<em>Would a prediction be accurate if the person about to act becomes aware of the prediction prior to the act itself? </em>
This is a classic problem of the deterministic approach to action. If psychology was perfect, it is likely that this would enable psychologists to predict how a person is going to act in any situation. It would also make psychologists able to predict when this act would take place. However, for such a prediction to be useful, the psychologist would have to keep this information from the subject. Otherwise, the knowledge of the prediction could potentially make the person act in a different way, rendering the prediction obsolete.
<em>Does the fact that a prediction can be known in advance disprove the possibility of predicting accurately or is that fact just one more antecedent condition? </em>
The fact that a prediction can be known in advance does disprove the possibility of predicting accurately. The moment a prediction is made, the prediction alters the state of the components that were necessary to know in order to make a prediction. Therefore, the prediction becomes obsolete as the action might or might not happen in the way that was previously predicted.
He tracked his progress with each virtue in a book.
<u>Explanation:</u>
Remember, the English word foreshadowing refers to a brief detail or scene that shows something that will occur again in the future. Indeed, this was the case in "House Taken Over" by Julio Cortazar.
For example, in the story a foreshadow of a shift in the tone of the story begins when we read about Elvio;
“I went down the corridor as far as the oak door, which was ajar, then turned into the hall toward the kitchen, when <em>I heard something in the library or the dining room. The sound came through muted and indistinct, a chair being knocked over onto the carpet or the muffled buzzing of a conversation...</em>I heard it. ....toward the door. I hurled myself against the door before it was too late and shut it...I ran the great bolt into place, just to be safe.”
Interestingly, from that point on the house became taken over by strange noises. In the end, the siblings been fully frightened left their ancestral home, that is when the true meaning title of the story becomes clearer. Indeed, it became a "House Taken Over".
