Taleb, though correct in principle, was not able to make money in the markets (buying vol and paying theta), and had to scuttle his Empirica fund.

Uneducated and unread me, I’m still able to withdraw profits from Intrade/Tradesports without any additional deposits, by golly!

But the point is, that I do not, and never have, believed that the market was or indeed is predicting the event on my behalf.

I am a bettor, who knows that there are generally no risk free profits; I do not indulge myself in crystal ball methodology. I know the percentages and I play the market if I belive that something may have been mispriced. Sometimes I get it right; sometimes I will get it wrong.

In the case betting markets, where a 1/40 shot wins, it wins; when it loses, it loses. We do not indulge ourselves in pointless banalities and narrative fallacies. We do not speak of the market as having predicted the event.

Some prediction market advocates did and do speak of the market as predicting events; they accordingly deserve the cogent criticism that that has been levelled against them.

Prediction markets are merely betting markets with pretensions, and, sadly, for them, they are more often than not less liquid and less efficient than said betting markets.

I also suspect that many of those that have jumped on the prediction market bandwagon, are nothing more than quasi-fascist agitators, who believe that we should allow markets to take over our lives.