Forecasting

Might you be interested in the Principles of Forecasting web site? It tries to provide everything needed for forecasting: principles, data sources, methods, reviews of software, published forecasts, bibliographies, and guides to the literature. It is located at forecastingprinciples.com.

RAEM

Freeman Dyson wants climate researchers to measure rathere than run simulations

"HERETICAL THOUGHTS ABOUT SCIENCE AND SOCIETY
By Freeman Dyson

My first heresy says that all the fuss about global warming is grossly exaggerated. Here I am opposing the holy brotherhood of climate model experts and the crowd of deluded citizens who believe the numbers predicted by the computer models. Of course, they say, I have no degree in meteorology and I am therefore not qualified to speak. But I have studied the climate models and I know what they can do. The models solve the equations of fluid dynamics, and they do a very good job of describing the fluid motions of the atmosphere and the oceans. They do a very poor job of describing the clouds, the dust, the chemistry and the biology of fields and farms and forests. They do not begin to describe the real world that we live in. The real world is muddy and messy and full of things that we do not yet understand. It is much easier for a scientist to sit in an air-conditioned building and run computer models, than to put on winter clothes and measure what is really happening outside in the swamps and the clouds. That is why the climate model experts end up believing their own models."

Online Map Shows Ease of Doing Business in 175 Countries

The IFC of the World Bank Group has created the "Doing Business Map," a visual learning tool to complement the Doing Business database, which provides objective measures of business regulations and their enforcement across 175 economies. The map enables users to discover how easy or difficult it is to do business in various developing countries.