I thought a "prediction" was something about the future. But Darwin, if I understand correctly, classified the plant as carnivorous. As it is the title makes you think the plant turned carnivorous since Darwin made his prediction; and make you think Darwin said "This plant will soon become carnivore". But what happened is that his statement has been confirmed, not that the plant changed.

From the second paragraph in the article:

>In 1875, Charles Darwin posited that some species from the genus Saxifraga—a group of flowering plants typically found in alpine environments—may be carnivorous because of their sticky glandular hairs, which can trap insects. However, there has been a lack of conclusive evidence to support this hypothesis.

Can you clarify how you got "But Darwin, if I understand correctly, classified the plant as carnivorous" out of that? Because it sounds like Darwin observed that there existed this feature on the plants that appeared adapted to carnivorous behavior, but didn't actually observe it in action (and of course he didn't have isotopic tracking to provide hard proof of molecular absorption either). So it was a hypothesis based on feature observation, and now someone has gotten around to proving that as fact via experiment. Not something radically new in terms of technique sure, could have been proved long ago in principle (this sort of tracking was core to what settled the original DNA/protein genetics debates), but still fun to read about and nice to see more getting learned about the species in our world.

I think prediction is about something you don't know. What happens in the future is that you might come to know.

For example, we predict that there is gold in X location.

As siblings have said, Prediction is not only about the future. For examples, see ML frameworks (sklearn comes to mind) where the inference method after training a classifier is called ‘predict.’

In science, a ‘prediction’ has special status because it can lend credence to a hypothesis if its implications (predictions) are borne out.

If it’s about the future, the precise verb is ‘forecast.’

We have been able to predict properties of elements that had not been isolated yet. Your definition is too narrow.

Darwin probably didn’t know this exact species but only other species of the same family and predicted that there are/were some members of the family that are carnivorous

Prediction is an appropriate word to use when you are stating something you believe to be true about something unknown.

'The sun will rise tomorrow' is a pretty weak prediction, but we don't truly know that the sun will rise tomorrow. However, we can be pretty sure it will based on probability, history, likelihood, from our own past observations. You wouldn't need much convincing to believe the prediction.

'The sun will not rise tomorrow' is a much stronger prediction, because it's a 'wilder' less believable claim with very huge impact. Nobody would believe the statement without proof.

A hypothesis, is a testable statement about a predicted outcome. You could hypothesize something like: 'The Earth's core will stop due to XYZ event, which will stop Earth's rotation. The sun will not rise tomorrow.' Then you go about designing experiments (or you observe and show something that is measurable, like some asteroid on a path close to Earth's) to prove the statement.

From the article: 'Charles Darwin posited that some species from the genus Saxifraga—a group of flowering plants typically found in alpine environments—may be carnivorous because of their sticky glandular hairs, which can trap insects'.

'Posited' is to suggest, assume, or put forward an idea, theory, or fact as a foundational basis for an argument or investigation. 'Posited' isn't quite as strong as the word prediction, it's more like a sensible suggestion for further study. Darwin had observed carnivorous behavior in other plants with sticky hairs, and suggested the behavior may be observed in another plant as well.

He didn't make a strong claim like: 'The genus Saxifraga plants are carnivorous because they have sticky hairs that trap insects.' This sort of claim suggests that plants with sticky hairs always trap insects for nutrients, and frankly, he couldn't know that's true without observing every plant with sticky hairs.

What if there are plants with sticky hairs that use the stickiness as a defensive measure instead?

Should the article have used a different word than 'predicted'? Probably, but it wouldn't attract as many viewers, and 'predicted' sort of lends Darwin deserved credibility.

Seems the prediction was not that the plants would somehow evolve to become carnivorous, but that the humans would later categorize them as carnivorous?

So predicting human activity rather than future evolution.

> I thought a "prediction" was something about the future.

This is not correct. A prediction is about something unknown — maybe because it is in the future, or maybe because of some other reason.

The headline is well written and clear.