[FRIAM] All models are wrong - modeling Covid-19

[thompnickson2 at gmail.com]

Eric, ‘n all, 

 

The Pandemic Cartoon,

 

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/a-comic-strip-tour-of-the-wild-world-of-pandemic-modeling

 

 

is REALLY GOOD. 

 

The basic message is that we are effed from here to Sunday because we don’t know the initial conditions.  It’s like modeling the weather on a day when all the weather observers are known to be drunk.   

 

And that message comes through even tho the cartoon NEVER reminds us of the stupendous irrationality of non-linear systems.  

 

But one thing we do know.  We have bent the curve in Santa Fe.  Please see attachment.  Now, mind you, I still think there are about 100 active cases of the virus in the County at the moment and until we know where each of those people is and what she/he is doing, we had better stay home and stay masked.  

 

Nick

 

Nicholas Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology

Clark University

 <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com

 <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

 

 

From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Eric Charles
Sent: Tuesday, April 14, 2020 10:24 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com>
Subject: [FRIAM] All models are wrong - modeling Covid-19

 

Most of you probably know the site Five Thirty Eight, which emerged over the last few election cycles as the top nerdy polling / public-opinion-modeling site. Some of you know SMBC, which has spent quite a few years towards the top of the pantheon of nerd comics. Well, the two collaborated on a long-form comic explaining why it is so hard to get stable models of Covid-19. It is really well done. If you have been struggling to explain to people how models like this work and why they are challenging, I highly recommend you try sharing this with them:




https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/a-comic-strip-tour-of-the-wild-world-of-pandemic-modeling




 


-----------

Eric P. Charles, Ph.D.
Department of Justice - Personnel Psychologist

American University - Adjunct Instructor

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200414/1d455355/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Coronavirus New Mexico numbers extended.xlsx
Type: application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet
Size: 13051 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200414/1d455355/attachment.xlsx>