Twigger's rule for predicting the future

Twigger's rule is simple: That which can be conceived need not be believed, but that which is made will not fade.

In other words: engineering is the real driver of techno-change not dumbass science fiction. Oh, don't get me wrong, I love sci-fi too, but it just isn't how the real world works. What happens is the tinkerers make something that has 'distinct possibilities'. They play with it, stretch it, make it cheaper. And bingo, now and again they make it do something that was 'predicted' by science fiction. There is a great episode of the Big Bang Theory in which Leonard's bullying old classmate says he needs a tech guy to make his invention come true. The 'invention' is just some sci-fi magic nonsense. And the brainboxes just say "pretty sure that can't be done". That in a nutshell is what conceiving is about. Driverless cars, AI in its more ambitious forms, quantum computing (come on!), Nuclear fusion and probably thorium fission- they are all driven by what 'should be possible' rather than engineers tinkering and making. A subset of this rule is that real advances are not trumpeted years before hand. They just get done. No one heard a darn thing about the internet and no one invested a penny till POW it was up and running. When you hear a lot about something it is usually a fanfare to get funding. So ask yourself- is this thing something a scientist conceives- ie. thinks up in theory or is it something that has been physically built and now does things. Incline towards the physical.