The blog posting from which I appropriated the picture above (I always provide, at the bottom of the page, an image credit for any graphics I use) is headlined as follows: "Why it’s so hard to make accurate predictions."
Well, why is it?
According to Nancy Kim, associate professor of psychology at Northeastern University, who studies conceptual thinking, there are really two different kinds of "prediction."
There are two basic kinds of predictions that people make: intuitive predictions, which rely on experience and intuition, and statistical predictions, which rely on data and algorithms. When meteorologists try to predict tomorrow’s weather, they’ll be able to draw upon mountains of carefully recorded data on precise atmospheric conditions and what the weather was actually like. They can look at computer models, which are constantly being honed. But predicting the outcome of events like elections is much different—and much harder—because of their uniqueness. There is no directly relevant data. You could try analyzing data from past elections, but every political election is different, with candidates who have never gone up against each other before and a different social and economic climate. Polling data is helpful, but it’s still all future-oriented guesses, not hard data cemented in the past. It consists entirely of people’s individual predictions about how they are going to vote in the future and whether they are actually going to make it to the polls, based on what they know and how they feel at the time of the poll.
You would really have to be fantastically devoted to his blog of mine to remember that I promised to address the issue of "prediction" some time ago - on August 9, 2024, in fact, and I am, today, making good on that promise. While I agree with Kim that there are two kinds of "prediction," I would describe them a little bit differently.
The "statistical" predictions that Kim mentions are "predictions" that are premised and predicated upon the "Laws of Nature" that govern the physical world. Since today is a Sunday, let's call that physical world the "World God Made." I am, in other words, reminding anyone reading this of my "Two Worlds Hypothesis," which is a particular way to think about, describe, and understand, our human condition.
Ultimately, we do live in the "World of Nature," which we did not, ourselves, create, and into which we have been, so mysteriously, born. This "World of Nature," which can best be visualized as Planet Earth, as seen from space, is the "ultimate" reality that determines our fate. No Planet Earth? No human beings. What "happens" in that "World of Nature" is governed by "laws," and those laws are different from the kind of "laws" enacted by Congress, or by your local City Council or Board of Supervisors. You can't, in fact, "disobey" the "Law of Gravity," or any of the other "laws" that govern the "World of Nature." If human beings put greenhouse gases, like carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere, the planet will heat up, according to what are some very complex "laws," indeed, but which "laws" are absolutely binding upon us. Want to keep burning fossil fuels (and there are lots of reasons to want to do that)? Well, get ready for major climate catastrophes. You can "predict" them!
"Human" laws, of course, are completely different from the "Laws of Nature." While we can't "disobey" the "Law of Gravity," or any other of the various laws that describe how the "World of Nature" works, we most emphatically can disobey any of the many "Human Laws" that we impose upon ourselves. The "Laws" that govern how "Nature" works, in other words, are "descriptive." They tell us what must and will happen, when certain circumstances exist.
"Human Laws," the ones that pertain to our own conduct, are completely different, since they can be disobeyed at will. There may be consequences, of course, if we disobey them, but they don't tell us what must and will happen. They tell us what we have decided ought to happen. They are "prescriptive," not "descriptive."
So, in the world of human affairs, in which human activities are subject to laws that are "prescriptive," but which can be disobeyed, we never really know, for sure, what will happen. We don't actually have to do what we are expected to do. The "Law of Gravity," and all the laws that govern the physical world operate completely differently from the laws we formulate to govern our own activities. Why? Human Freedom is why, just in case you haven't already figured this out.
So, to "predict" anything in which human beings are involved is always uncertain. Most of the time, people do what is "expected," so our predictions about "elections," and other human activities are, as Kim says, somewhat "intuitive." But Kim doesn't really take human freedom into account the way I think would better explain our situation. "Predictions" about human choices, and their consequences, can never be truly "predictive," the way we can "predict" the weather, and not really because human affairs are more complicated, but because what will happen isn't actually determined by laws or constraints that (were they completely known) would certainly determine outcomes. What happens depends on what we think, and decide, and do, and we can do something new, and unexpected, at any time.
Trying to "predict" elections, or any other comparably important thing in our "Human World," is basically a misguided effort, predicated on an erroneous equivalency, supposing that human affairs are like the seasons, or global mean temperatures, following "laws" that (when we know all the facts) will certainly tell us what will happen. The current presidential election certainly makes this obvious. Prior to July 21st, who could have predicted - in the sense of being certain about it - what has actually happened? Who would dare to predict any certain result on November 5th?
Let's forget all that (like we should forget all the "predictions" about the outcomes of the upcoming presidential election, given the tumult and turmoil we have witnessed in the presidential campaigns so far).
What will "happen" in "our" world, the "Human World" in which we most immediately live, will be determined by what human beings choose to do. That means what you and I will choose to do - and our actions can't be predicted. We must not try to "predict" the world we most immediately inhabit - the "Human World," or the "Political World." Instead, we must try to make the world our own. We can do that only by the actions we take, none of which are "determined," and all of which are governed under the sign of "possibility," and not by the kind of inevitabilities that prevail in the "World of Nature."
