Newton the Psychic Parrot is getting tons of props for his World Cup predictions, and I’ve largely ignored most of them since I’ve been in mourning for Rabiot the Psychic Octopus. But, today is the World Cup final — and as such I needed to see what the animals world was up to.
This psychic parrot picked France to win the World Cup ... OR DID IT?!
This makes no sense.
James Dator has been covering a wide range of sports for SB Nation for over a decade, with a special focus on the NFL.
Everyone is giving Newton props and saying his goal predicted a France win on Sunday, but I have inherent problems with the methodology. This assumes that all rules of soccer are out the window and scoring on your own goal is a good thing.
I think there’s inherent parrot bias.
To be fair, so far every time Newton has scored on a team’s goal they’ve won — but doesn’t this just mean he’s the LEAST psychic animal of all time? What if he’s been pulling for the losing team every single time, and his predictions are just wrong all the time?
We have a parrotdox.
So scoring on France’s goal makes France the winner — but they don’t win if they get scored on IRL. So does this mean Croatia is winning? History says no, reality says yes. I think Newton is playing both sides.
Think about it: He’s never wrong in this scenario. If Croatia wins he gets to squawk “Well, I scored on France” and if France wins he gets to bawk “I scored for them.”
Conclusion: Newton the parrot is smarter than all of us.
