a huge role in promoting the progress of human society.
Sociology founder Kong De believed that people's understanding of the objective world can be divided into three levels - description, explanation, and prediction. What is a description? For example, how many people came to the scene today, how many were men and women, and what were the proportions of people with different educational backgrounds? These are the descriptions. Explanation is to further analyze certain phenomena. Prediction is to anticipate the future development and changes of this matter. It should be said that prediction is a higher-level way of thinking.
I would like to point out that prediction is not a foreboding. In 2004, a shocking Indian Ocean tsunami occurred, resulting in over 200000 deaths. However, almost no animal bodies were found on site, and they all fled before the tsunami struck. Is this because animals have strong predictive ability? No, this is because animals are born with a keen sense of premonition. Human beings can predict the future, while animals rely on an instinct of premonition.
So, what is the significance of prediction for humanity? In one sentence: Being able to seek benefits and avoid harm is safer.
In history, those who are good at prediction are often outstanding individuals. For example, Fan Li assisted King Goujian of Yue in restoring the country and bravely retreated after achieving great success. Another meritorious minister, Wen Zhong, did not listen to his suggestion to leave the state of Yue and later committed suicide under the pressure of the King of Yue. Fan Li also had foresight in doing business, "When there is drought, boats are needed, and when there is waterlogging, cars are needed.". Due to the drought and dry river, the ship was no longer useful, so he bought it at a very low price; When the road was flooded, he bought a car at a low price. So he earned a lot of money, was wealthy enough to rival his country, and was revered as the "Saint of Commerce" by later generations.
There is another issue that needs to be clarified here, which is that not all knowledge is science, but science is always knowledge. In ancient China, divination was also a form of prediction, a way of understanding the future. However, the methods of prediction in ancient times were ignorant or superstitious, while modern prediction is a scientific discipline that uses scientific methods. Of course, the knowledge of prediction that we are discussing today will continue to develop and be continuously supplemented and improved.
There are four main categories of prediction methods
There are many methods for prediction. In ancient China alone, there were hundreds of them, such as Qimen Dunjia, Meihua Yishu, Tui Bei Tu, Bagua, and so on. There are also many modern prediction methods, such as Delphi method, systems engineering analysis method, simulation simulation method, etc.
I categorize all these prediction methods into four categories.
The first type is divine prediction, also known as mysterious prediction. The most typical and earliest prediction method in ancient China is the occupation of turtles. Why occupy the turtle? Because ancient people were full of fear towards nature, when they didn't know what to do, they believed that turtles appeared very early and lived for a long time. They went to ask turtles for good or bad luck, just like children asking elderly people when they encountered problems. Turtles cannot speak, and ancient people made judgments based on the different patterns presented by burning turtle shells. The cracks in the turtle shell are called "divination", so it is also known as divination.
Another method of divination is divination. Why use yarrow for divination? Because ordinary grass dies within a year, while yarrow is said to grow for thousands of years. Moreover, the cross-section of this type of grass has eight corners, also known as "Bagua Grass". Therefore, ancient people believed that this type of grass was spiritual and used it for divination.
In the West, ancient Greece had a prediction method called oracle. When they are unsure about something, they will go to the temple for meditation, where some wizards communicate with the gods and they will be told what to do. Oracle is also a method of ignorance and superstition.
The second type is empirical prediction, such as astrology. Some people classify astrology as divine predictions, but I don't think so because astrology is a conclusion drawn by ancient people through extensive observation, and it has empirical components in it. Human observation of astrology has a history of over 4000 years, leaving behind many records. For example, the ancient Egyptians believed that when Sirius and the Sun rose at the same time, major disasters such as floods and earthquakes would occur, which was based on a lot of observational experience and data.
In ancient times, some astrologers were scholars, such as Sima Qian and Dong Zhongshu, who were astrologers. The mathematician Kepler from abroad was also an astrologer. Astrology believes that the big and small universes are connected by heaven and humans, and the sky and earth are interconnected. The purpose of observing stars was initially to predict the will of heaven, so it is an empirical prediction.
The third type is philosophical prediction. Philosophical prediction has a basic logic, which is based on the laws of changes in things, rather than predicting the future based on subjective imagination and experience. It has an inherent logical thinking.
For example, the ancient Chinese Book of Changes. The Book of Changes is a valuable ancient philosophical classic. It is said that Confucius began to study the Book of Changes at the age of 50 and put in a lot of effort. He had to break the cowhide rope on bamboo slips three times before he could understand the Book of Changes. In the end, he created a classic work interpreting the Book of Changes - the Book of Changes. There is also Sun Tzu's Art of War, which is an ancient book on philosophical predictions.
