Prediction is powerful.

For as long as people have been thinking about the future,

we've also been trying to predict it.

And in some areas, we've gotten pretty good.

Think like meteorology and climate modeling.

But scientifically speaking, we're still pretty far from the stuff of crystal balls and oracles.

There's lots of things people have no reliable way to forecast,

despite what your horoscope may suggest?

Absolutely, but what if artificial intelligence could get us closer to that fantasy

supernatural realm of divination than ever before.

What if, for instance, an AI model could accurately forecast a person's death?

Wait, what?

Yeah, it, uh, it sounds really scary, right?

Uh, yeah.

And it might be, but probably not for the reasons you expect.

I'm Lauren Leffer, Tech Reporting Fellow at Scientific American.

And I'm Tillyke Bowes, Senior Multimedia Editor. And I'm Tylika Bose, senior multimedia editor.

And you're listening to Scientific American Science Quickly Podcast.

So, Tylka, death. We're all going to do it one day, but if you could know when you were going to die, would you want to?

No, no, no, I wouldn't even let me finish the question. No, no, I don't want to know.

Yeah, me either. It seems like a super obvious case of TMI. Yeah, for sure.

But the inherently unsettling nature of an AI calculator that spits out death predictions

...