Sean Gourley on the mathematics of war

Prevoditelj: Davorin Jelačić Recezent: Mislav Ante Omazić - EFZG

We look around the media, as we see on the news from Iraq,

Pregledavamo po medijima i vidimo vijesti iz Iraka,

Afghanistan, Sierra Leone,

Afganistana, Sierra Leonea,

and the conflict seems incomprehensible to us.

i sukob nam izgleda neshvatljiv.

And that's certainly how it seemed to me when I started this project.

A tako je svakako izgledao meni kad sam započeo s ovim projektom.

But as a physicist,

Ali kao fizičar,

I thought, well if you give me some data,

mislio sam, no, ako mi date podatke,

I could maybe understand this. You know, give us a go.

možda ću razumjeti. Znate, dajte nam neki početak.

So as a naive New Zealander

Pa sam, kao naivni Novozelanđanin

I thought, well I'll go to the Pentagon.

mislio, pa, idem u Pentagon.

Can you get me some information?

Možete li mi dati neke informacije?

(Laughter)

(Smijeh)

No. So I had to think a little harder.

Ne. Pa sam morao ozbiljnije razmišljati.

And I was watching the news one night in Oxford.

I jedne večeri sam u Oxfordu gledao vijesti.

And I looked down at the chattering heads on my channel of choice.

Gledao sam brbljave glave na programu koji sam odabrao.

And I saw that there was information there.

I uvidio sam da tu postoje informacije.

There was data within the streams of news that we consume.

Postoje podaci u tim strujama vijesti koje konzumiramo.

All this noise around us actually has information.

Sav taj šum oko nas zapravo sadrži informacije.

So what I started thinking was,

Pa sam počeo razmišljati

perhaps there is something like open source intelligence here.

da možda postoji nešto poput javno dostupne inteligencije ovdje.

If we can get enough of these streams of information together,

Ako dovoljno tih struja vijesti možemo okupiti

we can perhaps start to understand the war.

možda možemo početi razumijevati rat.

So this is exactly what I did. We started bringing a team together,

Pa sam upravo to učinio. Okupili smo tim,

an interdisciplinary team of scientists,

interdisciplinarni tim znanstvenika,

of economists, mathematicians.

ekonomista, matematičara.

We brought these guys together and we started to try and solve this.

Spojili smo te ljude i počeli s pokušajima da ovo riješimo.

We did it in three steps.

Učinili smo to u tri koraka.

The first step we did was to collect. We did 130 different sources of information --

Prvi korak je bio prikupljanje. Obradili smo 130 različitih izvora informacija --

from NGO reports to newspapers and cable news.

od izvješća neprofitnih organizacija do novina i kablovskih vijesti.

We brought this raw data in and we filtered it.

Unijeli smo sirove podatke i filtrirali ih.

We extracted the key bits on information to build the database.

Izvukli smo ključne dijelove informacija i izgradili bazu podataka.

That database contained

Baza je sadržavala

the timing of attacks,

vrijeme napada,

the location, the size and the weapons used.

lokaciju, snagu i oružje koje se upotrijebilo.

It's all in the streams of information we consume daily,

Sve je to u strujama informacija koje dnevno trošimo,

we just have to know how to pull it out.

i samo moramo znati kako to izvući.

And once we had this we could start doing some cool stuff.

A kad smo to učinili, mogli smo početi s nekim sjajnim stvarima.

What if we were to look at the distribution of the sizes of attacks?

Što ako pogledamo distribuciju snage napada?

What would that tell us?

Što bi nam to reklo?

So we started doing this. And you can see here

Pa smo počeli s time. I ovdje vidite

on the horizontal axis

na vodoravnoj osi

you've got the number of people killed in an attack

imate broj ljudi ubijenih u napadu

or the size of the attack.

odnosno snagu napada.

And on the vertical axis you've got the number of attacks.

A na okomitoj osi imate broj napada.

So we plot data for sample on this.

Pa smo ucrtali podatke da dobijemo uzorak.

You see some sort of random distribution --

Vidite neku vrstu slučajne distribucije --

perhaps 67 attacks, one person was killed,

možda 67 napada, jednu ubijenu osobu,

or 47 attacks where seven people were killed.

ili 47 napada u kojima je ubijeno sedam osoba.

We did this exact same thing for Iraq.

Baš ovo smo uradili i za Irak.

And we didn't know, for Iraq what we were going to find.

I nismo znali što ćemo otkriti.

It turns out what we found was pretty surprising.

