Alex Allan
speaker
24 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Sep 2011
last heard Sep 2011
Alex Allan’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
I mean, in terms of the work we do here in the Joint Intelligence Organization, Joint Intelligence Committee, I mean, we do a lot that's based around what would be recognizably sort of statistical approaches in that our work is a lot about decision-taking under uncertainty, trying to piece together fragmentary information, trying to draw conclusions based on uncertainty.
So to that extent, a statistical background, statistical training is quite helpful.
One of the issues, for example, is how we actually describe our judgments about what may happen.
You know, when we're saying something is likely, what sort of probability are we assigning to that?
There was a
study in the US I think by the CIA that showed indicators there was one term where people used a serious possibility in a document and two different people one interpreted a serious possibility as meaning 20 probability another interpreted a serious possibility as meaning 80 probability so you have to be very careful and there are sort of guidelines in the use of language I mean it may seem a trivial point but you know actually you can convey completely the wrong impression through that
Well, I certainly think it's helpful in intelligence analysis because one of the issues, for example, is trying to test different hypotheses, which is very much at the core of statistical analysis, even if we're not using specific statistical techniques.
But there are great dangers in intelligence analysis of, for example, groupthink, where everybody starts accepting something as the truth and interpreting all new information in that light.
The infamous assessment of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, for example.
I think there was a general conviction that Saddam Hussein did have weapons of mass destruction or was trying to develop them.
And so the intelligence was interpreted in that light and not properly challenged.
And so one of the things we do is use various techniques for investigating alternative hypotheses, sometimes using a technique called red teaming where you get another group who are specifically tasked with arguing a contrarian point of view.
And indeed the whole purpose really of the Joint Intelligence Committee is to get together a group of people with a wide range of interests to actually debate and really test out whether the hypotheses you're presenting are soundly based.
I mean, that's clearly a risk.
And certainly MI5, the security service, do analysis of what's happening online.
I mean, I don't really think I should go into the details of that.
But clearly there are civil liberties issues about, as you say, suddenly going and investigating people on the basis of what may be very flimsy correlations from online activities.
Well I did an undergraduate degree in maths and then I did a postgraduate MSc in statistics and in fact I did my thesis on dice games so I've been quite interested in some of the sort of game theory issues that can arise in intelligence analysis where you've got somebody you're looking at maybe deliberately trying to mislead you.
What can you learn from that?
How do you get into the
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