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Science fiction becoming true, en.wikipedia.org. developed by fictional character Dr Hari Seldon who established the Foundation in order to shorten the Darkest Interregnum as the galactic Empire fell apart
AI-generated and looks right, …
Psychohistory, a fictional science from Isaac Asimov's
Foundation series, is a predictive theory of history, sociology, and mathematics that uses statistical models to forecast the future behavior of large populations. It operates on the principle that while individual actions are unpredictable, the aggregate actions of billions of people can be predicted with accuracy, similar to how the overall behavior of a gas can be predicted even though the movement of individual molecules is random.
- Core concept: Psychohistory combines history, psychology, and mathematical statistics to make predictions about large groups of people, particularly their reactions to social and economic stimuli.
- Inspiration: Asimov was inspired by the fall of the Roman Empire and the laws of physical systems, like the kinetic theory of gases, to create the concept of predicting societal behavior on a mass scale.
- Function: In the Foundation books, psychohistory is used by Hari Seldon to predict the collapse of the Galactic Empire and to plan a more favorable future by setting up the "Foundations" to shorten the ensuing dark age.
- Limitations: A key element of psychohistory is that its predictions become less accurate or can even fail completely if the population being studied becomes aware of the forecast, as this can cause individuals to change their behavior. This is symbolized in the series by the character known as the Mule, who acts as an unpredictable "mule" in the system.
- Real-world parallels: While fictional, the concept has parallels in real-world fields that use large datasets and computational models to analyze and forecast collective behavior, such as big-data analytics, behavioral economics, and artificial intelligence.
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