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Big Data - Where Is The Wisdom

Where are we on the scale of data, information, knowledge and wisdom?

We must ensure that expertise, wisdom and understanding is not replaced with a plethora of numbers. With practical applications, this paper will challenge practitioners to consider:

  • The concept of new data that is a kilometre wide but only a millimetre thick
  • When a lot of information in a limited area may misdirect the whole focus of a project
  • A mass of information that might tell us what people are doing but not why they are doing it.
  • Some think that much more data means we don't need to interpret so we do not need professional expertise.
  • Information that might accurately define the present but is not a good basis for predicting the future.
  • Data that confirms that several factors may be an important part of the issue but gives no indication of the compounding of several factors together.
  • Measuring short term changes when the long term effect is quite different

Presented by John Reid, Austraffic Managing Director, at the AITPM National Conference 2017

Read Full Paper (download PDF) or View Full Presentation (download PDF)