Imagination

There is indirect evidence to support this idea. For instance, individuals tend to act in a way that is consistent with or constrained by how they have imagined themselves in those situations (Johnson and Sherman, 1990), implying that some record of that simulation influences later behavior. There is typically a high correspondence of stated... See more

In recent years, neuroimaging has provided evidence to suggest that imagining the future relies on much of the same neural machinery as remembering the past. One hypothesis that such findings motivate is that memories must be reactivated in order to extract the information needed to “flesh out” detailed simulations. Indeed, if simulations involve... See more

Research has shown a staggering number of health benefits associated with dispositional optimism, from improvements in cardiovascular health, to how quickly wounds heal, to slower disease progression.

I believe that in nearly every instance where science fiction has successfully ‘predicted’ a turn of events, it’s more true to say that it has inspired that turn of events.