"Mesmerizing & fascinating..." —The Seattle Post-Intelligencer "The Freakonomics of big data." —Stein Kretsinger, founding executive of Advertising.com Award-winning | Used by over 30 universities | Translated into 9 languages An introduction for everyone. In this rich, fascinating — surprisingly accessible — introduction, leading expert Eric Siegel reveals how predictive analytics (aka machine learning) works, and how it affects everyone every day. Rather than a “how to” for hands-on techies, the book serves lay readers and experts alike by covering new case studies and the latest state-of-the-art techniques. Prediction is booming. It reinvents industries and runs the world. Companies, governments, law enforcement, hospitals, and universities are seizing upon the power. These institutions predict whether you're going to click, buy, lie, or die. Why? For good reason: predicting human behavior combats risk, boosts sales, fortifies healthcare, streamlines manufacturing, conquers spam, optimizes social networks, toughens crime fighting, and wins elections. How? Prediction is powered by the world's most potent, flourishing unnatural resource: data. Accumulated in large part as the by-product of routine tasks, data is the unsalted, flavorless residue deposited en masse as organizations churn away. Surprise! This heap of refuse is a gold mine. Big data embodies an extraordinary wealth of experience from which to learn. Predictive analytics (aka machine learning) unleashes the power of data. With this technology, the computer literally learns from data how to predict the future behavior of individuals. Perfect prediction is not possible, but putting odds on the future drives millions of decisions more effectively, determining whom to call, mail, investigate, incarcerate, set up on a date, or medicate. In this lucid, captivating introduction — now in its Revised and Updated edition — former Columbia University professor and Predictive Analytics World founder Eric Siegel reveals the power and perils of prediction: What type of mortgage risk Chase Bank predicted before the recession. Predicting which people will drop out of school, cancel a subscription, or get divorced before they even know it themselves. Why early retirement predicts a shorter life expectancy and vegetarians miss fewer flights. Five reasons why organizations predict death — including one health insurance company. How U.S. Bank and Obama for America calculated the way to most strongly persuade each individual. Why the NSA wants all your data: machine learning supercomputers to fight terrorism. How IBM's Watson computer used predictive modeling to answer questions and beat the human champs on TV's Jeopardy! How companies ascertain untold, private truths — how Target figures out you're pregnant and Hewlett-Packard deduces you're about to quit your job. How judges and parole boards rely on crime-predicting computers to decide how long convicts remain in prison. 182 examples from Airbnb, the BBC, Citibank, ConEd, Facebook, Ford, Google, the IRS, LinkedIn, Match.com, MTV, Netflix, PayPal, Pfizer, Spotify, Uber, UPS, Wikipedia, and more. How does predictive analytics work? This jam-packed book satisfies by demystifying the intriguing science under the hood. For future hands-on practitioners pursuing a career in the field, it sets a strong foundation, delivers the prerequisite knowledge, and whets your appetite for more. A truly omnipresent science, predictive analytics constantly affects our daily lives. Whether you are a

A practical guide to outguessing everything, from multiple-choice tests to the office football pool to the stock market. People are predictable even when they try not to be. William Poundstone demonstrates how to turn this fact to personal advantage in scores of everyday situations, from playing the lottery to buying a home. Rock Breaks Scissors is mind-reading for real life. Will the next tennis serve go right or left? Will the market go up or down? Most people are poor at that kind of predicting. We are hard-wired to make bum bets on "trends" and "winning streaks" that are illusions. Yet ultimately we're all in the business of anticipating the actions of others. Poundstone reveals how to overcome the errors and improve the accuracy of your own outguessing. Rock Breaks Scissors is a hands-on guide to turning life's odds in your favor.

