Pending ●●●●●
2027 will set a new global temperature record of about +1.7°C above the 1880-1920 average.
“We project a global temperature record of +1.7°C in 2027”Climate
Who gets the future right?
A public record of predictions made by well-known people: their exact words, when they said them, and how things turned out.
Scorecard
| Person | Category | Predictions | Scored | Accurate | Late | Partial | Wrong | Accuracy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anthony Fauci | Scientist | 9 | 8 | 4 | 0 | 3 | 1 | 69% |
| Geoffrey Hinton | AI researcher | 7 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0% |
| James Hansen | Scientist | 11 | 6 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 100% |
| Michio Kaku | Scientist | 8 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 33% |
| Paul Ehrlich | Scientist | 9 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 7 | 0% |
| Yann LeCun | AI researcher | 6 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0% |
Accuracy counts accurate as 1, late or partial as ½, inaccurate as 0. Pending predictions don't count.
Predictions
Pending ●●●●●
AI will cause massive unemployment alongside a large rise in corporate profits.
“It's going to create massive unemployment and a huge rise in profits.”EconomyAI
Pending ●●●●●
AI will soon eliminate the need for legal assistants and paralegals.
“Someone like a legal assistant or paralegal — they're not going to be needed for very long.”EconomyAI
Pending ●●●●●
AI systems reading medical images will become considerably better than expert human readers.
“And they're about comparable with the experts by now. They'll soon be considerably better because they'll have had a lot more experience.”HealthAI
Unresolvable ●●●●●
A cyberattack will take down a Canadian bank by April 2035.
“But over the next 10 years, I wouldn't be at all surprised if there was a cyber attack that took down a Canadian bank.”BankingTechnology
Unresolvable ●●●●●
AGI/superintelligence (AI surpassing humans across domains) will arrive by April 2035.
“there's a good chance it'll be here in 10 years or less now.”AI
Accurate ●●●●●
Global temperature (vs 1880-1920) will stay above +1.5°C at end-2024 and fall at most slightly below +1.5°C in 2025.
“global temperature will remain above +1.5 °C at the end of 2024 and, at most, barely fall below +1.5 °C in 2025.”Climate
Pending ●●●●●
Global temperature will reach +2°C above the 1880-1920 average by 2045.
“global warming in the next two decades is likely to be about 0.2-0.3 °C per decade, leading to global temperature +2 °C by 2045.”Climate
Pending ●●●●●
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) will shut down by about 2055.
“shutdown of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is likely within the next 20-30 years, unless actions are taken to reduce global warming”Climate
Pending ●●●●●
By January 2030, a new AI architecture paradigm fundamentally different from today's LLMs will be in use.
“within three to five years we'll have systems that are a completely different paradigm.”AI
Pending ●●●●●
By January 2030, current-style large language models will no longer be used (at least as the central component of AI systems).
“I think within five years, nobody in their right mind would use them anymore,”AI
Pending ●●●●●
Human-level AI (AGI) will not be achieved within two years of late November 2024, i.e. not by end of November 2026.
“But it's not going to happen next year. It's not going to happen in two years,”AI
Pending ●●●●●
The vast majority of AI systems will be built on top of open-source AI platforms.
“So the direction of inevitable direction of history is that the vast majority of AI systems will be built on top of open source platforms.”AI
Pending ●●●●●
Human-level AI systems (with hierarchical planning and brain-like flexibility) will not exist before March 2034.
“all of this is going to take at least a decade and probably much more”AI
Pending ●●●●●
Global warming (long-term level, not a single year) will exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial during the 2020s.
“global warming will exceed 1.5°C in the 2020s”Climate
Pending ●●●●●
Global warming will exceed 2°C above pre-industrial before 2050.
“under the present geopolitical approach to GHG emissions, global warming will exceed 1.5°C in the 2020s and 2°C before 2050.”Climate
Pending ●●●●●
AI will become smarter than humans within 5 to 20 years of May 2023, i.e. by May 2043.
“I now predict 5 to 20 years but without much confidence.”AI
Pending ●●●●●
By 2038, quantum computers will be powerful enough to break today's standard encryption codes (e.g. RSA).
“We're talking about ten, 15 years in the future when quantum computers are so powerful they can break any code.”Technology
Accurate ●●●●●
Global mean temperature in 2024 will reach at least +1.4-1.5°C above the 1880-1920 average.
“global temperature in 2024 is likely to reach +1.4-1.5°C”Climate
Accurate ●●●●●
Global mean surface temperature in 2023 will be notably higher than in 2022.
“2023 should be notably warmer than 2022”Climate
Pending ●●●●●
Within the next few decades after 2023, the current form of human civilization will end.
“the next few decades will be the end of the kind of civilization we're used to”Climate
Pending ●●●●●
Humanity will detect a signal from an extraterrestrial civilization before the end of 2100.
“In this century, there is a very good chance that we will pick up a signal from another planet.”Space
Inaccurate ●●●●●
No text-trained language model, however powerful, will ever be able to say that an object on a table moves when the table is pushed.
“If you train a machine as powerful as could be…your GPT-5000, it's never gonna learn about this.”AI
Accurate ●●●●●
The US Omicron COVID-19 wave will likely peak by the end of January 2022.
“I would imagine, given the size of our country and the diversity of vaccination versus not vaccination, that it likely will be more than a couple of weeks, probably by the end of January, I would think”Health
Partly right ●●●●●
US elementary school children will be able to get a COVID-19 vaccine at the earliest by the end of 2021, and very likely in the first quarter of 2022.
“If you project realistically, when we will be able to get enough data to be able to say that elementary school children will be able to be vaccinated, I would think that would be, at the earliest, the end of the year, and very likely the first quarter of 2022,”Health
Accurate ●●●●●
By April 2021, virtually anyone in the US, in any category, will be able to start getting a COVID-19 vaccine.
“by the time we get to April, that will be what I would call for better wording 'open season,' namely that virtually everybody and anybody, in any category, could start to get vaccinated”Health
Partly right ●●●●●
A majority of the US population will likely not be vaccinated against COVID-19 until the end of 2021.
“But by the time you mobilize the distribution of the vaccine and get a majority or more of the population vaccinated and protected, that's likely not going to happen until the end of 2021,”Health
Unresolvable ●●●●●
There is a reasonably good chance a COVID-19 vaccine will be available in the US by the very beginning of 2021.
“I still think there is a reasonably good chance that by the very beginning of 2021, if we're going to have a vaccine, that we will have it by then,”Health
Accurate ●●●●●
COVID-19 will still be circulating in the US in fall 2020.
“we will have coronavirus in the Fall. I am convinced of that because of the degree of transmissibility that has the global nature.”Health
Inaccurate ●●●●●
The US COVID-19 outbreak will cause roughly 100,000 to 200,000 deaths (a hedged estimate with no stated time frame).
“I would say between 100,000 and 200,000 cases. But I don't want to be held to that, because it's -- excuse me -- deaths.”Health