“Our tendency to think that we're not predictable is probably one of our more predictable traits.”

— Derren Brown

TV Series and Specials (Includes DVDs), Trick of the Mind (2004–2006)

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Derren Brown 136

British illusionist 1971

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Gerardus 't Hooft (1946) Dutch theoretical physicist and Nobel Prize winner

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“The tendency to be rational is the consistent and hence predictable element in human behavior.”

David D. Friedman (1945) American economist, physicist, legal scholar, and libertarian theorist

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“I think we can become excellent predictors. It's just that we're careful not to depend upon prediction anymore than we have to.”

Ward Cunningham (1949) American computer programmer who developed the first wiki

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Context: I could say, "Wait! Wait! I know what's going to happen down here!" Well you knew what was going to happen down here. How does it help us get our job done for me to tell you what's going to happen down here? You could say, "Stop! I want to draw on the white board what we're going to do tomorrow, because I can see it coming." Well maybe I can see it coming too, but why make a commitment? It will come soon enough. So, we're certainly here and now, but I think we can become excellent predictors. It's just that we're careful not to depend upon prediction anymore than we have to.

“It is naïve to think that a [computer] model can predict future events on the Earth. To try to predict the future based on just one variable (CO2) in extraordinarily complex natural systems is folly.”

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“The grandfather of concepts for predicting the probable course of industry evolution is the familiar product life cycle.”

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“But a theory is not like an airline or bus timetable. We are not interested simply in the accuracy of its predictions. A theory also serves as a base for thinking. It helps us to understand what is going on by enabling us to organize our thoughts. Faced with a choice between a theory which predicts well but gives us little insight into how the system works and one which gives us this insight but predicts badly, I would choose the latter, and I am inclined to think that most economists would do the same.”

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“During the late contest for the Union, the air was full of 'nevers', every one of which was contradicted and put to shame by the result, and I doubt not that most of those we now hear in our troubled air will meet the same fate. It is probably well for us that some of our gloomy prophets are limited in their powers to prediction.”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

Could they commend the destructive bolt, as readily as they commend the destructive word, it is hard to say what might happen to the country. They might fulfill their own gloomy prophecies. Of course it is easy to see why certain other classes of men speak hopelessly concerning us. A Government founded upon justice, and recognizing the equal rights of all men; claiming no higher authority for its existence, or sanction for its laws, than nature, reason and the regularly ascertained will of the people; steadily refusing to put its sword and purse in the service of any religious creed or family, is a standing offense to most of the governments of the world, and to some narrow and bigoted people among ourselves.
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“It is impossible to trap modern physics into predicting anything with perfect determinism because it deals with probabilities from the outset.”

Arthur Stanley Eddington (1882–1944) British astrophysicist

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“In stochastic processes the future is not uniquely determined, but we have at least probability relations enabling us to make predictions.”

William Feller (1906–1970) Croatian-American mathematician

Source: An Introduction To Probability Theory And Its Applications (Third Edition), Chapter XV, Markov Chains, p. 420.

“I think it foolhardy to predict the absolute limits of human endurance.”

Lewis Pugh (1969) Environmental campaigner, maritime lawyer and endurance swimmer

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“Our tendency to think that we're not predictable is probably one of our more predictable traits.”

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