Quotes About Prediction

The future is no more uncertain than the present.

America, too, is a prophecy.

He who asks fortune-tellers the future unwittingly forfeits an inner intimation of coming events that is a thousand times more exact than anything they may say

The best way to predict the future is to invent it" and "People who are serious about software should make their own hardware.

Einstein was asked what the next war would look like. "I do not know how the Third World War will be fought," he answered, "but I can tell you what they will use in the Fourth—rocks.

He kept asking Kay and others for an assessment of "trends" that foretold what the future might hold for the company. During one maddening session, Kay, whose thoughts often seemed tailored to go directly from his tongue to wikiquotes, shot back a line that was to become PARC's creed: "The best way to predict the future is to invent it."60

Although Jobs later said that he was not plotting to take over Apple at the time, Ellison thought it was inevitable. Anyone who spent more than a half hour with Amelio would realize that he couldn't do anything but self destruct, he later said

One day ladies will take their computers for walks in the park and tell each other 'My little computer said such a funny thing this morning!' " he japed in 1951.

During one maddening session, Kay, whose thoughts often seemed tailored to go directly from his tongue to wikiquotes, shot back a line that was to become PARC's creed: "The best way to predict the future is to invent it."60

predijo que Apple vendería un millón de canciones en seis meses. En vez de eso, la tienda iTunes vendió un millón de canciones en seis días.

I can't see any reason that anyone would want a computer of his own," DEC president Ken Olsen declared at a May 1974 meeting

The complexity for minimum component costs has increased at a rate of roughly a factor of two per year," he noted. "There is no reason to believe it will not remain nearly constant for at least ten years.

Some people say, "Give the customers what they want." But that's not my approach. Our job is to figure out what they're going to want before they do. I think Henry Ford once said, "If I'd asked customers what they wanted, they would have told me, 'A faster horse!'" People don't know what they want until you show it to them. That's why I never rely on market research. Our task is to read things that are not yet on the page.

I can't see any reason that anyone would want a computer of his own," DEC president Ken Olsen declared at a May 1974 meeting where his operations committee was debating whether to create a smaller version of its PDP-8 for personal consumers.

La mejor forma de predecir el futuro es inventarlo

I do not know how the Third World War will be fought," he answered, "but I can tell you what they will use in the Fourth—rocks.

At the end of the 1940s, when it was becoming clear to him that the effort to control nuclear weaponry would fail, Einstein was asked what the next war would look like. "I do not know how the Third World War will be fought," he answered, "but I can tell you what they will use in the Fourth—rocks."20

Si alguna vez surge una raza mentalmente sobrehumana —dijo en cierta ocasión Edward Teller, el creador de la bomba de hidrógeno—, sus miembros se parecerán a Johnny von Neumann.

Forecasts may tell you a great deal about the forecaster; they tell you nothing about the future.

Charlie's dictum: "All I want to know is where I'm going to die so I'll never go there.

Science fiction didn't see the mobile phone coming. It certainly didn't see the glowing glass windows many of us carry now, where we make things amazing happen by pointing at it with our fingers like goddamn wizards.

Prediction is the best circus act of all. But it is just an act. It's a carny turn. Stop doing it.

The near future? The future of anything is like some massive weather system on the horizon, pushing out thunderheads all over the place, and it's impossible to predict where the lightning will strike. And in 2011 it's worse than ever.

Predicting causes litter.