retrodict

present singular third person retrodicts · participle present retrodicting · participle past retrodicted · past retrodicted

1. To attempt to estimate the previous state from the present.

   Many are impressed by the fact that climate models can "retrodict" climatic change—that is, use past climatic data (say, from the 1860s) to predict climatic data from the less-distant past (say, from the 1920s). They should not be.

   2013, Jamie Whyte, The Wall Street Journal, Jamie Whyte: Science Says So, Suckers!