# The Future of Analysis By:: [[Brian Heath]] 2023-01-18 The future of analysis is not data - it's beyond data. Those who spend most of their time working with data will eventually become an entirely different occupation. Perhaps they will be called Data Scientists, but the field will not be at the forefront of analysis. Technically, Data Scientists will do some analysis, but it won't be their primary role. Their primary role will be cleaning messy human data forever and pointing robots at closed system problems. It will become a role that no one cares about. Computers will always be better at a job when data and existing systems are the primary focus. Sorry Data Science, you are a fad just like the telephone operator. The future of analysis is deep, systemic, empirical, and philosophical thinking and problem-solving. Yes, that's a lot of things at once, but the world isn't getting any simpler. Problems are becoming more interconnected, systemic, and complex. Simply throwing data into an algorithm and hoping to find a nugget of wisdom is not effective when trying to solve truly challenging problems. What real problems have machine learning and data science solved? Has it made a dent in global warming, poverty, human rights, energy crises, aging populations, and healthcare epidemics? Nope. Smarter machine learning algorithms and more data won't solve these systemic problems. They can contribute to the solution but are just a piece of the puzzle. Real, integrated analysis is the future as solutions need to be synthesized. Optimizing existing data and systems is rarely the path to innovation and progress. Nearly everyone today with the title of an analyst is merely an optimizer of the status quo. By definition, there is no future there. Analysts in the future will look back on this period in time and wonder how we made any progress at all - just like we wonder how humans survived without electricity and indoor plumbing. #### Related Items [[Analytics]] [[Systems Thinking]] [[Complexity]] [[Philosophy]] [[Data Science]]