There’s a lot of room for debate on the correctness of the resolutions of these predictions:
e.g. Heinlein in 1949:
Space travel we will have, not fifty years from now, but much sooner. It’s breathing down our necks.
This is marked as incorrect, due to the marker assuming that this meant mass space travel, but I wouldn’t interpret this as mass space travel unless there’s some relevant context I’m missing here—keep in mind that this was from 1949, 8 years before Sputnik.[1]
On the other hand:
All aircraft will be controlled by a giant radar net run on a continent-wide basis by a multiple electronic “brain.”
This is marked as correct, apparently due to autopilot and the “USAF Airborne Command Post”? But I would interpret it as active control of the planes by a centralized computer and mark it as incorrect.[2]
Edited to add: there were a bunch i could have mentioned but want to remark on this one where my interpretation was especially different from the marker’s:
Interplanetary travel is waiting at your front door — C.O.D. It’s yours when you pay for it.
This is also from 1949. The marker interprets this as a prediction of “Commercial interplanetary travel”. I see it rather as a conditional prediction of interplanetary travel (not necessarily commercial), given the willingness to fund it, i.e. a prediction that the necessary technology would be available but not necessarily that it would be funded. If this is the right interpretation, it seems correct to me. Again, I could be completely wrong depending on the context. [3]
Edited to add: I realized I actually have a copy of Heinlein’s “Expanded Universe” which includes “Where To?” and followup 1965 and 1980 comments. In context, this statement comes right in the middle of a discussion of hospitals for old people on the moon, which considerably shifts the interpretation towards it being intended to refer to mass space travel, though if Heinlein were still here he could argue it literally meant any space travel.
In context, it’s not 100% clear that he meant a single computer, though I still think so. But he definitely meant full automation outside of emergency or unusual situations; from his 1980 followup: “But that totally automated traffic control system ought to be built. … all routine (99.9%+ )takeoffs and landings should be made by computer.”
And now seeing the context, I stand by this interpretation: It’s a standalone comment from the original, but Heinlein’s 1965 followup includes “and now we are paying for it and the cost is high”, confirming that government space travel counted in his view...but, given that he did assert we were paying for it, and interplanetary space travel has not occurred (I interpret the prediction as meaning human space travel), this actually might cut against counting this as a correct prediction.
Data collector here. Strongly agree with your general point: most of these entries are extremely far from modern “clairvoyant” (cleanly resolving) forecasting questions.
Space travel. Disagree. In context he means mass space travel. The relevant lead-up is this:
“According to her, the Moon is a great place and she wants us to come visit her.”
“Not likely!” his wife answers. “Imagine being shut up in an air—conditioned cave.”
“When you are Aunt Jane’s age, my honey lamb, and as frail as she is, with a bad heart thrown in, you’ll go to the Moon and like it.”
Re: footnote 1. He was a dishonest bugger in his old age so I don’t doubt he would argue that.
Central piloting. Yep, you’re right. We caught this before, but changed it in the wrong branch of the data. Going to make it ‘ambiguous’; let me know if that seems wrong.
Commercial interplanetary travel. Disagree—“C.O.D.” is an old-timey word meaning something so normal and cheap that you don’t even need to pay for your ticket upfront—which implies that “you” is a consumer, not a government. (But again I see what you’re saying.)
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Central piloting. Yep, you’re right. We caught this before, but changed it in the wrong branch of the data. Going to make it ‘ambiguous’; let me know if that seems wrong.
I would call it a full miss myself.
I still strongly disagree on the commercial interplanetary travel meaning.
If “Cash on Delivery” has that old-timey meaning, it could push a bit to your interpretation, but not enough IMO.
My reasoning:
Interplanetary travel is waiting at your front door —
Actual interplanetary travel, or say a trip on a spaceship, cannot literally be waiting at your front door. So clearly, a metaphorical meaning is intended.
C.O.D. It’s yours when you pay for it.
Here he extends the metaphor.
But, in your view, that means it’s cheap. I disagree, if it was cheap he wouldn’t need to say “It’s yours when you pay for it”. Everything has to be paid for. If he meant it was cheap, he would just stop at C.O.D. and not say “It’s yours when you pay for it.”
IMO, the “It’s yours when you pay for it” clearly means that he expected it to cost enough that it would be a significant barrier to progress (and the prediction is that it is in effect the only barrier to interplanetary travel). I do suspect though that he did intend the reader to pick up your connotation first, for the shock value, and the “It’s yours when you pay for it” is intended to shift the reader to the correct interpretation of what he means by C.O.D, i.e., it’s meant to be taken literally within the metaphorical context (and by Gricean implicature a large cost is meant) and not as an additional layer of metaphor.
I suppose the 1965 comments could have been written to retroactively support an interpretation that would make the prediction correct, but I would bet most 1950 readers would have interpreted it as I did.
