A “vivid, wide-ranging, and delightful guide” (bestselling author Tim Harford) for understanding how and why predictions go wrong, with practical tips to give you a better chance of getting them right How can you be 100 percent sure you will win a bet? Why did so many Pompeians stay put while Mount Vesuvius was erupting? Are you more likely to work in a kitchen if your last name is Baker? Ever since the dawn of human civilization, we have been trying to make predictions about what the world has in store for us. For just as long, we have been getting it wrong. In How to Expect the Unexpected, mathematician Kit Yates uncovers the surprising science that undergirds our predictions—and how we can use it to our advantage.
From religious oracles to weather forecasters, and from politicians to economists, we are subjected to poor predictions all the time. Synthesizing results from math, biology, psychology,...
Description:
A “vivid, wide-ranging, and delightful guide” (bestselling author Tim Harford) for understanding how and why predictions go wrong, with practical tips to give you a better chance of getting them right
How can you be 100 percent sure you will win a bet? Why did so many Pompeians stay put while Mount Vesuvius was erupting? Are you more likely to work in a kitchen if your last name is Baker? Ever since the dawn of human civilization, we have been trying to make predictions about what the world has in store for us. For just as long, we have been getting it wrong. In How to Expect the Unexpected, mathematician Kit Yates uncovers the surprising science that undergirds our predictions—and how we can use it to our advantage.
From religious oracles to weather forecasters, and from politicians to economists, we are subjected to poor predictions all the time. Synthesizing results from math, biology, psychology,...