John Kenneth Galbraith Quotes

The art of prophecy is very difficult, especially with respect to the future.

Newspapers tell beforehand what is going to happen - maybe.

I shall always consider the best guesser the best prophet.

I do not like to talk about the future. I don't like to be one of those people. It's so easy to have a very vague idea and say, oh, computers will be 3D-ish and then 10 years later I'll say I predicted it 10 years ahead. I don't think that's honest and I don't think that's valid and worth anything.

Among all forms of mistake, prophecy is the most gratuitous.

We can speculate. Last time I checked, the future doesn't take my advice.

Forecasts may tell you a great deal about the forecaster; they tell you nothing about the future.

Prophecy is what we all have to go by now.

Well, I don't want to become a prognosticator.

You can't see the future, there's no such thing. It's all bets. You'll never get the same answer from two seers. But that doesn't mean either of them's wrong.

You can't know what the future holds, though you might conjecture on it, and if you're psychic, you might venture a guess.

Prophesy is a good line of business, but it is full of risks.

Prophecy, however honest, is generally a poor substitute for experience.

I try not to get involved in the business of prediction. It's a quick way to look like an idiot.

The difference between hearsay and prophecy is often one of sequence. Hearsay often turns out to have been prophecy.

My gran'ther's rule was safer 'n 'tis to crow: Don't never prophesy — onless ye know.

I'd love to know what the future looks like.

No one predicts the future. No one tries to.

Science is the observation of things possible, whether present or past; prescience is the knowledge of things which may come to pass, though but slowly.

It is bad enough to know the past; it would be intolerable to know the future.

What I have figured out is that I can predict the future. I just can't predict when.

Men, forever tempted to lift the veil of the future-with the aid of computers or horoscopes or the intestines of sacrificial animals-have a worse record to show in these sciences than in almost any scientific endeavor.

I never quite trust futurists because I think they're kind of telling us what they think our future should be.

Pundits forecast not because they know, but because they are asked.

What men have seen they know; But what shall come hereafter No man before the event can see, Nor what end waits for him.