Fog of War, Fog of Market

Adjust how fast information arrives, how costly waiting is, and how much you already know. The chart shows where commit beats wait for certainty — and what waiting until t = 8 hours costs you.

“If we have not made a great mistake, the issue should hardly remain doubtful, even if our information is far from being complete or precise.” — Carl von Clausewitz, On War, Bk. I, Ch. III, trans. Col. J. J. Graham (1873)

Step 1 — Set the regime

Three knobs define every decision under uncertainty: how fast new information arrives, how expensive it is to wait, and how much you already know going in.

Information rate k 0.50 / h

How fast the unknown half of the picture fills in.

Cost of waiting c 8.0 %/h

What every extra hour of analysis costs in lost option value.

Baseline awareness Q₀ 30 %

How much you already know at t = 0.

Step 2 — The decision-quality curve

Illustrative

Illustrative model — your slider values, not real data. The Clausewitzian claim is qualitative: cost of waiting eventually dominates the value of more data.

Step 3 — The four numbers that matter

Optimal commit 3.0 h peak of V(t)

Info at commit 84% Q(t*)

Net value at commit 60% V(t*) = Q − C

If you wait to t = 8 h 35% Penalty: −25 pp

Diagnosis

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Show the model

An exponential saturation for information completeness, a linear cost of waiting, and a closed-form optimum where marginal information equals marginal waiting cost. Pick the regime; read off the optimal commit. The point is not the formula — it is the shape: V(t) rises, peaks, and falls.

Reference

Carl von Clausewitz, On War, Bk. I, Ch. III “On Military Genius” (the “coup d'œil” passage), trans. Col. J. J. Graham (London, 1873). Project Gutenberg #1946.

Klein, G., Calderwood, R., & Clinton-Cirocco, A. (1986). Rapid decision making on the fire ground. Proc. Human Factors Society 30th Annual Meeting, 30(6), 576–580. SAGE.