Prophecies and Predictions

[redchild]

What's your opinion on prophecies and predictions in sci-fi/fantasy?

A convenient plot device to foreshadow future events? To enhance irony?

What do you think about prophecies that come true? Or don't? Or does in one sense but doesn't in another?

[Albertosaurus Rex]

Like everything else, this can be done right. After all, we're all fans of Robin Hobb here, who devoted a number of books to the White Prophets. However, prophecies have been done so often that most of the time, it's going to be cliched and lame.

I remember reading the Magic Legends Cycle (a trilogy of [i]Magic: the Gathering tie-in novels by Clayton Emery) that poked some fun at this. It featured the prophecy of None, One and Two. Over the course of the story, the characters come up with various interpretations, but in the end no one gets any closer to answer and they decide that it isn't important after all.

In addition to being cliched, prophecies come with a host of questions: if the future is apparently foretold, does that mean that our heroes' universe is deterministic? Why are prophecies so vaguely worded? (Yes, to keep the story suspenseful, but what is the in-universe reason?)

['thul]

In the sword of truth series, the vagueness both is and isnt there... Only true prophets are meant to understand the prophecies. Most others can interpret them, but not necessarily correctly... (and quite often incorrectly)

Another reason for such vagueness provided is that a prophecy can be very dangerous tool... Most prophecies there are vague so that only those they matter for will understand them. Otherwise, people could just kill the grandfather of the one it is about (or similarly) and void the prophecy.

[redchild]

However, prophecies have been done so often that most of the time, it's going to be cliched and lame.

Yes I always view them with a bit of suspicion. Thankfully, good writing tends to be much more focused on characters and their interactions with other characters/environment.

Over the course of the story, the characters come up with various interpretations, but in the end no one gets any closer to answer and they decide that it isn't important after all.

Hmm, perhaps prophecies can be like the Holy Grails of stories? Something people search for, even if only to validate its existence, yet is ultimately elusive?

Even the events in a story will eventually be historical events in that world. If a prophecy is fulfilled, wouldn't there be another prophecy to take its place? Is there ever an ultimate prophecy (an ultimate end) or are they cyclical? I think Hobb tackles this with her White Prophets in the RotE quite effectively.

In addition to being cliched, prophecies come with a host of questions: if the future is apparently foretold, does that mean that our heroes' universe is deterministic? Why are prophecies so vaguely worded? (Yes, to keep the story suspenseful, but what is the in-universe reason?)

Another reason for such vagueness provided is that a prophecy can be very dangerous tool... Most prophecies there are vague so that only those they matter for will understand them.

Perhaps prophecies are really only MacGuffins something that drives characters to act as they do. Vagueness is precisely why prophecies are dangerous. People's different interpretations (or lack of knowledge) on prophecies can lead into conflict with other characters in their endeavors to fulfill, alter, or annul the prophecy.

The probability of a highly precise, "perfect" prophecy to be realized with 100% fail-safe execution is extremely improbable. Or, in the case of prophecies that end up becoming fulfilled, perhaps they are worded so vaguely to allow room for different permutations that eventually come to the same ultimate fate.

For example, if the supposed hero who is thought to be the one to fulfill the prophecy dies, it can still be fulfilled though in a different time, with a different hero, under different circumstances. Let's say somebody made a prediction that Columbus would "discover" the American continents.

If Columbus had not "discovered" the New World (perhaps he died or Isabella sent some guy called Joe instead,) eventually someone else would have.

Or, someone else could have discovered the Americas (and there is archaeological evidence that it was) before Columbus' expedition but did not stake claim nor was technologically advanced enough or had no incentive to settle.

Or had Native Americans reached a cultural and scientific "Renaissance" before Europe had, would they have been the ones to discover and colonize the "New World:" Europe?

Any number of circumstances, ranging from slightly to wildly different, would have led to the eventual meeting of peoples between the two "worlds." However, making such a prediction requires either prior knowledge (a la time travel?), or a general conclusion derived from sufficiently gathered data (had there been superhero genius anthro-/sociologists around during the time) to support the probability of, an ultimate outcome. It's quite the paradox really, that if you know the ultimate outcome, you can attempt to alter it. Yet if it is "ultimate," then it should be unavoidable and any attempt to change it is futile...but you never know unless you try (unless, of course, you can time travel.)

['thul]

In the sword of truth series, there were occasional prophecies that werent unclear. When the enemy of the good guys was approaching that storage place, those had to be destroyed because anyone could understand them...

[Farseer]

This is such a fantastic topic for a thread, redchild! While I haven't contributed anything as yet, I AM thinking deeply about it away from the keyboard and can't wait for a long enough break that will enable me to come back and sink my teeth into it all.

While I'm here, I'll also apologise to you personally for my apparent ignorance with regard to a couple of other replies I am yet to paste in, in response to posts you have made eg time/stars, national customs etc. Sorry...I feel awful about them, though you may not have even noticed how slack I have appeared to be. Still, I have successfully retrieved some of these replies from saved docs I had made (on a computer infected by a virus) so I hope to finally paste in those over the coming weekend as well!

['thul]

As far as these beings know, keyboards are not edible to humans like yourself. Sinking your teeth into it would therefore be unwise.

So long as the outcome of all prophecies are not 100% certain to come to pass, the clearer a prophecy, the more dangerous it is. A lot of prophecies will also provide at least 20/20 hindsight.

[redchild]

Bah, edited my last post. Columbus' journey was during the Renaissance-- not post-industrialization *facepalm*

While I'm here, I'll also apologise to you personally for my apparent ignorance with regard to a couple of other replies I am yet to paste in, in response to posts you have made eg time/stars, national customs etc. Sorry...I feel awful about them, though you may not have even noticed how slack I have appeared to be. Still, I have successfully retrieved some of these replies from saved docs I had made (on a computer infected by a virus) so I hope to finally paste in those over the coming weekend as well!

There's no need to apologize; actually I'm kind of surprised that you are. I usually post just to get stuff out there. But since you mentioned it, I'm looking forward to reading your replies

You're a lot more diligent than I am in keeping up with threads What kind of anti-virus programs do you have on your computer? I recommend getting AVG and Avast, if you haven't got them already.

['thul]

These being use MSE, but have also been recommended those two...

[Nuytsia]

I've got McAfee at the moment, but there's several good ones I've used.