Jon writes:
Do you agree that prediction is a key component of the scientific method?
No, not in the way you seem to understand it. I think you misunderstand 'prediction' as it relates to science. As far as science is concerned, a 'prediction' is just any given implication of a scientifically-derived conclusion; it says: 'if conclusion X is true, then y and z should also be true if we examine them'. We are required to test our implications as much as we test their related conclusions.
Neither Straggler nor anyone else here "misunderstands 'prediction' as it relates to science." You claim you described your young man validating his predictions, but what you quote is just you describing additional evidence gathering. The gathering of additional evidence of the same nature as your existing evidence and finding it is consistent is not validation of predictions.
You could have described it differently, e.g.: "Based on what he learns from his interviews of the people in his village he predicts that when he interviews the people from other villages that they will not be able to describe anything before five generations ago."
But I think most here would disagree that that's a true prediction. What you describe is just repeating the same experiment and getting the same or very similar results.
I think the kind of thing Straggler is referring to is making independent predictions, for example things like this:
- "The young man predicts that if he excavates the tribe's latrines that he will find waste matter going back only five generations."
- "The young man predicts that if he examines the tribe's cemetery that he will find graves going back only five generations."
--Percy