Can we ever predict the future?

            Hello, lovelies.

            What would you do if you could actually predict the future? Would you sneak a peek at the winning lottery numbers? Place all your money on whatever the new up and coming .com is? Would you brave a look at your future life? But what if you didn’t like what you saw? If you won the lottery, could you be happy with all the new complicated set of problems it would bring? And what would you do if the world of the future didn’t turn out the way you’d imagined? Or, what if all those hopes and dreams that you’d always wanted to do, you find that you never did them? Would seeing into the future be all it’s cracked up to be? Or does it not matter what the future holds, it’s what we make of it that counts?

            When I was a child, I always imagined what my life was going to be like when I grew up. Of course, I was destined to be a world-famous Actor, with at least 3 or 4 Oscars under my belt by the time I was 30. I was going to be ludicrously rich and live in the biggest mansion in England, set in at least 1000 acres of land.  And I was most certainly going to be married to the 80s’ heartthrob Morten Harket of A-ha fame. Anything less was unimaginable. I used to fantasise about walking down a long red carpet, camera's flashing, with Morton on my arm, as I accepted my latest award. But, as you can imagine, none of those things happened. But did I really expect them to do so?

            Is it actually possible to see into the future? Before the start of 2020, I might have said yes. But no one foresaw the advent of Covid 19, if they had, we might not be in such dire straits that we are in now. But Google thinks that it might be able to do so. It has launched a fortune telling app that claims to predict your future. Going by the name Fortunetelling-Predict your future, the app will allow you to ask questions regarding your life. But can it really see what life has in store for you? Will it show us a future of VR lives, flying cars and brain-computer hybrids? Will we be living in a new technological sci-fi age? It seems like that is the way we’re heading now anyway. We have adapted so quickly this year, that most of our interactions with friends and family are done via the internet and video calling. We shop online. Meet our prospective partners online and live in an online world that can be entirely of our own making.

Has there ever been anyone that has accurately predicted the future? Many have tried, and many have failed. But the most famous prophesier was Nostradamus. He lived from December 1503 to July 1566.  He was a French astrologer, physician and reputed seer, who is best known for his book Les Prophéties, a collection of 942 poetic quatrains allegedly predicting future events. But how many of his prophesies came true? Many academics have argued that Nostradamus's predictions are characteristically vague, meaning they could be applied to virtually anything, and are useless for determining whether their author had any real prophetic powers. They also point out that English translations of his quatrains are almost always of extremely poor quality, based on later manuscripts, produced by authors with little knowledge of sixteenth-century French, and often deliberately mistranslated to make the prophecies fit whatever events the translator believed they were supposed to have predicted. So, no.

           Is predicting the future beneficial? Yes and no. We need to have some idea what direction we as a species are heading into. We need to watch the scientific models on Climate change and Economic growth, and how closely interlinked those two are. We need to guard for our futures and for the future of the planet. But if we actually knew the future, what impact would it have on all our decisions today? If we knew that we were going to end up working in a job we hate, in a town that doesn’t inspire us, and in a relationship that didn’t fill you with joy, would there be any point in trying to make a difference? If that’s where we are going to end up, why fight it?  By not knowing what our choices will bring, means that we are always on our toes. We are always looking out for new and better paths to walk down. By not knowing, means that it’s not already set. We can make our own futures. And we can make it whatever we want it to be.

            And it’s always important to look out for the future you. Not that I mean the you of the future popping over for a cup of coffee. But by taking care of yourself today, so the future you has a better chance tomorrow. By going to bed earlier than you have been. By eating a better, more balanced diet. And by not putting such huge expectations onto ourselves. We are only human, and we can only do so much. And by continually pushing ourselves to do more and more will only damage our future selves. Work today for the person you want to be tomorrow.