Earlier quoted context omitted.
> World-building for purposes of entertainment generally has little to do with successful prediction Do you have any evidence that that's true? A decent number of ideas portrayed in science fiction have come true, so clearly successful prediction is going on. Ultimately, economist or author are both using imagination and extrapolation. I don't see any particular reason to expect better results from the economist.
> clearly successful prediction is going on. Throwing out all possible wild ideas, some of which happen to come true, isn't what "prediction" means.
Given the poor prediction reputation of Economists, their attempts probably match your description as well.