Pokazuje se da smo otkrili nešto prilično iznenađujuće.

You take all of the conflict,

Uzmete sve sukobe,

all of the chaos, all of the noise,

sav kaos, sve te šumove,

and out of that

i iz toga

comes this precise mathematical distribution

proiziđe ova precizna matematička distribucija

of the way attacks are ordered in this conflict.

onoga kako napadi izgledaju u ovom sukobu.

This blew our mind.

Ovo nas je zaprepastilo.

Why should a conflict like Iraq have this

Zašto bi sukob poput iračkog pokazao ovo

as its fundamental signature?

kao svoj fundamentalni potpis?

Why should there be order in war?

Zašto bi postojao nekakav red u ratu?

We didn't really understand that.

Nismo to zaista razumjeli.

We thought maybe there is something special about Iraq.

Mislili smo da možda ima nešto posebno u iračkom ratu.

So we looked at a few more conflicts.

Pa smo pogledali još neke sukobe.

We looked at Colombia, we looked at Afghanistan,

Pogledali smo Kolumbiju, pogledali smo Afganistan,

and we looked at Senegal.

i Senegal.

And the same pattern emerged in each conflict.

I isti se uzorak pojavio u svakom sukobu.

This wasn't supposed to happen.

Ovo se nije trebalo dogoditi.

These are different wars, with different religious factions,

To su različiti ratovi, s različitim vjerskim skupinama,

different political factions, and different socioeconomic problems.

različitim političkim frakcijama i različitim socioekonomskim problemima.

And yet the fundamental patterns underlying them

Pa ipak, fundamentalni uzorak u temeljima

are the same.

bio je isti za sve.

So we went a little wider.

Pa smo proširili promatranje.

We looked around the world at all the data we could get our hands on.

Pogledali smo po svijetu, sve podatke do kojih smo mogli doći.

From Peru to Indonesia,

Od Perua do Indonezije,

we studied this same pattern again.

opet smo proučavali isti uzorak.

And we found that not only

I otkrili smo ne samo da su

were the distributions these straight lines,

distribucije ove ravne linije,

but the slope of these lines, they clustered around

već i nagib tih linija, da se grupiraju oko

this value of alpha equals 2.5.

vrijednosti Alfa od 2,5.

And we could generate an equation

Pa smo mogli napisati jednadžbu

that could predict the likelihood of an attack.

koja bi predvidjela vjerojatnost napada.

What we're saying here

Ono o čemu govorimo jest

is the probability of an attack killing X number of people

da je vjerojatnost kako će napad ubiti X ljudi

in a country like Iraq

u zemlji poput Iraka,

is equal to a constant, times the size of that attack,

jednak konstanti, puta snaga napada,

raised to the power of negative alpha.

a sve na potenciju negativnog Alfa.

And negative alpha is the slope of that line I showed you before.

A negativni Alfa je nagib linije koju sam vam već pokazao.

So what?

Pa što?

This is data, statistics. What does it tell us about these conflicts?

Ovo su podaci, statistika. Što nam ona govori o tim sukobima?

That was a challenge we had to face as physicists.

S tim smo se izazovom morali suočiti kao fizičari.

How do we explain this?

Kako to objasniti?

And what we really found was that alpha,

A ono što smo doista otkrili je da,

if we think about it, is the organizational

ako doista promislimo o tome, Alfa predstavlja

structure of the insurgency.

organizacijsku strukturu pobune.

Alpha is the distribution of the sizes of attacks,

Alfa je distribucija snaga napada,

which is really the distribution

koja je zapravo distribucija

of the group strength carrying out the attacks.

snage skupine koja izvodi napade.

So we look at a process of group dynamics:

Pa smo promotrili proces dinamike skupine --

coalescence and fragmentation,

ujedinjenje i fragmentaciju.

groups coming together, groups breaking apart.

Skupine koje se ujedinjuju. Skupine u raspadanju.

And we start running the numbers on this. Can we simulate it?

I počeli smo analizirati te brojke. Možemo li to simulirati?

Can we create the kind of patterns that we're seeing

Možemo li stvoriti takve uzorke kakve vidimo

in places like Iraq?

na mjestima poput Iraka?

Turns out we kind of do a reasonable job.

Pokazuje se da nam uspijeva razumno dobro.

We can run these simulations.

Možemo pokrenuti simulacije.

