Prediction

“ In every case the practical aim of knowledge is prediction, and we have good reasons to regard as the defining characteristics of knowledge those properties of it which make prediction possible. „Savoir pour prévoir. ”

“ But to predict what has not been observed, is to attempt ourselves to use the legislative phrases of nature; and when she responds plainly and precisely to that which we thus utter, we cannot but suppose that we have in a great measure made ourselves masters of the meaning and structure of her language. The prediction of results, even of the same kind as those which have been observed, in new cases, is a proof of real success in our inductive processes. ”

“ For to what end is the prediction delivered in obscure and enigmatic terms, if the purpose of the inspirer was that the subject of the prediction should be immediately, and in all its circumstances, precisely apprehended? Why, then, is any distinction made between Prophecy, and History? The mode of writing clearly demonstrates, that something, 226 for a time at least, was meant to be concealed from us: and then, if men will attempt, out of season, to penetrate this mystery, what wonder if mistake be the fruit of their presumption? ”

“ It may be that the mere judgment of fact, a citation of resemblances and differences, is the basis of scientific knowledge, but before knowledge is worthy of the name, these facts have undergone an ideal transformation controlled by the needs of successful prediction and motivated by that self-conscious realization of the value of control which has raised man above the beasts of the field. ”

“ And the experience which thus authorizes a perfect confidence of prediction, is evidence that, though discipline must wholly disclaim an absolute power to effect the great object in question, there is, nevertheless, such a constitution of things that it most certainly will, as an instrumental cause, in many instances effect it. ”

“ Yet in these instances the well-known laws of the peculiar style in which the predictions are enveloped, suggest restrictions and cautions which no humble and pious expositor can overlook. The fault of the dogmatist in prophecy is then manifest. Is a mystic prediction averred to be unfulfilled? then we know, that, by the essential law of its composition, it is designedly, we might say artfully constructed, so as to admit of several, and perhaps of many, plausible interpretations, having nearly equal claims of probability ”

“ The highest test of truth is verified prediction; if we calculate beforehand that an eclipse of the Sun will occur at a certain hour and minute, and that eclipse occurs accurately at the predicted moment, we may rest assured that our knowledge upon that point is true and complete. ”

“ If we felt tempted to risk a prediction, we should easily resist this temptation, by thinking of all the stupidities the most eminent savants of a hundred years ago would have uttered, if some one had asked them what the science of the nineteenth century would be. ”

“ It is natural to trust to a line of progress which has served us well in the past. Indeed it [Pg 298] is a healthy attitude to assume that nothing is beyond the scope of scientific prediction until the limits of prediction actually declare themselves.
(2) The current epistemology of science presupposes a deterministic scheme of this type. To modify it involves a much deeper change in our attitude to natural knowledge than the mere abandonment of an untenable hypothesis. ”

“ 22 During many ages, the prediction, as it is usual, contributed to its own accomplishment. ”

“ It is noteworthy, indeed, that the very circumstance which appears to present a fatal objection to all schemes of prediction based on the motions of the celestial bodies, supplies the means of imagining that predictions have been fulfilled. ”

“ The prediction that a piece of lead will take more force to lift it than a piece of wood of equal size, exhibits certainty, but not completeness, of foresight. The kind of effect in which the one body will exceed the other is foreseen ”

“ More specifically a very important form of working is the prediction of events. Knowledge of the future is an almost universal object of human desire, which men have sought to compass by fair means and foul, and the calculation of the future is the avowed aim of many scientific inquiries. ”

“ It will continually happen that we are able, from certain measured phenomena and a correct theory, to determine the amount of some other phenomenon which we may either be unable to measure at all, or to measure with an accuracy corresponding to that required to verify the prediction. ”

“ Such predictions and their fulfillment are, indeed, well calculated to impress the uninformed, whose faith in science rests solely on similar coincidences between its prophecies and what comes to pass. ”

“ This art of prediction is not attainable any otherwise, than by these three ways; first, it is done by the company of familiar spirits and genii, which are of two sorts; some good and some bad; who tell the gifted person the things of which he informs other people. Secondly, it is performed by the second-sight, which is very various, and differs in most of the possessors, it being but a very little in some, very extensive and constant in others ”

“ Such superstitions as these last must be the result of study; they are too recondite for natural or spontaneous growth. But when the attempt was once made to construct a science of predictions, any association, though ever so faint or remote, by which an object could be connected in however far-fetched a manner with ideas either of prosperity or of danger and misfortune, was enough to determine its being classed among good or evil omens. ”

“ Observe, then, that, respecting a concrete phenomenon of some complexity, the most exact science enables us to make predictions that are mainly general, or only partially special. Seeing that this is so, even where the causes and effects are not greatly involved, and where the science of them is well developed, much more may we expect it to be so among the most involved causes and effects, the science of which is but rudimentary. ”

“ I say decisively that nothing is so marked in modern writing as the prediction of such ideals in the future combined with the ignoring of them in the past. ”

“ That an unsupported body will fall; that a lighted candle will go out when immersed in water; that ice will melt when thrown on the fire—these, and many like predictions relating to the familiar properties of things have as high a degree of accuracy as predictions are capable of. It is true that the results predicated are of a very general character; but it is none the less true that they are rigorously correct as far as they go: and this is all that is requisite to fulfil the definition. There is perfect accordance between the anticipated phenomena and the actual ones ”

