“…To be sure, social science work on slowmotion variables in world politics is not as rooted in rigorous science as structural engineering. But it offers grounds for optimism that experts could do something analogous: (a) identify chronic riskamplifiers and attenuators for nuclear proliferation (Bas & Coe, 2016;Bell, 2015;Carless et al, 2021;Cimbala, 2017;Kaplow & Gartzke, 2016;Solingen, 2007Solingen, , 2018, secession (Black, 2004;Levinson, 2017;Siroky & Abbasov, 2021) and interstate border disputes (Carter & Poast, 2016;Goemans & Schultz, 2016;Huth, 1996) viewpoint-variable hypotheses bearing on the connections among ideology, forecasts, and forecasting accuracy. Each set of hypotheses is purely correlational-and rests on the working assumption that the present contains clues to the future that observers with the requisite skills and mindsets are better at spotting.…”