We can recreate this using a process of group dynamics

Možemo to ponovno stvoriti rabeći proces dinamike skupine

to explain the patterns that we see

kako bismo objasnili uzorke koje vidimo

all around the conflicts around the world.

posvuda u sukobima širom svijeta.

So what's going on?

Pa, što se događa?

Why should these different -- seemingly different conflicts

Zašto bi ti različiti – naizgled različiti sukobi

have the same patterns?

pokazivali isti uzorak?

Now what I believe is going on is that

Ono što ja vjerujem je

the insurgent forces, they evolve over time. They adapt.

da pobunjeničke snage evoluiraju tijekom vremena. Prilagođavaju se.

And it turns out there is only one solution

I pokazuje se da postoji samo jedno rješenje

to fight a much stronger enemy.

u borbi protiv puno jačeg neprijatelja.

And if you don't find that solution as an insurgent force,

A ako ste pobunjenici i ne nađete to rješenje,

you don't exist.

tada ne postojite.

So every insurgent force that is ongoing,

Pa svaka pobunjenička sila koja opstaje,

every conflict that is ongoing,

svaki sukob koji traje,

it's going to look something like this.

izgleda nekako ovako.

And that is what we think is happening.

I to je ono što mislimo da se događa.

Taking it forward, how do we change it?

Gledajući unaprijed, kako to možemo promijeniti?

How do we end a war like Iraq?

Kako okončati rat poput iračkog?

What does it look like?

Kako to izgleda?

Alpha is the structure. It's got a stable state at 2.5.

Alfa je struktura. Njezino stabilno stanje je pri vrijednosti od 2,5.

This is what wars look like when they continue.

Tako izgledaju ratovi koji traju.

We've got to change that.

Moramo to promijeniti.

We can push it up:

Možemo to gurnuti prema gore.

the forces become more fragmented;

Snage postaju usitnjenije.

there is more of them, but they are weaker.

Ima ih više, ali su slabiji.

Or we push it down:

Ili to možemo pogurati nadolje.

they're more robust; there is less groups;

Snažniji su. Ima manje skupina.

but perhaps you can sit and talk to them.

Ali možda možemo sjesti i s njima razgovarati.

So this graph here, I'm going to show you now.

Pa ovaj grafikon, sada ću vam ga pokazati.

No one has seen this before. This is literally

Nitko ovo još nije vidio. Ovo je doslovno

stuff that we've come through last week.

ono što smo otkrili prošli tjedan.

And we see the evolution of Alpha through time.

Vidimo evoluciju Alfa vrijednosti kroz vrijeme.

We see it start. And we see it grow up to the stable state

Vidimo početak. Vidimo rast do stabilnog stanja

the wars around the world look like.

kako izgledaju ratovi širom svijeta.

And it stays there through the invasion of Fallujah

I vrijednost ostaje takva tijekom invazije na Faludžu

until the Samarra bombings in the

sve do bombardiranja u Samarri

Iraqi elections of '06.

na iračkim izborima 2006.

And the system gets perturbed. It moves upwards

I sustav se preokreće. Giba se nagore

to a fragmented state.

u fragmentirano stanje.

This is when the surge happens.

Ovdje se događa pobuna.

And depending on who you ask,

I, ovisno o tome koga pitate,

the surge was supposed to push it up even further.

pobuna ju je trebala gurnuti još više gore.

The opposite happened.

A dogodilo se suprotno.

The groups became stronger.

Skupine su postale jače.

They became more robust.

Postale su moćnije.

And so I'm thinking, right, great, it's going to keep going down.

Pa si mislim, dobro, sjajno, nastavit će se spuštati.

We can talk to them. We can get a solution. The opposite happened.

Možemo razgovarati s njima. Možemo naći rješenje. A dogodilo se obrnuto.

It's moved up again. The groups are more fragmented.

Opet je krenulo prema gore. Skupine su usitnjenije.

And this tells me one of two things.

A to mi govori jednu od dvije stvari.

Either we're back where we started

Ili se nalazimo na početku,

and the surge has had no effect;

i pobuna nije imala učinka.

or finally the groups have been fragmented to the extent

Ili su, napokon, skupine do te mjere usitnjene

that we can start to think about maybe moving out.

da možemo početi razmišljati o izvlačenju.

I don't know what the answer is to that.

Ne znam koji je odgovor na to pitanje.

But I know that we should be looking at the structure of the insurgency

Ali znam da bismo trebali promatrati strukturu pobune

to answer that question.

kako bismo odgovorili na to pitanje.

Thank you.

Hvala vam.

(Applause)

(Pljesak)