Predictions for 2020

Every January, I make a set of predictions about what will happen over the course of the new year. At the end of the year, I come back and score them to see how accurate I was. Here are my predictions for 2020.

PERSONAL/ACADEMIC

I will read 15 books this year: 95%
....20 books: 80%
....25 books: 70%
I will read three technical/science/engineering books this year: 80%
...five books: 60%
I will write an average of one blog post per month: 90%
....two blog posts per month: 60%
I will not experience a major political/religious/philosophical conversion: 95%
I will still be using Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr: 80%
I will remain single this year: 70%
I will vote in the 2020 general elections: 95%
I will have my wisdom teeth removed: 60%
I will not be hospitalized this year: 95%
I will compete in the NaNoWriMo Summer Writing Program: 90%
....and succeed: 80%
My French will not improve this year: 80%
I will not begin learning Russian this year: 80%
I will still be attending graduate school: 90%
....on track to graduate in May 2021: 80%
I will end the year GPA 3.5 or above: 70%
I will still be participating in the Less Wrong/SSC community: 95%
I will attend some sort of Solstice event: 70%

SCIENCE/SPACE

No successful human clones announced: 90%
No strong evidence of extra-terrestrial life found: 95%
Both Voyager spacecraft will still be operational: 80%
Hubble Space Telescope will still be operational: 90%
International Space Station will still be operational: 95%
JWST scheduled to launch on or before December 31, 2021: 70%
SpaceX conducts Demonstration Mission 2 successfully: 70%
Boeing conducts the Crew Test Flight successfully: 60%
Astronauts (public or private) launch from American soil to above the Kármán Line: 70%
One Commercial Crew rotation begins this year: 60%
SLS will not launch this year: 60%
Virgin Galactic tourist flights will not begin this year: 60%
Blue Origin begins crewed tests this year: 60%
SpaceX Starship will not fly this year: 60%
Rocket Lab will demonstrate successful stage recovery: 60%
China will have more successful orbital launches than the US this year: 80%
The United States will have more successful orbital launches than Russia: 90%
No crewed flights beyond Low Earth Orbit: 95%
Shenzhou 12 successfully completed: 70%
No deaths in space this year: 90%
No country leaves the ISS Treaty: 90%
Sci-Hub will remain easily accessible from the United States: 90%

POLITICS/WORLD

Donald Trump will still be President of the United States: 95%
Mike Pence will still be Vice-President of the United States: 95%
At least one US government shutdown will occur this year: 60%
Donald Trump wins the Republican Party nomination: 95%
Joe Biden wins the Democratic Party nomination: 70%
The Democratic Party nominee will win the Presidency: 60%
Democrats will maintain control the House: 70%
Republicans will maintain control of the Senate: 70%
United States will not go to war with a nuclear power: 95%
United States will not enter a major new war (>100 US casualties): 80%
Boris Johnson will still be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom: 90%
Justin Trudeau will still be Prime Minister of Canada: 95%
Vladimir Putin will still be President of Russia: 95%
UK will leave the European Union: 80%
No additional counties will opt to leave the European Union: 95%
North Korean government will not be overthrown or displaced: 95%
North Korean government will not begin major liberal reforms: 95%
Bitcoin will end the year valued $500 or above: 90%
....$1000 or above: 80%
....$5000 or above: 60%
Fewer than 200 cases of wild polio this year: 70%
Fewer than 350 case of vaccine-derived polio this year: 60%

META

I will remember to score these predictions: 95%
I will still be overconfident in these predictions: 70%

This year I am making sixty-eight (68) predictions, because I wanted an even number in each category and didn't want to cut any. I am less confident that I'll be over-confident this year, because I performed comparatively well in 2019, but we won't know for another twelve months whether I am or not.

2019 Prediction Results

For the last three years, I've made predictions about how the coming year would go. In 2019, I made sixty (60) predictions, and now it's time to see how well I did.

Predictions left unmarked, while those struck through were incorrect. I am not throwing any out this year, which would be marked in italics. There are a few borderline cases, such as Boeing's Orbital Flight Test, which did not dock at the International Space Station due to a software problem, but otherwise appears to have been a successful spacecraft demonstration. I am also counting my time playing around with Python as learning a new programming language, because I had basically forgotten everything I learned about it from the last time I used it.

