Predicting has a spotty record in science fiction. I've had some failures. On the other hand, I also predicted the fall of the Berlin Wall and the rise of fundamentalist Islam... and I'm not happy to be right in all of those cases.
It was a fantastic learning experience and OK, I got slammed because I wasn't Audrey Hepburn but you could have predicted that, really, if you'd opened your eyes wide enough.
If you look at the Bible almost everything that was predicted, maybe everything, has come to pass.
The most important advances, the qualitative leaps, are the least predictable. Not even the best scientists predicted the impact of nuclear physics, and everyday consumer items such as the iPhone would have seemed magic back in the 1950s.
George Orwell's science-fiction classic 'Nineteen Eighty-Four' wasn't a failure because the future it predicted failed to come to pass. Rather, it was a resounding success because it helped us prevent that future.
In 2004, Kucinich was the only presidential candidate who warned that a war in Iraq would be completely disastrous. I remember how mocked he was when he predicted hand-to-hand combat in Baghdad. I remember Candy Crowley, and other reporters as well, treating his views on the impending war as ridiculous, out there, almost insane.
The process of a date, I think, is terrible. Horrible. Because everything is banal and predicted.
The latest scientific assessment has almost doubled the predicted rate of warming if no changes are made.
Standing beneath the white light of an Apple store is like standing on a Stanley Kubrick movie set. His '2001: A Space Odyssey' predicted Jobs and a future where technology was our friend. Kubrick, of course, didn't like what he saw. And occasionally, I have my doubts.
But nobody predicted anything of this magnitude in terms of resistance. And in part, the magnitude of the resistance was spurred by our failures in reconstruction.
Look at what has occurred in history. When the Berlin Wall fell, it was not surprising, but it was unexpected. Who predicted the Arab Spring? Nobody expected it, but all the ingredients were there. I think all the ingredients are also there for Quebec to become a country. But when? That's another question.
The end of commercial fishing is predicted long before the middle of the 21st century.
You could not have predicted the amazing discoveries at Pluto, even though we have been to a couple of objects in the solar system that were at least a little analogous to Pluto.
My father believed in astrology. His astrologer had predicted that his daughter would become a writer someday. My father would nag me, but I didn't write a word till he passed away. I wish he could see me now.
Under Reagan's policies, inflation and nominal GNP growth shriveled much faster than predicted, throwing off government revenue estimates and resulting in budget deficits.
The prediction that glaciers will be gone from Glacier National Park has been moved up by 10 years to 2020, the same year it's predicted the Arctic Sea will be ice-free in the summer.
I'd be kidding if I said that I predicted the financial collapse.
The minute you can be predicted, as a brand, you've got a problem.
When I was born, the Internet was barely two years old. It was the preserve of academics, used to connect dozens rather than billions of users. There weren't many who predicted it would transform our world.
I wasn't predicted to be anything. I just followed an inner spirit, and it put me in the right place and the right time. I didn't want to be the mayor of Atlanta. I didn't want to run for Congress. I didn't want to work for Martin Luther King Jr. I wanted to work close to him and be a writer and write about the movement.
The imminent demise of the church has been predicted since the middle of the 18th century. This is the regular secular mantra if churchgoing declines. I could take you to plenty of churches that are full to bursting and new churches being built.
One of the greatest technicians of all time was a man named W. D. Gann (1878-1955). He had tremendous success predicting market moves much in advance. Legend has it that he occasionally sent notes to 'The Wall Street Journal', which accurately predicted tops and bottoms in grain markets months ahead of time.
At the end of their first years, there are few people who would have predicted that Truman would be elected in 1948 or that Reagan would get a second term. It's always premature to make some kind of categorical judgment after the first year in office.
Tests conducted before I graduated predicted a future for me in journalism, forestry, or the teaching of music; persons who know me well could recognize some truth in those seemingly errant prognoses.
In 1994, nobody could have predicted 'Shawshank' would one day be an iconic movie - and believe me, that would never have happened if Danny Glover had been Red instead of Morgan Freeman.
'Elf' has become this big holiday movie, and I remember running around the streets of New York in tights saying, 'This could be the last movie I ever make,' and I could never have predicted that it'd become such a popular film.
The whole freedom-of-speech thing is great. But I don't think that our Founding Fathers predicted social media when they created all of these amendments and stuff.
I couldn't have predicted the business would be worth so much. I could see that we would have this sort of market share, but I didn't realise the numbers would be so large.
