food transport

But going to my mom's car, removing them from her suitcase, and transferring them to my luggage would take less time than standing there arguing about it. Besides, I reasoned, we were veterans of food transport; nothing would happen.

Well, I was wrong. Something did happen.

When I returned home, I opened my suitcase to a scene that looked like something out of a low-budget horror flick. The raspberries had leaked all over the place, resulting in a particularly brilliant red splotch on my favorite blue dress shirt.

I just looked in dismay at the carnage.

I had a feeling this might happen.

I thought about the raspberries when I learned recently that they have developed a computer program that predicts global conflict.

The program is highly sophisticated. You can tell because of the many big words involved. Statistical technique. Hazard assessment. Regime performance. These are not words to be taken lightly. When collected, verified, codified, analyzed, assessed, and formulated, these words point decidedly toward a world in which experts can say with absolute assurance, "I dunno. Whatta you think?"

On a radio call-in show, I heard one of the program's creators say that the goal is to "anticipate problems before they become unmanageable."

Toward that end, they engage in a lot of very high-powered data-collection activity, such as reading the newspaper and watching TV. I told you this was pretty heady stuff.