Humans, AI compete to predict Japan’s cherry blossom dates
Humans, AI compete to predict cherry blossom dates
By The Yomiuri Shimbun March 10, 2019 11:32
Who can more accurately predict when Japan’s cherry trees
will bloom, artificial intelligence or humans? Shimadzu Business Systems Corp.,
a Kyoto-based subsidiary of Shimadzu Corp., started a unique competition
between the two sides.
As of March 1, both human and AI prognosticators were
calling for the flowers to appear earlier than in an average year nationwide.
But in some locations, the expectations differ by a few days. The results of
the competition will be announced on April 5 on the company’s Otenki Japan
weather forecast website.
In the company, human weather forecasters had predicted
the blooming dates until 2017, but in 2018 the AI replaced them for the first
time. However, its 2018 predictions for only 31 percent of 45 locations in the
country came within two days of the actual blooming dates. The hit ratio of the
AI predictions is lower than the ratio for predictions by Hisashi Kataoka.
Kataoka, 41, is the company’s group leader and has worked
as a weather forecaster for 17 years. His average hit ratio was 37 percent from
2010 to 2017.
So, the company gave its AI additional information about
cherry blossoms’ cycle of being dormant in autumn and winter and developing
flower buds in early spring, and about changing weather patterns, such as
temperature data. As a result, the ratio improved to 60 percent in a simulation
based on last year’s blossoming dates.
Kataoka said: “I held a 63 percent hit record in the
past. I’m looking forward to the results.”
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