“ The subject of a prediction is the downfall of some mighty state, or the fortune of its governours. Why then is this important revelation intrusted to an obscure priest, or sordid peasant, in preference to the great persons, more immediately concerned in it8?
Again; some momentous events have been signified in dreams: why not to persons awake, and in the full possession of their best faculties9?
And then, of those dreams, why are they 18 sometimes sent to one man, and the interpretation of them reserved for another10? ”

“ The practical value of being able to make even such elementary predictions as these is obviously enormous, and this value increases as applied science, which is built up simply by the formulation of more and more comprehensive general laws of this type, widens the field of facts which can be explained. ”

“ When predictions, like those in Scripture, are particular and complicated, and the events are so remote and so contingent as to be out of the reach of human sagacity, it is plain that the writers of the predictions do not speak according to the measure of information which they had acquired by natural means, but are merely the instruments through which the Almighty communicates, in such measure and such language as he thinks fit, that knowledge of futurity which is denied to man. ”

“ No one can exactly know with what births, monstrous or beautiful, the future may teem. Admitting a certain point of view—that of almost unrestrained optimism—the predictions here offered will, it is believed, be found to be along the line of existing progress. ”

“ Predictions may possibly be made more particular, though with less certainty, if, when the general tendencies of the times are found, a good philosophical or political judgment applies them to such things as are most liable to accidents of this kind. ”

“ In the leaders of those conspiracies we discover all the traits of character, attributed in prophecy to the scoffers who should arise in the last days. When every circumstance, in events so remarkable agree with the predictions, can doubt remain whether the predictions are fulfilled? ”

“ We may, from the experience we have had of the train and succession of ideas in our minds, often make, I will not say uncertain conjectures, but sure and well--grounded predictions concerning the ideas we shall be affected with pursuant to a great train of actions, and be enabled to pass a right judgment of what would have appeared to us, in case we were placed in circumstances very different from those we are in at present. ”

“ Others have undertaken to prophesy, to foretel things to come, and that with the utmost certainty and exactness. But a little time usually convinces these Enthusiasts. When plain facts run counter to their predictions, experience performs what reason could not, and sinks them down into their senses. ”

“ That these scientific accounts of this world of organised experience are true, at least in a measure, we are said to verify, in so far as, first, we predict that, if they are true, certain other fragmentary phenomena will get presented to us under certain definable conditions, and in so far as, secondly, we successfully proceed to fulfil such predictions. ”

“ The physical sciences may therefore be properlyviii made the practice-ground of the reasoning powers, because they furnish us with a great body-of precise and successful investigations. In these sciences we meet with happy instances of unquestionable deductive reasoning, of extensive generalisation, of happy prediction, of satisfactory verification, of nice calculation of probabilities. ”

“ Should this person predict events so improbable and so beyond all human intelligence as to be equivalent to an equal interruption of experience as to the laws of mind, as time developed the fulfillment of these predictions, the same belief would be induced in the authority of the person thus supernaturally endowed. ”

“ Being utterly unable to make assured predictions about a single life, or the conduct of individuals, people are sometimes startled, and occasionally even dismayed, at the unexpected discovery that such predictions can be confidently made when we are speaking of large numbers. ”

“ It may, indeed, be doubted whether any predictions of a definitely positive kind—predictions that such and such things will happen—can be safely made, save the obvious ones which are based on the assumption that existing natural conditions remain for some time operative. ”

“ To prove, in short, that our science, and our knowledge of the particular case, render us competent to predict the future, we must show that they would have enabled us to predict the present and the past. ”

“ Being determin'd by Custom to transfer the past to the future, in all our Inferences; where the past has been entirely regular and uniform, we expect the Event with the greatest Assurance, and leave no room for any contrary Supposition. But where different Effects have been sound to follow from Causes, which are to Appearance exactly similar, all these various Effects must occur to the Mind in transferring the past to the future, and enter into our Consideration, when we determine the Probability of the Event. ”

“ To make it an aim is to throw away the surest means of attaining it, namely attention to the full use of present resources in the present situation. Forecast of future conditions, scientific study of past and present in order that the forecast may be intelligent, are indeed necessities. Concentration of intellectual concern upon the future, solicitude for scope and precision of estimate characteristic of any well conducted affair, naturally give the impression that their [pg 267] animating purpose is control of the future. ”

“ But for some of us moderns, who have been touched with the spirit of science, prophesying is almost a habit of mind.
Science is very largely analysis aimed at forecasting. The test of any scientific law is our verification of its anticipations. The scientific training develops the idea that whatever is going to happen is really here now--if only one could see it. And when one is taken by surprise the tendency is not to say with the untrained man, "Now, who'd ha' thought it?" ”

“ The test of the degree in which the science affords safe [pg 630] ground for predicting (and consequently for practically dealing with) what has not yet happened, is the degree in which it would have enabled us to predict what has actually occurred. Before our theory of the influence of a particular cause, in a given state of circumstances, can be entirely trusted, we must be able to explain and account for the existing state of all that portion of the social phenomena which that cause has a tendency to influence. ”

“ You will accuse our prognostications of partiality and of false perspective: “All will not be so rosy,” you will be tempted to say, “as sanguine forecast has pictured it, you have represented the exceptional as the typical, the typical as the exceptional; hard outlines have become blurred for you, and shadows, in their turn, taken substance.” Well, we do our best; we are puppies, perhaps, and idealists, but you will do well to take our depositions and to sift them for yourselves. ”