Ask HN: Is Neil Ferguson's Pandemic Simulation code open source? I guess the question is: Is Neil Ferguson's code any good? Per his Twitter: "I wrote the code (thousands of lines of undocumented C) 13+ years ago to model flu pandemics..." Is the code tested? How was validation performed? Results published where? Is it peer reviewed? I ask because my state is applying even harder lockdown measures beginning tonight based largely on Mr. Ferguson's "2 Million US deaths" claim. If his code is buggy or outright wrong, I would like to know. I would also like to come to understand his liability for producing such software in the first place. A lot of people are out of jobs, emotionally shattered, and so on. If much of the decision making has been based on faulty models, we need to know right away. |