PERSONAL/PROFESSIONAL

I will read 15 books this year: 95%
....20 books: 80%
....30 books: 60%
I will read three technical/science/engineering books this year: 80%
....five books: 60%
I will write an average of one blog post per month: 90%
...two blog posts per month: 70%
I will still be using Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr: 80%
I will remain single this year: 60%
I will have my wisdom teeth removed: 60%
I will not be hospitalized this year: 95%
I will compete in NaNoWriMo: 80%
...and succeed: 70%
My French will improve this year: 60%
I will not begin learning Russian this year: 70%
I will begin learning a new programming language this year: 70%
I will either find an engineering job or enroll in grad school: 90%
I will still be participating in the Less Wrong/SSC community: 90%
I will attend some sort of Solstice event: 70%

SCIENCE/SPACE

No successful human clones announced: 80%
KIC 8462852 will not be satisfactorily explained: 80%
No strong evidence of extra-terrestrial life found: 95%
The Mars InSight lander will still be operational: 90%
Both Voyager spacecraft will still be operational: 80%
Hubble Space Telescope will still be operational: 90%
JWST scheduled to launch on or before December 31, 2021: 70%
SpaceX conducts Demonstration Mission 1 successfully: 90%
SpaceX conducts Demonstration Mission 2 successfully: 70%
Boeing conducts the Orbital Test Flight successfully: 90%
Boeing conducts the Crew Test Flight successfully: 70%
Falcon Heavy will fly at least once this year: 80%
SLS scheduled to launch on or before December 31, 2020: 70%
Virgin Galactic tourist flights will not begin this year: 60%
Blue Origin begins crewed test flights this year: 70%
No Chinese crewed space flights this year: 80%
No deaths in space this year: 90%
No country leaves the ISS Treaty: 90%
Sci-Hub will remain easily accessible from the United States: 80%

POLITICS/WORLD

Donald Trump will still be President of the United States: 95%
Mike Pence will still be Vice President of the United States: 95%
Donald Trump will still be planning to run for re-election: 90%
At least one new US government shutdown will occur this year: 80%
More than 5 major Democrats (current or former Governor, Senator, or Representative) announce Presidential bids: 90%
....more than 10: 70%
At least one major Republican announces a Presidential primary challenge: 70%
United States will not go to war with a nuclear power: 90%
United States will not enter a major new war (>100 US casualties): 70%
Theresa May will still be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom: 80%
UK will leave the European Union: 90%
No additional countries opt to leave the European Union: 90%
North Korean government will not be overthrown or displaced: 95%
North Korean government will not begin major liberal reforms: 95%
US Nominal GDP will finish ahead of the EU and China: 80%
Bitcoin will end the year valued $500 or above: 80%
....$1000 or above: 60%
Fewer than 25 cases of wild polio contracted this year: 70%
Fewer than 100 cases of vaccine-derived polio this year: 80%

META

I will remember to score these predictions: 95%
I will still be overconfident in these predictions: 80%
I will be less overconfident than in 2018: 60%

The last two predictions required me to do some analysis before scoring, and serve as my tie-breaker questions. This year, I almost had to invoke them for that purpose.

60% predictions: 5 right and 3 wrong, for a score of 63%
70% predictions: 8 right and 6 wrong, for a score of 57%
80% predictions: 13 right and 3 wrong, for a score of 81%
90% predictions: 13 right and 1 wrong, for a score of 93%
95% predictions: 8 right and 0 wrong, for a score of 100%

Graphed, my results look like this:

This is much better calibration than either 2017 or 2018. Deviation from the orange line indicates the degree of under- or over-confidence. I had some small under-confidence at the very high ends, and some over-confidence at that 70% level, but overall my result hug the perfect calibration curve much more closely than the previous years I've done this exercise. I'm still counting this as over-confident overall, but just barely.

I did about evenly-well in each major category. Personal/Professional and Politics/World were tied at 74% accuracy, while Science/Space was 84% accurate. My overall accuracy was 78% i.e., I got 47 out of 60 questions correct.

Unlike previous years, there aren't any major, obvious failure areas. I still had a degree of launch schedule optimism, which contributed towards the over-confidence at the 70% mark, but not to nearly the same degree as in past years. I also missed both questions about UK politics. Finally, the other categorical error was expected fewer cases of polio this year than actually occurred. This could be a case of anchoring: there were very few cases in the years before I began making calibrated predictions, but polio eradication effort has run into some serious stumbling blocks the last couple of years, with 2019 being particularly bad.