Also, I note that John C. Wright agrees with my interpretation (in your link to support Heinlein being a “dishonest bugger”) (I didn’t notice anything in that link about him being a dishonest bugger, though—could you elaborate?). Wright also agrees with me on the central piloting prediction; looking briefly through Wright’s comments I didn’t see any interpretation of Wright’s that I disagreed with (I might quibble with some of Wright’s scoring, though probably mostly agree with that too). Unfortunately Wright doesn’t comment on whether he thinks Heinlein meant mass space travel as that was a side comment in the lunar retirement discussion and not presented specifically as a separated prediction in Heinlein’s original text.
There’s a lot of room for debate on the correctness of the resolutions of these predictions:
e.g. Heinlein in 1949:
This is marked as incorrect, due to the marker assuming that this meant mass space travel, but I wouldn’t interpret this as mass space travel unless there’s some relevant context I’m missing here—keep in mind that this was from 1949, 8 years before Sputnik.[1]
On the other hand:
This is marked as correct, apparently due to autopilot and the “USAF Airborne Command Post”? But I would interpret it as active control of the planes by a centralized computer and mark it as incorrect.[2]
Edited to add: there were a bunch i could have mentioned but want to remark on this one where my interpretation was especially different from the marker’s:
This is also from 1949. The marker interprets this as a prediction of “Commercial interplanetary travel”. I see it rather as a conditional prediction of interplanetary travel (not necessarily commercial), given the willingness to fund it, i.e. a prediction that the necessary technology would be available but not necessarily that it would be funded. If this is the right interpretation, it seems correct to me. Again, I could be completely wrong depending on the context. [3]
Edited to add: I realized I actually have a copy of Heinlein’s “Expanded Universe” which includes “Where To?” and followup 1965 and 1980 comments. In context, this statement comes right in the middle of a discussion of hospitals for old people on the moon, which considerably shifts the interpretation towards it being intended to refer to mass space travel, though if Heinlein were still here he could argue it literally meant any space travel.
In context, it’s not 100% clear that he meant a single computer, though I still think so. But he definitely meant full automation outside of emergency or unusual situations; from his 1980 followup: “But that totally automated traffic control system ought to be built. … all routine (99.9%+ )takeoffs and landings should be made by computer.”
And now seeing the context, I stand by this interpretation: It’s a standalone comment from the original, but Heinlein’s 1965 followup includes “and now we are paying for it and the cost is high”, confirming that government space travel counted in his view...but, given that he did assert we were paying for it, and interplanetary space travel has not occurred (I interpret the prediction as meaning human space travel), this actually might cut against counting this as a correct prediction.
Data collector here. Strongly agree with your general point: most of these entries are extremely far from modern “clairvoyant” (cleanly resolving) forecasting questions.
Space travel. Disagree. In context he means mass space travel. The relevant lead-up is this:
Re: footnote 1. He was a dishonest bugger in his old age so I don’t doubt he would argue that.
Central piloting. Yep, you’re right. We caught this before, but changed it in the wrong branch of the data. Going to make it ‘ambiguous’; let me know if that seems wrong.
Commercial interplanetary travel. Disagree—“C.O.D.” is an old-timey word meaning something so normal and cheap that you don’t even need to pay for your ticket upfront—which implies that “you” is a consumer, not a government. (But again I see what you’re saying.)
DM me for your bounty ($10)! I’ve linked to your comment in the changelog. Thanks!
I would call it a full miss myself.
I still strongly disagree on the commercial interplanetary travel meaning.
If “Cash on Delivery” has that old-timey meaning, it could push a bit to your interpretation, but not enough IMO.
My reasoning:
Actual interplanetary travel, or say a trip on a spaceship, cannot literally be waiting at your front door. So clearly, a metaphorical meaning is intended.
Here he extends the metaphor.
But, in your view, that means it’s cheap. I disagree, if it was cheap he wouldn’t need to say “It’s yours when you pay for it”. Everything has to be paid for. If he meant it was cheap, he would just stop at C.O.D. and not say “It’s yours when you pay for it.”
IMO, the “It’s yours when you pay for it” clearly means that he expected it to cost enough that it would be a significant barrier to progress (and the prediction is that it is in effect the only barrier to interplanetary travel). I do suspect though that he did intend the reader to pick up your connotation first, for the shock value, and the “It’s yours when you pay for it” is intended to shift the reader to the correct interpretation of what he means by C.O.D, i.e., it’s meant to be taken literally within the metaphorical context (and by Gricean implicature a large cost is meant) and not as an additional layer of metaphor.
I suppose the 1965 comments could have been written to retroactively support an interpretation that would make the prediction correct, but I would bet most 1950 readers would have interpreted it as I did.
Also, I note that John C. Wright agrees with my interpretation (in your link to support Heinlein being a “dishonest bugger”) (I didn’t notice anything in that link about him being a dishonest bugger, though—could you elaborate?). Wright also agrees with me on the central piloting prediction; looking briefly through Wright’s comments I didn’t see any interpretation of Wright’s that I disagreed with (I might quibble with some of Wright’s scoring, though probably mostly agree with that too). Unfortunately Wright doesn’t comment on whether he thinks Heinlein meant mass space travel as that was a side comment in the lunar retirement discussion and not presented specifically as a separated prediction in Heinlein’s original text.