The typical representative figure of modern philosophical prediction is Marx. Marx used the theory of social values to infer from the duality of commodities, labor, and socially necessary labor time that the capitalist system will inevitably be replaced by the socialist system. Chairman Mao said that the predictions made by Marx marked the first time in the history of social prediction that they had risen to a scientific level. Mao Zedong was also a great prophet. In his 1938 article "On Enduring War," he scientifically foresaw the trend of the Anti Japanese War.
The fourth type is empirical prediction, also known as modern prediction. In modern society, the amount of information is rapidly increasing, and relying solely on human brain thinking is not enough. Tools are needed. Empirical prediction relies on computational power and mathematical algorithms for prediction. William Petty, a British economist, published the book "Political Arithmetic" in 1690. He believed that national conditions and strength could be reflected through arithmetic methods, using digital data such as population, resources, land, capital, and industry. Marx gave William Petit high praise, considering him the "father of political economy" and the founder of statistics.
In the 17th century, two countries were stronger than Britain. One is the Netherlands, known as the "sea carriage drivers", and the other is France, whose army swept across Europe. At that time, Britain felt its national strength was weak and deeply discouraged. However, William Petit compared these three countries in "Political Arithmetic" and strongly proved that Britain could surpass France and the Netherlands, greatly boosting morale. Later on, Britain became the new world hegemon, which confirmed William Petty's prediction.
Another iconic event was Edmund Halley's successful prediction of a comet. He used Newton's law of universal gravitation and the laws of planetary motion to calculate that a comet had a period of 76 years around the Earth, and predicted that the comet would reappear in 1759. In March 1759, observatories around the world were waiting for the comet predicted by Halley. On March 13th, this bright comet appeared in the starry sky with its long tail. Unfortunately, Harley passed away in 1742 and was unable to see it with his own eyes. This comet is named "Halley's Comet".
There is also a well-known case of empirical prediction. In the 1970s, the famous Western think tank, the Club of Rome, published the book "The Limits to Growth". A scientific organization led by Dennis Meadows, a scholar at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, collected 70 years of historical data from around the world. Based on computer models, it used system dynamic analysis methods to predict what the Earth would look like in 100 years. They believe that if humanity continues to increase population and consume resources without restrictions, the global economy will reach its limit within 100 years. So, they proposed to suppress the growth of population and industrial capital. These empirical predictions were all calculated using mathematical methods.
"Why are social predictions often inaccurate?"
Prediction can be roughly divided into social prediction and natural prediction.
To what extent has human prediction of natural phenomena reached? Predictions of solar and lunar eclipses can already be accurate to minutes or even seconds, and are very reliable. It can be seen that human predictions of natural phenomena are often quite accurate.
However, social predictions are often inaccurate. Why? Because the subject and object of social prediction are in an interactive backtesting relationship, I predict you, you predict me, it is a game of mutual benefit.
Give an example. There is a pessimist and an optimist in futurism, who once made bets in the 1970s and 1980s. The two American economists who bet are Julian Simon from Maryland State University and Paul Elrich from Stanford University. Elrich is a pessimist who believes that the future of humanity is not promising due to factors such as population explosion, food shortages, consumption of non renewable resources, and environmental pollution. Simon is an optimist who believes that technological progress and price mechanisms in human society will solve various problems that arise in human development, and the future of humanity is bright.
They couldn't convince anyone, so they decided to take a gamble. What are you gambling on? They decided to gamble on whether non renewable resources would be depleted. They selected five metals: chromium, copper, nickel, tin, and tungsten, and virtual bought them for $1000. Two people signed an agreement, agreeing that in 10 years, if the world's resources become less and less used, prices will inevitably increase significantly, then Elrich will win; If the prices of these metals fall, then Simon has won. As a result, the optimists won the bet.
What does this example illustrate? After the prediction subject makes the prediction, the object perceives the prediction and will definitely have corresponding behavior. The so-called responsive behavior refers to taking corresponding countermeasures. After taking countermeasures, the original prediction object changed. Taking non renewable resources as an example, after extensive use of wood, humans face the situation of wood depletion, so people no longer cut down trees in large quantities. Human beings discovered coal instead, and when problems arose with large-scale coal mining, oil was discovered again. Oil is also limited, and people immediately discovered combustible ice, as well as wind and electricity, so the utilization of resources has not dried up, and the prices of the five metals that scientists bet on have not increased.
Therefore, social prediction is different from natural prediction, and often the situation changes after prediction, so continuous prediction is needed. Moreover, in real life, it is not just a game between the subject and object, but a multi-party game where everyone is the subject and object, intertwined, and the situation is very complex.