The author of the acclaimed New York Times bestseller The Next 100 Years now focuses his geopolitical forecasting acumen on the next decade and the imminent events and challenges that will test America and the world, specifically addressing the skills that will be required by the decade’s leaders. In the long view, history is seen as a series of events—but the course of those events is determined by individuals and their actions. During the next ten years, individual leaders will face significant transitions for their nations: the United States’ relationships with Iran and Israel will be undergoing changes, China will likely confront a major crisis, and the wars in the Islamic world will subside. Unexpected energy and technology developments will emerge, and labor shortages will begin to matter more than financial crises. Distinguished geopolitical forecaster George Friedman analyzes these events from the perspectives of the men and women leading these global changes, focusing in particular on the American president, who will require extraordinary skills to shepherd the United States through this transitional period. The Next Decade is a provocative and fascinating look at the conflicts and opportunities that lie ahead.

In this off-beat book perfect for reading aloud, a Caldecott Honor winner shares the story of a duck who rides a bike with hilarious results. One day down on the farm, Duck got a wild idea. “I bet I could ride a bike,” he thought. He waddled over to where the boy parked his bike, climbed on, and began to ride. At first, he rode slowly and he wobbled a lot, but it was fun! Duck rode past Cow and waved to her. “Hello, Cow!” said Duck. “Moo,” said Cow. But what she thought was, “A duck on a bike? That’s the silliest thing I’ve ever seen!” And so, Duck rides past Sheep, Horse, and all the other barnyard animals. Suddenly, a group of kids ride by on their bikes and run into the farmhouse, leaving the bikes outside. Now ALL the animals can ride bikes, just like Duck! Praise for Duck on a Bike “Shannon serves up a sunny blend of humor and action in this delightful tale of a Duck who spies a red bicycle one day and gets “a wild idea” . . . Add to all this the abundant opportunity for youngsters to chime in with barnyard responses (“M-o-o-o”; “Cluck! Cluck!”), and the result is one swell read-aloud, packed with freewheeling fun.” —Publishers Weekly “Grab your funny bone—Shannon . . . rides again! . . . A “quackerjack” of a terrific escapade.” —Kirkus Reviews

What if an algorithm could predict which manuscripts would become mega-bestsellers? Girl on the Train. Fifty Shades. The Goldfinch. Why do some books capture the whole world's attention? What secret DNA do they share? In The Bestseller Code, Archer and Jockers boldly claim that blockbuster hits are highly predictable, and they have created the algorithm to prove it. Using cutting-edge text mining techniques, they have developed a model that analyses theme, plot, style and character to explain why some books resonate more than others with readers. Provocative, entertaining, and ground-breaking, The Bestseller Code explores the hidden patterns at work in the biggest hits and, more importantly, the real reasons we love to read.

In this book, ten prominent economists—including Nobel laureates and several likely laureates—offer their ideas about what the future might hold in 100 years. This pithy and engaging volume shows that economists may be better equipped to predict the future than science fiction writers. Economists' ideas, based on both theory and practice, reflect their knowledge of the laws of human interactions as well as years of experimentation and reflection. Although perhaps not as screenplay-ready as a work of fiction, these economists' predictions are ready for their close-ups. In this book, ten prominent economists—including Nobel laureates and several likely laureates—offer their ideas about the world of the twenty-second century. In scenarios that range from the optimistic to the guardedly gloomy, these thinkers consider such topics as the transformation of work and wages, the continuing increase in inequality, the economic rise of China and India, the endlessly repeating cycle of crisis and (projected) recovery, the benefits of technology, the economic consequences of political extremism, and the long-range effects of climate change. For example, 2013 Nobelist Robert Shiller provides an innovative view of future risk management methods using information technology; and Martin Weitzman raises the intriguing but alarming possibility of using geoengineering techniques to mitigate the inevitable effects of climate change. Contributors Daron Acemoglu, Angus Deaton, Avinash K. Dixit, Edward L. Glaeser, Andreu Mas-Colell, John E. Roemer, Alvin E. Roth, Robert J. Shiller, Robert M. Solow, Martin L. Weitzman

