Nice article in The Economist about expert advice:

http://www.economist.com/node/21556625

If you don't know about Tetlock's work, you should. There's a human
instinct for explanations, even if they are wrong more often than not.
 It's good to know why this is, and the book "Thinking, Fast and Slow"
is an excellent guide to your brain. Ste

The Economist article is a bit contradictory in this regard:

"The average active-fund manager fails to beat the stockmarket index;
no reliable way has been found for selecting above-average managers in
advance."

"Some financial advice may be extremely useful. Many advisers steered
their clients away from Bernie Madoff’s fraudulent funds. Investors
also need to be made aware of the benefits of diversification and of
the effect on their portfolios of tax rules and regulations. There is
also evidence that market valuations revert to the mean over the long
term, so pointing out when markets look historically cheap or dear can
help."

The people who were steered away from Madoff were just lucky. Those
same advisers might have steered people away from, say, Paulson's
fund, before the crash, because his returns were too good. Indeed,
they were very real returns, unlike Madoff's. Given the information
available, it would be hard to distinguish between Paulson and Madoff
in the past.

While it is a fairly safe bet that funds with +20% returns will
regress towards the mean, you can't really know when. Any bear
following Apple was saying that the iPod was a one shot. Reality is
that they were wrong, and they continue to be wrong. And, any bear
following AOL in the 90's would have been right, but only after 2001.

I guess the Delphi of Oracle would not have predicted the Greek crisis
either. :)

Cheers,
Rob

> Delphi of Oracle

Oracle of Delphi. It's all Greek to me.

Cheers,
Rob