Predictioneer

* Bruce Bueno de Mesquita can predict the future. He is a master of game theory, a rather fancy name for a simple idea: when people compete with each other they always do what they think is in their own best interest. Bueno de Mesquita uses game theory to foretell - and even engineer - political, financial and personal events. In fact, Bueno de Mesquita's forecasts, for everyone from the CIA to major companies, have an astonishing ninety per cent success rate. In this startling and revelatory book he describes his methods and allows us to play along.

* Bueno de Mesquita explores the origins of game theory as formulated by John Nash, the Nobel Prize-winner who became the subject of the film A Beautiful Mind. He has developed Nash's ideas to create a rigorous and pragmatic system of calculation that enables us to think strategically about what our opponents want, how much they want it, and how they might react to our every move.