Prediction VS Forecast

The official position of the USGS is even more emphatic: earthquakes cannot be predicted. �Neither the USGS nor Caltech nor any other scientists have ever predicted a major earthquake,� the organization�s Web site asserts.24 �They do not know how, and they do not expect to know how any time in the foreseeable future.�

Earthquakes cannot be predicted? This is a book about prediction, not a book that makes predictions, but I�m willing to stick my neck out: I predict that there will be more earthquakes in Japan next year than in New Jersey. And I predict that at some point in the next one hundred years, a major earthquake will hit somewhere in California.

Both the USGS and I are playing some semantic games. The terms �prediction� and �forecast� are employed differently in different fields; in some cases, they are interchangeable, but other disciplines differentiate them. No field is more sensitive to the distinction than seismology. If you�re speaking with a seismologist:

1. A prediction is a definitive and specific statement about when and where an earthquake will strike: a major earthquake will hit Kyoto, Japan, on June 28.

2. Whereas a forecast is a probabilistic statement, usually over a longer time scale: there is a 60 percent chance of an earthquake in Southern California over the next thirty years.

The USGS�s official position is that earthquakes cannot be predicted. They can, however, be forecasted.

Notes:

One is a definitive statement, the other a probabilistic one.

Folksonomies: statistics semantics prediction forecast

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The Signal and the Noise

Books, Brochures, and Chapters>Book: Silver , Nate (2012-09-27), The Signal and the Noise, Penguin Press, Retrieved on 2013-04-09

Source Material [books.google.com]

Folksonomies: