Of course ‘the Simpsons’ also predicted the great blackout of Spain. At this point you have stopped having merit

Any relevant event in the history of humanity in recent decades It has previously appeared in ‘The Simpsons’. It is a phrase made, almost a meme that has acquired the category of popular wisdom and that is counted between the oldest collective knowledge samples of the digital era. Of course, Monday’s blackout in Spain and Portugal has become part of the long list of ‘The Simpsons’ predictions: it is neither very tight nor very accurate, but that does not prevent the myth from continuing to fatter.

The blackout in ‘The Simpsons’. A couple of episodes that make supposed reference to the Backman last Monday. In ‘The last day of Springfield’, issued in 1998the city runs out of light, with traffic lights and unusable phones, and the nuclear plant where Homer works. Of course, chaos and anarchy take over the streets, something that did not happen here. Besides, In 2023 it was issued The episode ‘How beautiful is to pipify it’, where Springfield suffers a blackout for a fire in the nuclear plant. Here the consequences are almost apocalyptic, and Lisa tells the story in the distant future, explaining that the city lights candles every year to commemorate the events.

The explanation of the prophecy. Either simple: These two blackouts do not make any reference to Spain or to the date on which it occurred. Simply, they are blackheads that end up leading to the Apocalypse, a trope of science fiction that have exploited recent series such as ‘Blackout’ or ‘The collapse’, or the movie ‘Leave the world behind’, but which we have also seen in very previous films: ‘The domino effect’ is one of the most notorious, but there are also based on real blackouts, such as ‘Blackout in New York’ or ‘Summer of Sam’ of which the American city suffered in 1977.

Why ‘The Simpsons’ always succeed. According to Matt SelmanExecutive producer of the series, it is a mixture of knowing how to use the probabilities, historical knowledge and the study of human trends. The scriptwriters investigate in the past and extrapolate, until they end up. Or in another way more simpsonian, study and satirize “the stupidities of the past” to anticipate their repetition. They are logical extrapolations to which the impressive longevity of the series is added, which only multiply the possibility of coincidences, which is known as “Large numbers law“: The more episodes there is, the more likely the apparently unlikely becomes.

When the phenomenon began. The meme began to popularize in the middle of the first decade of this century. Without a doubt, the first great impact of the series was the alleged prediction of the attacks of the Twin Towers. It was in the episode of 1997 ‘New York City vs. Homer Simpson ‘, where a brochure with number 9 appears and the twin towers forming a 11. It was interpreted as a reference to 11-S, although The explanation is very simple: The two towers together resemble a 11, the chance is that the attacks were on that date, and not to guess ‘The Simpsons’.

Predictions for all tastes. Since then, ‘The Simpsons’ have predicted the future, and the truth is that sometimes the coincidences are stupid. In season 11, for example, the presidency of Donald Trump was mentioned, and in 10, the purchase of Fox by Disney (clear examples that the predictions are possible if an acute satirist observes carefully observes the signs that the current one sends). The complete list is virtually infinite: smartwatchesthe video calls, the performance of Lady Gaga in the Super Bowl, the Higgs Boson formula (amazingly close to the real), the three -eyed fish in the contaminated waters of Springfield, and a highly contagious epidemic that begins in Asia.

We want fictions to explain it to us. We already told it A collation of the ‘Blackout’ series and how your search has become a trend after the real blackout: our thought is structured to look for significant patterns and connections between facts, even when these are the result of chance. These patterns help us explain what we do not understand or the phenomena that are rationally inconceivable or surpass us, and are marked by narratives, series and movies. And that ‘The Simpsons’ anticipate incomprehensible phenomena (such as the 11-S attack or Donald Trump’s triumph) helps us to rationalize them.

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