How do you predict something that has never happened before? There's a useful calculation being employed by Wall Street, Silicon Valley and maths professors all over the world, and it predicts that the human species will become extinct in 760 years. Unfortunately, there is disagreement over how to apply the formula, and some argue that we might only have twenty years left. Originally devised by British clergyman Thomas Bayes, the theorem languished in obscurity for two hundred years before being resurrected as the lynchpin of the digital economy. With brief detours into archaeology, philology, and overdue library books, William Poundstone explains how we can use it to predict pretty much anything. What is the chance that there are multiple universes? How long will Hamilton run? Will the US stock market continue to perform as well this century as it has for the last hundred years? And are we really all doomed?

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE ECONOMIST “The most important book on decision making since Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow.”—Jason Zweig, The Wall Street Journal Everyone would benefit from seeing further into the future, whether buying stocks, crafting policy, launching a new product, or simply planning the week’s meals. Unfortunately, people tend to be terrible forecasters. As Wharton professor Philip Tetlock showed in a landmark 2005 study, even experts’ predictions are only slightly better than chance. However, an important and underreported conclusion of that study was that some experts do have real foresight, and Tetlock has spent the past decade trying to figure out why. What makes some people so good? And can this talent be taught? In Superforecasting, Tetlock and coauthor Dan Gardner offer a masterwork on prediction, drawing on decades of research and the results of a massive, government-funded forecasting tournament. The Good Judgment Project involves tens of thousands of ordinary people—including a Brooklyn filmmaker, a retired pipe installer, and a former ballroom dancer—who set out to forecast global events. Some of the volunteers have turned out to be astonishingly good. They’ve beaten other benchmarks, competitors, and prediction markets. They’ve even beaten the collective judgment of intelligence analysts with access to classified information. They are "superforecasters." In this groundbreaking and accessible book, Tetlock and Gardner show us how we can learn from this elite group. Weaving together stories of forecasting successes (the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound) and failures (the Bay of Pigs) and interviews with a range of high-level decision makers, from David Petraeus to Robert Rubin, they show that good forecasting doesn’t require powerful computers or arcane methods. It involves gathering evidence from a variety of sources, thinking probabilistically, working in teams, keeping score, and being willing to admit error and change course. Superforecasting offers the first demonstrably effective way to improve our ability to predict the future—whether in business, finance, politics, international affairs, or daily life—and is destined to become a modern classic.

Since its original publication, Expert Political Judgment by New York Times bestselling author Philip Tetlock has established itself as a contemporary classic in the literature on evaluating expert opinion. Tetlock first discusses arguments about whether the world is too complex for people to find the tools to understand political phenomena, let alone predict the future. He evaluates predictions from experts in different fields, comparing them to predictions by well-informed laity or those based on simple extrapolation from current trends. He goes on to analyze which styles of thinking are more successful in forecasting. Classifying thinking styles using Isaiah Berlin's prototypes of the fox and the hedgehog, Tetlock contends that the fox--the thinker who knows many little things, draws from an eclectic array of traditions, and is better able to improvise in response to changing events--is more successful in predicting the future than the hedgehog, who knows one big thing, toils devotedly within one tradition, and imposes formulaic solutions on ill-defined problems. He notes a perversely inverse relationship between the best scientific indicators of good judgement and the qualities that the media most prizes in pundits--the single-minded determination required to prevail in ideological combat. Clearly written and impeccably researched, the book fills a huge void in the literature on evaluating expert opinion. It will appeal across many academic disciplines as well as to corporations seeking to develop standards for judging expert decision-making. Now with a new preface in which Tetlock discusses the latest research in the field, the book explores what constitutes good judgment in predicting future events and looks at why experts are often wrong in their forecasts.

The book is a summary of a time series forecasting competition that was held a number of years ago. It aims to provide a snapshot of the range of new techniques that are used to study time series, both as a reference for experts and as a guide for novices.