[MHalblaub]

"Therefore, looking-back is a science (e.g., Paleobiology), looking-forward in a distant future an art usually practiced by charlatans (e.g., chiromancers)."

You're quite wrong. Natural sciences like physics, chemistry or biology are predicting the future. Newton's Theory enables us to calculate where the stars will be in thousand years. Chemistry enables us to predict what happened mixing chemicals together. Biology (here evolution theory) enables us to predict a great danger from the bird flu or simpler what blood should be used for a successful blood transfusion.

Science is about predicting the future.
Even statics is a prediction about stability of structures.
si tacuisses.

[King Prout]

Newton's Theory enables us to calculate where the stars will be in thousand years.

really?

[Doctor Stochastic]

Science is about predicting the future.
Even statics is a prediction about stability of structures.

And statistics is a prediction about the stability of randomly generated events.