

AI Journalist Helps You Talk Trash During March Madness - RobbieStats
http://singularityhub.com/2011/03/16/ai-journalist-helps-you-talk-trash-during-march-madness/#more-29326

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JoachimSchipper
More interesting than the baseball stats, to me:

"StatSmack will give you any stats it can find that support [that a tiny,
unranked team will beat #1]. (...) In almost every industry we are faced with
an overload of data. (...) We will need to turn to computers to process these
piles of data (...) Stat Smack is a clear example of how that dependence could
be a danger if we’re not careful. With enough information, an AI can select
data to support almost any conclusion you want to draw."

More concretely: to what extent will something like Palantir actually improve
decisions, and to what extent will it be used to produce reams of supporting
evidence for a predetermined outcome?

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jerf
This page [1] suggests Southern is a good candidate for "worst team" and Ohio
State a good candidate for "best team". It is interesting to compare the two
smacks [2] [3].

One interesting side effect of how this is set up is that while the system
will tell you what you want to hear, the very first link after that is
basically "And here's why that's wrong", which suggests one way to ameliorate
your concern. A good understanding of stats could help. Though that's a scary
thing to require before safe use of a beguilingly-simple tech can be used
safely.... then again we've been using stats to lie by hand for a long time.
Maybe this isn't so new.

[1]: <http://www.teamrankings.com/ncb/rankings/>

[2]: [http://statsheet.com/mcb/teams/stat_smack?t2=ohio-
state&...](http://statsheet.com/mcb/teams/stat_smack?t2=ohio-
state&t1=southern-university) \- Southern better than OSU

[3]: [http://statsheet.com/mcb/teams/stat_smack?t2=southern-
univer...](http://statsheet.com/mcb/teams/stat_smack?t2=southern-
university&t1=ohio-state) \- other way around

~~~
sparky
In particular, check out the crime statistics at the bottom of each page.
Apparently Columbus and Baton Rouge both have higher crime rates than one
another!

