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3 readings

Old Forecasts, Graded

Named forecasts traced as far back as we can read them, graded item by item as hit, costume error, miss or untestable, each with a quantity we recompute; no live predictions and no quote-hunting for its own sake.

Engraving from Verne's From the Earth to the Moon, 1874 Italian edition: a column of fire bursting from the gun's mouth in the ground, smoke above

Old Forecasts, Graded

From the Earth to the Moon: Verne’s Gun, 22,000 g or More

Verne's 12,000 yards per second over a full 900-foot run averages about 22,000 g. We grade seven of his claims: the crew a hit, the gun a costume error.

Image credit

"From the Earth to the Moon (151481126)" by Henri de Montaut — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:From_the_Earth_to_the_Moon_(151481126).jpg — Public domain in the US (published 1874) and in the EU (artist died 1900 at the latest, life+70; no engraver named on the plate, published more than 70 years ago); modified: cropped to 16:9 for the page and the card view, keeping the gun's mouth and the column of fire; the shell at the top of the plate, the upper smoke and the tiny figures at the foot are cut

Engraved portrait of Thomas Robert Malthus, from his hair down to a dark coat collar, printed in April 1909

Old Forecasts, Graded

Malthus: His 512 to 10, People to Food, Had No Date

Image credit

"PSM V74 D416 Thomas Robert Malthus" by unknown creator — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PSM_V74_D416_Thomas_Robert_Malthus.png — Public domain in the US (published 1909) and in the EU (printed without a named maker by April 1909, more than 70 years since first publication); modified: cropped to head and collar, 16:9