My overall take-away is that my calibration has improved, with the obvious caveat at 70% confidence. Besides adjusting for this, there does not seem to be a major, obvious lesson for my 2020 predictions besides more of the same.

Last Sunday Night (for now)

I think it's time to admit that weekly reviews just aren't very compatible with my academics—a month is long enough to say that it's not a single occasion, but rather the general pattern of the semester.

I've been doing reasonably well (I still haven't gotten very many assignments back) and mostly maintaining my balance, but the process of slowing down long enough to reflect on the past week is a habit I've clearly broken. We're on Fall Break right now, which seems a reasonably enough time to state the matter openly.

Grad school is more reasonable than the demands of being an undergraduate upperclassman, but the fact remains that it isn't easy to maintain a writing habit. I started a couple of Fictober prompts, for instance, and almost instantly abandoned them simply because I had other assignments and such to worry about. Design reports seem to satisfy the itch well enough that I don't have to write—there's ideas still bouncing around in my head, both fiction and non, but fitting it into my schedule is....tricky.

In any case, this concludes a series of weekly reviews stretching almost a year. My conclusions is that they can help clear my mind to some extent, but do not in themselves provide too much in the way of self-organizational value. Talking about my life to friends on a regular basis probably goes further, with the added benefit of feedback or simple external insight. It's possible to get stuck going in circles, which is one of the reasons I'm so glad to have more friendships in my life than I remember having had right now.

Come to think of it, maybe that's why I don't feel so compelled to write about my personal life so often. It's gotten a lot less internal, and about that, I really can't complain.

Busy

Things are starting to pick up academically, to the point that I've had to turn down invitations to social functions (that I actually wanted to go to, rather than as a lame excuse). The career fair is this week, adding to the load, but overall I think I'm managing it quite well.

As a summary, I'm not sure what information is really relevant. All I'm thinking about is my specific assignments—diffuser design in propulsion, the second homework in my space class. And the RASC-AL meeting tomorrow. 

Oh, and I finished the main text of Manned Spacecraft Design Principles today. There are some useful appendices that I intend to read through before calling it finished, but I'm done with the bulk of the material. Expect a review sometime soon-ish.

I don't know when the next serious blog post will be. Could be a week, could be Halloween. We'll see. School is both more important and urgent.

Week Two

This last week went pretty swimmingly from a strictly academic perspective, but we had wallpaper removed in the hall and that was a bit of a disruption. I'm glad that that work is basically over. Dad is doing some touchup around the edges, but as far as I'm concerned he's welcome to it. I spent far too many hours doing that last summer and fall to think about going back to it anytime soon.

I'm still a little sick, but getting better. Allergies are a confounding factor, though those haven't really gotten to bad yet.

This week, my main focus is optimizing my morning and evening routines to make more time in the day to study. So far, the actual homework situation is insignificant compared to undergrad, but a habit for reading and research will serve me will in the coming months. Making more room for that—and for high-quality recreation—is a good thing to focus on.

Labor Day Weekend

I guess I was so worked up about classes starting that I forgot to do a weekly review last Sunday. I kept my streak seven months, I think. I'm not going back into the archives to check for certain.

In any case, the first week of classes went well! I think I'm going to get a lot out of these courses. Thanks to new information I got from my erstwhile- (and to-be) classmates during the School of Engineering orientation, I made a last-minute change to my schedule, but I'm not regretting it so far. The new faculty in the department is teaching an experimental class that may or may not be offered again, whereas the course I switched out of appears to be offered every fall semester. Unless something drastic happens, I'll take it next autumn.

Speaking of, it feels like autumn. I caught a cold from Mom (or at one of the orientations), and about simultaneously the weather got cold and rainy. Coming home from the first day of classes, taking notes at the sun went down at an unreasonably early hour, drinking echinacea tea and blowing my nose occasionally—it was a stark difference from where I was a few weeks ago.

Also, Dad did notice my new glasses, after six days. I'm finally getting used to them myself.

