Nostradamus predicted that those who have a cat at home will…

never made such a specific prediction.

Nostradamus and the Problem of Retrospective Predictions

One of the biggest challenges with Nostradamus is that many supposed predictions are identified after something happens.

This is called retrospective interpretation.

Imagine that a verse contains references that could be interpreted in several different ways.

Before an event happens, nobody knows which interpretation will supposedly fit.

After the event, however, people can select the details that seem to match and ignore the ones that don’t.

That can make an old passage appear remarkably accurate.

Did Nostradamus