We are often more certain than the evidence really allows.
More quotesFuture conference bingo:
“Exponential.”
“By 2035.”
“Seventy-three per cent.”
“A new species of customer.”
A line rising towards the top-right corner.
The present is messy, crowded with exceptions and vulnerable to somebody checking it before coffee. The future is clean. It has no disappointing data, no angry users and no awkward sod in finance asking why last quarter disagrees.
Precision makes the trick feel respectable. “Everything will change” is wind. “Seventy-three per cent of transactions will be autonomous by 2032” sounds researched. A precise number gives a guess borrowed authority.
The audience gets magnitude. The speaker gets authority today. Accuracy will be checked years later, if anybody remembers.
Forecasting should make uncertainty more useful, but keynote certainty often does the reverse. One glittering future encourages one expensive commitment. Several plausible futures expose which decisions survive different outcomes, which is more valuable and much harder to photograph.
Old predictions would improve the event enormously. Put the speaker’s claims from ten years ago beside the new ones. Score dates, probabilities and direction. Let graceful revisions count as learning. The sudden outbreak of nuance would be magnificent. Better still, replace the single prophecy with decisions under conditions. What would we regret failing to prepare for? Which small bet creates information? What remains sensible across several outcomes? These questions sound less visionary because they accept that the future has not signed a contract. They are also more likely to protect actual money.
Nobody can fact-check 2035 today. That is exactly why the record from 2016 belongs on the next slide.
Keep the old claim, its date and the evidence available at the time. Write correct, wrong or unclear beside it. Leave the last box blank if nobody can yet tell. Then begin the new forecast.