Predicting Human Behavior #2

Hi, again. So I’ve been thinking. Let us suppose that humans are emotional creatures and that our actions are based on emotional feelings more often than logic and reasoning and thus, it is hard to predict human behavior.

I now want to say that I think we can actually predict human behavior using logic and reasoning with one simple concept: history. History is essentially a record of human activity. To expand on this, I want to say that human actions are determined by past experiences (history). If a child meets fire and decides to scream and run away and be afraid of fire, it is quite possibly because that when the child was younger, he/she may have had a traumatic experience with fire. The child will not act courageous and unafraid and loving to the fire just because of human emotions. It will draw from its past the experiences and actions it performed last time and subconsciously determine the best course of action. With this, I want to say that once we know the history of a person, and their experiences, it would, theoretically, be possible to completely predict what that person’s future actions will be.

This may seem like an impossible job and that even if it were possible, it would take ages, not to mention the technological advances needed to collect a person’s precise thoughts and all their experiences. But I do believe that with the rapid progression and/or evolution of artificial intelligence, we can, not just predict what the future action of a particular individual in a particular situation would be, but we may even be able to leave the prediction process totally up to the artificial intelligence machines (let’s not forget that quantum computers, supercomputers are a thing). With this, the application possibilities are endless. Better planning systems, better employee management, better job direction, etc. By knowing a person’s or a group of people’s specific responses to a given situation, it’s like having the answer key to a more advanced civilization. We would have the answer to human behavior.

We could then, by analyzing how experiences and situations change actions, create certain situations to instill traits in developing humans that we find desirable, like courage, bravery, etc.

But of course, this would raise ethical and moral questions. Would being able to predict human behavior effectively be considered manipulation and isn’t that on the same level of wrongness as lying? But then we can argue that white lies are considered to be a good thing because they aid in survival. Then the question arises, “Does holding the answer key to human civilization count as manipulation, and if it does, would it be similar to that of a white lie?”

Also, what happens if the prediction results are contradictory? Let’s take my favorite example,

Let us say you are by profession, a medical doctor. It is in your nature to heal. Your patient is dying of a curable and treatable disease and it is in your power to make this patient healthy again. However, the patient wants you to leave them alone and let them die. Would you ignore the patient’s wishes and heal the patient because your nature, your profession and everything you stand for or believe in places human health at the top of everything or would you listen to them because it is their life, their body and ultimately, their wish to die?

Now for different individuals, results would be different, of course. So what happens if in the above situation, the prediction result for the doctor concerned, says that the doctor will try to save the patient, but the prediction result for the patient then says that the patient will do everything in his power to die. How do you determine whose actions have a stronger chance of happening, how do you measure predictions?