Numbers: An overrated tool

Where data is the new oil, and Machine Learning, AI are the new combustion engines, numbers are the blood and breathe to all activities. But numbers, are just the cover to the book, might paint a false picture of the true story. They have immense power to determine trends, but lack the ability to meaningfully justify them. Additionally, it offers a lot of space for distinctive interpretation from the same data and therefore cannot be considered uni dimensional. There are various economic theories and concepts which state certain numbers as a decisive benchmark. Economic advisory councils and senior economists do still perceive these to be strong tools for analysis, and are widely cited. Numbers are derived from standard procedures and predefined formula, nevertheless might be redundant given the scenario. A standard rule can never be a fit all policy. Numbers are conclusive in nature, and they tend to follow the events, as they are reflective of the results. Therefore leaving scope for mere post facto study and hypothesizing future from past figures. In Fact the data mining concept bets on random trends that every data set consists.

There are volumes written on diverse techniques to regress numbers, but they are all effectively trying to fit models in scattered data. Another downside with numbers is the reliability in their calculation methodology, because if we base our conclusions upon certain figures but they turn out to be fragile, they can mislead decisions and may sometime lead to haywire fallacies. Sometimes numbers narrate their own story irrespective of the underlying rationale, for instance, we may randomly witness a very high correlation between ‘the numbers shoes in a year’ and ‘the amount of rainfall in that year’. Numbers are still in existence and form a significant part of the data or ‘Oil’ because of paucity of logical conclusive data forms. The advent of Business Analytics, Data Visualization and Trend Forecasting, numbers have become indispensable. Economies should wisely chase numbers, as the rationale that drives these figures will sustain but the former would still be turbulent.