Talk:Postdiction

Moved here from the Vaticinium ex eventu ("Prophecy from the event") page

• Article: de:Vaticinium ex eventu
• Corresponding English-language article: Vaticinium ex eventu
• Worth doing because: No corresponding English article
• Originally Requested by: Itai 19:29, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)
• Status: Done Mpolo 09:59, Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)
• Other notes: I added the bit on the Sibylline oracles.

---

This is borderline un-neutral... Not that I'm for or against Nostradamus, but author seems biased against him and/or his readers specifically (count the number of example with Nostradamus specifically, compared to others; statistically speaking Nostradamus seems singled out here). How about in this case, author removes real-life examples, instead make somthing up like "a prediction that water will run downhill is an example of satistically likely". That will appease the neutrality-minded and new-agers alike.

---

Is the "prophecy" by Virgil about Caesar Augustus in this category, or is it exempted because it was intended more as a tribute than as a hoax? Jwrosenzweig 14:11, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Hmmm... I don't think that Virgil was presenting the Aeneid as "true history", so maybe not. Certainly Anchises is pretty direct in his praise for the illustrious decendant of Aeneas. I don't think it would hurt to mention it or to leave it out. Mpolo 14:27, Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)

"Steps to avoid postdiction" should be removed

Section violates a number of wikipedia guidelines, among them WP:NOR, (where are these "steps" published outside WP?) WP:WWIN, (Wikipedia is not a guide book), and WP:NPOV (the very existence of the section implies that clairvoyance is real and that psychics should take these sensible precautions). I will remove the section in two weeks unless a cogent defense addressing each of these points is posted below. Peace. Argyrios 18:52, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I gave it two months and deleted the section. Argyrios 14:29, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Most predictions from such figures as Nostradamus and James Van Praagh are deliberately written in a such a vague and ambiguous way as to make interpretation nearly impossible before the event, rendering them useless as predictive tools.

This article is entirely biased; it shows only the skeptics' beliefs and it contains a ridiculous mini-dictionary of irrelevant words in what appears to be an attempt to disprove Postdiction. In fact this is less an article about Postdiction, and rather more an article on the impossibility of Postdiction.

Beyond that it is un-cited and unjustified and, in my opinion, a complete waste of space.

Thanks for sharing. Just a few nitpicks: Skeptics don't have beliefs, there's no "mini-dictionary of irrelevant words" here, and postdiction is a joke. So I think you could have gotten your point across in much fewer words: "I am an idiot". — NRen2k5^(TALK), 03:44, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Raymond Brown

The Latin phrase vaticinium ex eventu is the professional Biblical scholar's term for [Literally: Foretelling after the event]. Raymond E. Brown charges that the practice of writing after the event is too rational and simple.[An Introduction to New Testament Christology by Raymond Brown, Paulist Press, 1994. P.45.] For example, the story of Jonah being in the belly of the sea monster for three days was connected (probably due to apophenia) to the story of Jesus being in the grave for three days. To the early Christians doubting the historical truth of the Jonah story was looked upon as denying the historical truth that Jesus was in the grave for three days. In the Gospel of Mark Jesus' spoken words while on the cross are words lifted from Psalm 22. In John 19:28 the author tells the reader Jesus said, "I thirst" to fulfill words of Scripture, probably Psalm 22:16; 69:22 in the Hebrew Bible. How does one gently explain these things to the uninformed? Kazuba (talk) 19:07, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

John of Patmos

While it is true that many modern Christians interpret Revelation as a prophetic text (in a futurist or in a historicist sense) it is by no means certain that the book was written as a work of fore-telling. Indeed it would have made the work spectacularly useless to first century Christians if that were its only purpose. It's quite legitimate to regard the text as inspirational, or Jewish-style apocalyptic, or deliberately designed to appeal to tastes and background of the first and second century AD church. I'd suggest we find a wording which reflects this in some way. It is however, true to say that many writers of the historicist interpretative school have retrospectively found prophecies in the book of Revelation. Rob Burbidge (talk) 08:43, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

vaticinia ex eventu

This term is referenced here, but I think postdiction and vaticinia ex eventu are not the same thing. Postdiction means: (1) prophecy, then (2) event, then (3) reinterpretation of the prophecy to show that it really did predict the event, even though it wasn't obvious at the time. Vaticinia ex eventu means: (1) event, then (2) prophecy of that event (written as if it will come in the future), then (3) modern day, where we're unsure whether 1 or 2 came first.