retrodiction means A form of "prediction" that deals with the past rather than the future, sometimes useful in testing theories whose actual predictions are too long-term to be of immediate use. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 88 out of 100.
Why this word is great
RETRODICTION — [Noun] The inference of past events, conditions, or causes, used as a formal test of a theoretical model. Blend of the Latin-derived prefix retro- ("backward" or "in the past") and the English word prediction (from Latin praedicere, "to foretell"). Unlike prediction, which is an arrow shot forward into the fog of what-might-be, or the often-synonymous postdiction, which can imply merely fitting known data, retrodiction is a scientific archaeology: constructing a testable narrative of what must have been. It is the astronomer calculating a comet's forgotten path through ancient skies, the geologist reading the vanished violence of an earthquake in twisted strata, or the historian reconstructing a lost letter from the silence it left in an archive—the intellect's quiet rebellion against the finality of the event, proving that to explain the past is also to predict it, in reverse.
noun
- A form of "prediction" that deals with the past rather than the future, sometimes useful in testing theories whose actual predictions are too long-term to be of immediate use.