Predictive power

This article is about predictive power in the context of philosophy of science. For a statistical measure of predictive power, see Mean squared prediction error.
The New York Times of November 10, 1919, reported on Einstein's confirmed prediction of gravitation on space, called the gravitational lens effect.

The concept of predictive power, the power of a scientific theory to generate testable predictions, differs from explanatory power and descriptive power (where phenomena that are already known are retrospectively explained or described by a given theory) in that it allows a prospective test of theoretical understanding.