Machines Will Be Smarter Than Us - Get Ready

Forbes - Dec. 4, 2012 by Frederico Pistono

Today, large streams of data, coupled with statistical analysis and sophisticated algorithms, are rapidly gaining importance in almost every field of science, politics, journalism, and much more. What does this mean for the future of work?

As we saw a few weeks ago, the race for the 2012 US presidential election had a clear and undisputed winner: data. Big Data, statistics, and computer algorithms, to be precise. The war had two clear factions. On one side, we had experienced journalists, who had worked many years in the field, who based their analysis partially on polling data; but hunches, gut feelings, instincts, and intuitions had the final word on the matter.



On the other side, there was New York Times blogger Nate Silver, with no experience as political analyst and hence little intuition; but with a huge bag full of Big Data, statistical models, mathematical formulas and computer algorithms. Journalists called Silver and his methods a “joke”, “numbers racket”, and accused him of “getting into silly land.” What was the result? Most experienced political analysts failed miserably; while Nate Silver and his Data Science correctly predicted the results of the election, days in advance, with a 100% accuracy, getting all 50 states right.

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