So, since social prediction cannot be judged by its fulfillment, what value does prediction have? Famous sociologist Robert King Merton proposed the theories of self actualization prophecy and self negation prophecy.
Self actualization prophecy is the process of making a prophecy come true through effort or psychological suggestion. For example, the Rosenthal effect is an example. Psychologist Rosenthal came to an elementary school and, under the guise of experimental testing, randomly selected some so-called students with development potential. After 8 months, Rosenthal conducted a re examination of the students in this elementary school, and a miracle occurred: all the students on the list made significant progress in their grades, and had a lively and outgoing personality, strong self-confidence, a strong thirst for knowledge, and a greater willingness to interact with others. This reflects the positive effect of self fulfilling prophecies. Although Rosenthal randomly selected students, in the end, as predicted, these students all made significant progress in their grades.
The prophecy of self negation also has a certain promoting effect on us. For example, the book "The Limits to Growth" sends a deafening warning to the world, based on historical facts, experiences, and data, pointing out that if humanity continues to develop like this, it will face catastrophic consequences. In response to this self denying prophecy, people around the world have actively taken many measures, such as sustainable development, scientific development concept, low-carbon economy, etc., to prevent this prediction from becoming a reality.
So, we cannot simply say that some social predictions that are not very accurate are useless. Although many social predictions are constantly changing, they still have some value.
"Transforming passive safety into active safety"
What is the purpose of social prediction? Simply put, it means seeking benefits and avoiding harm, achieving feedforward control over society, transforming passive safety into active safety, and making our lives better.
The so-called feedforward control refers to observing the situation, collecting and organizing information, mastering patterns, predicting trends, correctly predicting potential problems in the future, taking measures in advance, and eliminating potential deviations in the bud.
Why do we need feedforward control? The founder of cybernetics, Wiener, once quoted a German folk saying: "If a nail is missing, the hoof will be removed; if the hoof is removed, the warhorse will be defeated; if the warhorse is defeated, the knight will be defeated; if the knight is defeated, the war will be ruined; if the war will be ruined, the country will be destroyed." Because the nail for nailing the horseshoe was missing, it led to the downfall of the country. Only by starting with something as small as a nail can we truly achieve feedforward control.
The ancient Chinese allusion "Bianque Meets Duke Huan of Cai" is also a typical case of feedforward control. Bian Que saw Duke Huan of Cai and said that he was sick, in the texture of his skin. However, Duke Huan of Cai insisted that he was not sick. Bian Que saw Duke Huan of Cai for the second time and found that his illness was in his muscles; The third time, the disease is in the gastrointestinal tract; The fourth time, the disease was in the bone marrow, and it was already critically ill. Bian Que knew she couldn't cure it, so she quickly ran away. This story illustrates that the earlier the feedforward control is carried out, the better the control. In the face of hidden dangers, early treatment measures should be taken.
Nowadays, with the rapid advancement of information technologies such as big data, modern prediction has also entered a new stage of development. To turn passive safety into active safety and eliminate unsafe factors, it is necessary to rely on cutting-edge technologies such as big data and artificial intelligence, and have scientific and practical predictive models to detect and control unsafe seedlings as early as possible.
10 years ago, I designed China's first crime prediction system. This prediction software is based on the ten categories of crimes and their subcategories stipulated in the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China, collecting a massive amount of historical data for six years, including crime time, location, weather and geographical conditions, as well as other aspects of crime and accident data, and conducting mathematical modeling. It can analyze data conclusions such as which locations and time periods have a high incidence of a certain type of criminal event, thereby transforming passive police response into active response and improving governance efficiency.
In 1992, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences was the first to launch the Blue Book of China's Economic Forecasting, which established mathematical models to predict the economic situation for the next year. Later, various fields launched blue books, such as social prediction blue books, environmental prediction blue books, agricultural prediction blue books, and so on, making prediction seem to have become a fashion.
At present, with the help of big data, computers and other tools, the latest prediction method is simulation. For example, in the economic field, there is a forecasting method called policy simulation, which can simulate the economic operations of multiple countries or even major countries around the world, and evaluate policies based on the analysis of computer simulation results. It can predict a country's import and export trade, GDP, fiscal revenue, foreign exchange, employment, etc., including the amount of investment, cost, and achievements of a project, with high accuracy in prediction. For example, in the military field, war simulation and deduction can be carried out, which can jointly simulate the participation of multiple countries in war and predict the results of the war, truly achieving strategic planning.
With the advent of the digital age, China is vigorously promoting the construction of new smart cities and digital China. Many cities are building "urban brains", which are excellent carriers for prediction, early warning, and pre control. I believe that urban brains and digital communities in various regions should increase the content of prediction, early warning, and pre control, in order to promote the significant development of modern prediction in China.