I've got the house mostly to myself this weekend—Mom and Dad made plans that I would love to participate in, but from experience I know that big obligations at the start of the semester are academically unconscionable. Given how much I've gotten done, and yet how much I need to do tomorrow, I stand by this decision. I'll be in much better psychological shape for it.

We're probably having home improvement work done at some point this week, too, so there's that on my plate. How supervision will be my responsibility depends on when the contractor finally finishes the previous project. I'm a little concerned that I haven't heard anything yet, but then again, I wasn't in a hurry to do this at all.

One Week Left

That's right: a week from tomorrow I will be a student once again. I'm kind of excited, but also not, because I've been through enough syllabus weeks before to be blase about it.

This week was pretty busy: I had my car checked over to make sure it was in good condition (it is). I went to the dentist on Thursday, and took myself to the local art museum afterwards. That was really interesting and I'm going to have to go back there—it's a lot more fun when it's self-directed! The last time I was there was a field trip in high school, and before that I was either too young to appreciate the matter or busy trying to keep track of both parents and my grandmother. Visiting by myself was a total change of pace.

On Friday, I picked up my eyeglasses. I didn't tell Dad about this and I'm waiting until he notices. So far, he hasn't said anything. If that doesn't change this week, I'll need to be more obvious somehow—perhaps switching pairs when I leave the room briefly. Admittedly, the frames aren't all that different, but my old pair were kind of skewed on my face, so I thought it was a noticeable shift. But we're all self-involved like that.

This weekend had multiple social outings, so I'm a little over-extroverted right now. This coming week entails multiple orientations in Lawrence, which may have a similar effect, but there's a couple of days before that starts, and it's nothing like Boiler Gold Rush. I expect to be well-rested for the start of my first semester of graduate school.

Late Sunday Update

I almost forgot to write anything this week because I've gotten MATLAB working on my computer again and that removed the major stumbling block for a project I've been working on for...awhile now. So expect that in the coming few weeks. As in, I've been working on that instead of going to bed on time. Given how much trouble my sleep schedule has had this week, I'm counting a productive late night up as an improvement.

Anyway, I finalized my classes this week and didn't get to do that car maintenance I'd hoped for because Mom's car had issues and had to go to the shop instead. Hopefully mine can hold out without any major trouble for the time being. I think it's mostly okay, but I'm going to be commuting a lot this semester.

It's Happening

It's all happening. Or at least, that's what it feels like.

I've reached the point in grad school prep where I've realized I need a checklist. That's when it starts being real, I suspect. In any case, I won't vent about it here.

But on top of all that, the hard drive in our DVR-cum-router has finally bought a plot, which is leading to all sorts of gnashing of teeth among my parents. I got off TV years ago but they're both still disciples of cable. The box is still working fine at providing Internet, which would keep me satisfied if not for the fact that the box lives in my room and so I'm subject to any actions taken upon it. Since it's really not cooperating, we'll probably just have to write off everything that was on the hard drive and get a new one.

I really don't have time to deal with cable crap this week, so I'm very much hoping that the system is as plug-and-play as it claims to be.

On the plus side, I got new glasses ordered this week, so those should be ready before school starts. I'm also managing to get some writing done, which might make the pressure after classes begin a bit lower having already gotten some material up ahead of time.

Enrollment

This week kicked off the process (finally!) for getting enrolled in fall classes. I haven't finalized my schedule so no sneak peeks—not that anyone should really care besides my immediate family—but I should be able to achieve that will in-time for classes.

There's also all the usual documentation and orientation rigmarole which seems designed precisely to thwart its stated purpose—ensuring a straightforward onboarding for new students—and that will probably be continuing until sometime this autumn. That won't really heat up for another few weeks still, though, which gives me a window to take care of some of the other tasks I'd like to take care of before then.

Probably the most significant this week will be trying to order a new pair of glasses. I went to the optometrists a few months ago for a new prescriptions, but couldn't find any frames that I felt happy with. Of course, at that time I was both under a good deal more pressure and also unspeakable cold for the whole experience. Evaluating the possibilities should be significantly easier in more pleasant weather.

In the meantime, my behaviorism experiment continues with mixed results. It remains continuously tempting to stay up far too late, which stands in the way of incentivizing early rising. More practical incentives will be arising soon for reasons implied above, but maintaining a 24-hour sleep cycle would be immaterial were I not trying to interact with those around me.