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I don't understand the reason for your comment: 1. are you suggesting that prof. Bar-Yam, head of the New England Complex Systems Institute would be more intere

I don't understand the reason for your comment: 1. are you suggesting that prof. Bar-Yam, head of the New England Complex Systems Institute would be more interested in profiting from his findings and keeping them private then doing science for the sake of science (in part paid by the military) or to influence policy so mass starvation can be prevented? Not everyone does their thing for the sake of money. Why would that be silly? 2. Science works with confidence levels, the quote "about a year" is English for that there is a margin of error in their predictive statistical model. There was an all time peek august 2012, exactly half a year later. So the model might be correct and of future use. Fortunately the prices have been below that peek since. http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/foodpricesindex/en/ http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/foodpricesindex/en/ I'd expect people posting on HN have some basic sense about science, hypothesis, models and confidence.

yummyfajitas 13y ago
If the professor bought a bunch of futures (or raised a fund to do so), he would be signalling to the markets that food production should be increased, thereby preventing mass starvation. Generally speaking, people pay far more attention to money than to academic papers. As for your point (2), that's what I was saying - the author is not very confident in his results.
- yequalsx 13y ago
  Assuming the professor's wealth is around average for professors it does not seem likely that the professor's buying power would be sufficient to act as a greater signal to 'the markets' than the paper written. The professor very likely does not have enough money to signal to 'the markets' to increase food production and thereby prevent mass starvation. This suggestion of yours seems patently absurd.
  - yummyfajitas 13y ago
    or raise a fund In any case betting his personal wealth would signal far more confidence than merely writing a paper. As dlthomas points out, he could do both.

yummyfajitas 13y ago

If the professor bought a bunch of futures (or raised a fund to do so), he would be signalling to the markets that food production should be increased, thereby preventing mass starvation. Generally speaking, people pay far more attention to money than to academic papers. As for your point (2), that's what I was saying - the author is not very confident in his results.

yequalsx 13y ago
Assuming the professor's wealth is around average for professors it does not seem likely that the professor's buying power would be sufficient to act as a greater signal to 'the markets' than the paper written. The professor very likely does not have enough money to signal to 'the markets' to increase food production and thereby prevent mass starvation. This suggestion of yours seems patently absurd.
- yummyfajitas 13y ago
  or raise a fund In any case betting his personal wealth would signal far more confidence than merely writing a paper. As dlthomas points out, he could do both.