Warner says Pentagon threat-bet program to be canceled

Associated Press ^ | 07-29-03

[Brian S]

The Pentagon will abandon a plan to establish a futures market to help predict terrorist strikes, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee said Tuesday.

Sen. John Warner, R-Va., said he spoke by phone with the program's director, "and we mutually agreed that this thing should be stopped."

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Other Democrats expressed similar alarm.

All the Democrats are against it, so it must be a good idea.

[kevao]

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., said she was appalled to hear of plans to set up "a futures market in death."

This from a woman who turned $10,000 into $100,000 trading futures.

[billbears]

Wyden said the Senate version of next year's defense spending bill would cut off money for the program, but the House version would fund it. The two versions will have to be reconciled.

Well now that's next year isn't it? What about this year? Money has already been spent for this year. Over $700,000 has been spent this year. What about pulling the sites down immediately? Or as I suggested over on the other thread, will this truly be dismantled? Or will it just 'go away' for the media?

[Spiff]

Check it out while it is still there. http://www.darpa.mil/iao/FutureMap.htm

Program Objective:

The DARPA FutureMAP (Futures Markets Applied to Prediction) program is a follow-up to a current DARPA SBIR, Electronic Market-Based Decision Support (SB012-012). FutureMAP will concentrate on market-based techniques for avoiding surprise and predicting future events. Strategic decisions depend upon the accurate assessment of the likelihood of future events. This analysis often requires independent contributions by experts in a wide variety of fields, with the resulting difficulty of combining the various opinions into one assessment. Market-based techniques provide a tool for producing these assessments.

There is potential for application of market-based methods to analyses of interest to the DoD. These may include analysis of political stability in regions of the world, prediction of the timing and impact on national security of emerging technologies, analysis of the outcomes of advanced technology programs, or other future events of interest to the DoD. In addition, the rapid reaction of markets to knowledge held by only a few participants may provide an early warning system to avoid surprise.

Program Strategy:

The DARPA FutureMAP program will identify the types of market-based mechanisms that are most suitable to aggregate information in the defense context, will develop information systems to manage the markets, and will measure the effectiveness of markets for several tasks. Open issues that will drive the types of market include information security and participant incentives. A market that addresses defense-related events may potentially aggregate information from both classified and unclassified sources. This poses the problem of extracting useful data from markets without compromising national security. Markets must also offer compensation that is ethically and legally satisfactory to all sectors involved, while remaining attractive enough to ensure full and continuous participation of individual parties. The markets must also be sufficiently robust to withstand manipulation. FutureMAP will bring together commercial, academic, and government performers to meet these challenges.

Planned Accomplishments:

TBD

[JRjr]

Check that. It was actually $1000 that she started with.

[billbears]

Policy Analysis Market registration site

Seems they've moved the dates up from what the article reports. Aug 1 is the registration date and Oct 1 is the beginning date instead of Jan 1 as the start date. Hmmm, must be going ahead with it.....

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Someone might want to take a sample of the water over there...

[GovernmentShrinker]

All the Democrats are against it, so it must be a good idea.

Huh? Every Republican mentioned in this article was also against it.

[Rodney King]

I think it was a great idea. Markets yield a lot of valuable data.

[Cobra64]

In the annals of dumb government ideas, it is difficult to top this one.

That's an understatement. Whoever endorsed this plan should be fired.

[Rodney King]

What exactly is everyone's problem with it? I thought we all believed that markets yielded good, unfiltered information. I thought we all agreed that State Deparment analysts were a bunch of nimcompoops.

[billbears]

Policy Analysis Market is under the supervision of retired Adm. John Poindexter, the head of the Terrorism Information Awareness program

It's Poindexter, what else would you expect? I'm just suprised they didn't make it a national lottery....

[billbears]

Perhaps the fact that it's sponsored by the government and it is based on betting when people are going to be killed? Do you really want to cross that moral road? Tie this government sponsored program in with some of the reality shows that are out as of late and you've got everything you need for a real version of The Running Man

[Rodney King]

Perhaps the fact that it's sponsored by the government and it is based on betting when people are going to be killed? Do you really want to cross that moral road? Tie this government sponsored program in with some of the reality shows that are out as of late and you've got everything you need for a real version of The Running Man

OK, so it's a moral thing. Doesn't bother me, does bother you. I can accept that.

[Spiff]

That's an understatement. Whoever endorsed this plan should be fired.

Wrong. I think this is a good example of people who have no idea of what they're talking about reacting to idiotic media reports of some "betting" thing going on in the Pentagon - that they're "betting" on terrorists.

The media is reporting it all wrong. If the best form of trend analysis and prediction is the market method where various sources are used and probability is tracked somewhat, vaguely similarly to the stock market - then that is the best form and it should be used. If the bulls-eye graphic I posted is credible then they have evidence that the market methods is the best method. No amount of media hype should deter them from using the best tools for the job.

The person that should be fired is the idiot that improperly leaked this to the press and who first used the term "betting".

[Montfort]

The idea is not for the US to make money off of terrorism, but to tempt the folks who are privy to terrorists' plans. We know that some folks connected with Al Qaeda made bets against GE and others based on their knowledge of upcoming Sept 11 plans. It is kind of hard to monitor the stock investing of every person connected with Islamic extremism, so our government was inviting them to come to us with information. This would draw in information from folks who otherwise might not invest in US stocks, anyway. Many people mislead themselves into thinking that there is anonymity on the internet. They would place a bet on-line from Islamabad, but would never invest with Morgan Stanley.

Some of the dim bulbs over on yahoo boards are somehow suggesting that this was a way for well-connected Americans to make money off of terrorism. It must be hard to go through life without any powers of perception or reasoning.

I can understand how this might look tasteless, but it might also be very effective and save many American lives. I guess the problem is that some folks might actually bet right based on luck alone, and this would be intolerable to some.

The reality is that this sort of betting arrangement probably exists on-line already, but our government would not get a first look at all the bets and the IP addresses of the people who placed them, etc. Yes, many would be careful, but some will make a mistake and make a big bet on a terrorist act happening on a particular day. I just hope our government will be able to get that information somehow.

[Rifleman]

GoOrdinance posted: In the annals of dumb government ideas, it is difficult to top this one.

Rifleman replies: On the contrary, this is one of the very few clever ideas that I have ever seen come out of the federal security apparatus.

Markets are almost miraculous at gathering information (including hidden information) and making it usable. It might not work as I can think of a couple of ways to spoof it that might be effective, but it is well worth trying. The 'rats are both stupid and ignorant to oppose it. The repugs are just stupid to fold on this.

[Rifleman]

"That's an understatement. Whoever endorsed this plan should be fired."


Why? And please explain your answer.