Looking back, I could vaguely recall feeling great. Happy and confident. But over what? My head is always so full of stuff! Fantasies and passing schemes and thoughts that sci-fi authors call what-ifs. Heck, I’m lucky ever to make sense of that jumble of half-formed ideas. Hence, it took me some time—despite Kilonova’s blithe confidence—to zero in on the thing.
Freud (the young-smart version) offered methods. Like free association—allowing words, phrases, and images to roll out of the imagination, writing them down, and doing a little detective work. Correlating and finding common threads. For example, I already knew the aha must have to do with predictive methods.
Not tracking and scoring of would-be public prophets. Liar-Outer and FIBuster were already doing that and had a full head of steam, with thousands of eager players innovating new methods daily.
And not the aha moment detection system, either! I knew nothing of that a week ago.
What I had been thinking about, lately, were those prediction markets of Sophia’s, how to utilize the wisdom of crowds. Find potential errors and opportunities—land mines and diamond mines—in the murky realm ahead. Despite some progress, results from existing markets were still disappointing. They didn’t measure up to what math-ists said prediction markets ought to be accomplishing.
Of course, the problem was obvious. People were hedging. Failing to commit. Hemming and hawing and letting mass opinion influence them. It was all very good to harness human competitiveness, but conformity could be just as strong. What we all needed was a way to get their most honest predictions, free of superficial repressions. The frank, candid, even rude opinions bubbling out of the great calculation engine of—
I sat up in bed, so fast that dizziness made me sway, before my pounding heart caught up.
The great calculation engine of the unconscious, of course.
Moreover, I knew how to do it! I had known for a couple of weeks, in fact. And the realization had almost killed me.
Kilonova rolled over, opened one eye to glance at me, and sighed. A sigh that said: Ah, dummy’s finally figured it out.
“Milla, I think I know—”
“Great.” I could tell that her rapid evaluation swiftly settled on no danger and, losing interest, she floated back toward sleep. “Proud of you…tell me in mornin’.”
And she rolled over the other way.
I sat back, letting this secondary aha settle in. Unlike a passing dream, I wouldn’t have to write it down.
You see, the human face is a window into those lower realms, beneath conscious awareness. We all use facial cues to some extent…except for unfortunate folks whose brains skip that innate skill. Meanwhile, a few in every generation—some priests, merchants, charlatans, healers, magicians, con artists—learn how to peer through that window for opportunity, truth, insight, or advantage.
All of which is being automated. First machines learned to recognize that a face is there. Then to recognize one face out of billions. Simple biometric scans led to perceiving smiles and frowns, then lip-reading words.
They say we’ll soon have visage-based lie detection. And if only elites get to use that, then we’ll have Big Brother forever…
…but if instead all citizens can apply such tools on politicians and oligarchs and salesmen? Then we’ll have Big Brother never.
So many threads coming together, almost all at once. The Singularity, some called it, though day to day, month by month, the process of adaptation always felt like—well—normality. Always vexing. Always verging on the new. Life. Not the future at all.
And now we were all going to get apps to detect each other’s aha moments. Yeesh.
But all of it came together when I thought about prediction markets. The problem was that participants kept squelching their answers for reasons like conformity, timidity, or fear of being judged immoral for betting on a dark possibility. Was there a way to get past all that, and learn what the participant really thought, deep down?
The tell. I had been using it all my adult life, from poker games to mentalist shows, to helping skeptics solve hoaxes. My art form was reading human faces. And now, all my tricks and tools were going online, available to any Tom, Ahmed, and Sally. And to Sophia or any competitor who wanted to set up a predictions market. So long as the wagering participants did so over a video link, revealing their faces.
Let them make one bet consciously…but also take note when their unconscious clearly disagrees! Let both sides of the participant play and make wagers. Including the side that doesn’t care about social niceties, or tact, or conformity. The side that some autistics tap into so easily. A side of you that knows when you’re lying to yourself.
Of course, I was absolutely determined that this could only be voluntary. Participants have to know, top to bottom. But then—after some initial, reflexive outrage, why would they refuse? It’s just another modern tool. Another means of self-expression. Only this time for another, inner you.
Another way, possibly, to win your wagers.
Oh, this won’t solve the prediction problem. In fact, nothing ever will. Not sheep entrails nor the flights of birds. Nor quantum computers, chewing on ginormously Big Data. Not finely meshed cellular automata models. Nor improved systems to find folks who are right more often, giving them more cred than charlatans. Nor science fiction extrapolations, nor finely crafted scenarios. And not even vastly improved prediction markets. Some or most of those methods will help us navigate, as individuals and societies, anticipating a bit better, evading a higher fraction of mistakes. But the fantasy goal of real prophecy will always elude us, slipping just ahead, like an alluring wraith.
The future will always leap out to bite us, no matter how compulsively hard we try to penetrate its shadows with those prefrontal lamps on our brows. How much wiser, then, also to invest in resilience, not just anticipation.
Still, we are what we are. Children of Prometheus, whose name meant “foresight.” It’s how we’re built.
Magic men. Magic women. We shuffle the cards, then spread them out, like a fan. Like the many branches of a dimly lit road.
Pick one.