Big data makes the assumption that reality maps neatly on to behaviour, but it doesn’t. Context changes everything. Perception may map neatly on to behaviour, but reality does not map neatly onto perception. We should also remember that all big data comes from the same place: the past. Yet a single change in context can change human behaviour significantly. For instance, all the behavioural data in 1993 would have predicted a great future for the fax machine.
