Did Black Mirror: Crocodile come true?
Partly. Black Mirror: Crocodile (2017) has a P(n) of 64% on Nearfi's P(n) Board, our estimate of the chance its future arrives within 20 years. Of its 4 tracked predictions, 3 have arrived and 0 are arriving. Its central premise, 'A device can reconstruct the images in a person's visual memory and play them on a screen', is expected within 50 years. The next prediction is estimated to arrive around 2075.
The Recaller, a device that plays a person's visual memories on a screen, has no credible near-term path. The world around it is already here: insurers mining personal data, driverless vehicles on public streets, and investigators who know recall bends under suggestion.
Read the review · 6.6/10 →
How this P(n) was calculated
P(n) is the chance that this work's future arrives within 20 years, by 2046. For each prediction we turn our estimate into a probability: arrived is 100%, diverged is 0%, and otherwise the low end of our 80% range counts as a 10% chance, the median year 50% and the high end 90%. Each prediction is weighted 1–5 by how pivotal it is to the story, and P(n) is the weighted average. P50 does the same by 2076. P(n), explained.
| Claim | Prediction · why this weight | Weight | Status · estimate | By 2046 | By 2076 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CROC-1 | A device can reconstruct the images in a person's visual memory and play them on a screen. Core premise: the Recaller is the engine of the plot, and every murder is exposed by it. |
5 | NEAR 2075 (2055–2110) | 7% | 51% |
| CROC-2 | Insurers investigating a claim draw on witnesses' and claimants' personal data, and people routinely let them. Supporting: it explains why Shazia is at the door and why witnesses open up, but the plot would survive a police detective instead. |
3 | ARRIVED arrived 2016 | 100% | 100% |
| CROC-3 | Driverless vehicles operate on public roads, carrying goods or passengers, and sometimes hit pedestrians. Texture: the pizza truck's collision gives Mia a witness-in-waiting, but it is a coincidence the plot could have swapped for another. |
2 | ARRIVED arrived 2023 | 100% | 100% |
| CROC-4 | Investigators use smells, sounds and prompts from the scene to strengthen a witness's recall, and know that suggestion can change what the witness remembers. Supporting: the episode's best idea, that replayed memory is unreliable, drives its scenes of witnesses, but the plot turns on the Recaller itself. |
3 | ARRIVED arrived 1984 | 100% | 100% |
| P(n) = P20 = Σ(weight × chance by 2046) ÷ Σ weight = 8.3 ÷ 13 = 64% | |||||
| P50 = 10.6 ÷ 13 = 81% | |||||
Already here today (arrived 1, arriving ½, weighted): 62%.
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CROC-1
A device can reconstruct the images in a person's visual memory and play them on a screen.
Weight 5/5 · Core premise: the Recaller is the engine of the plot, and every murder is exposed by it.
Researchers can reconstruct what someone is looking at, crudely, from fMRI scans, and decode the gist of imagined speech. Both need a scanner, hours of training on that individual and a cooperating subject. Nothing reads out a remembered scene, and memories are reconstructions rather than recordings, so any such device would give a best guess. 123
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CROC-2
Insurers investigating a claim draw on witnesses' and claimants' personal data, and people routinely let them.
Weight 3/5 · Supporting: it explains why Shazia is at the door and why witnesses open up, but the plot would survive a police detective instead.
Claims investigators check social media, public records and vehicle telematics for evidence that contradicts a claim. That is far short of reading a mind, and insurers weigh the cost of checking every claim, but the practice of mining personal data to settle a payout is established. 456
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CROC-3
Driverless vehicles operate on public roads, carrying goods or passengers, and sometimes hit pedestrians.
Weight 2/5 · Texture: the pizza truck's collision gives Mia a witness-in-waiting, but it is a coincidence the plot could have swapped for another.
Waymo carries paying passengers with no driver in several US cities. Cruise's robotaxi dragged a pedestrian in San Francisco in October 2023 and lost its California permits. Delivery-specific vehicles are less common; Toyota and Pizza Hut showed a concept in January 2018. 789
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CROC-4
Investigators use smells, sounds and prompts from the scene to strengthen a witness's recall, and know that suggestion can change what the witness remembers.
Weight 3/5 · Supporting: the episode's best idea, that replayed memory is unreliable, drives its scenes of witnesses, but the plot turns on the Recaller itself.
The cognitive interview, developed from 1984, has witnesses mentally reinstate the setting to aid recall. Research on the misinformation effect shows later information can distort memory, and the US National Academies' 2014 review of eyewitness identification recommends practical safeguards. The episode's beer smell, passing song and a changed jacket colour use real principles. 101112
- FOR Semantic reconstruction of continuous language from non-invasive brain recordings. Nature Neuroscience, 2023-05-01. A non-invasive decoder rebuilds the gist of heard or imagined stories from fMRI.
- AGAINST Brain activity decoder can reveal stories in people's minds. University of Texas at Austin, 2023-05-01. Needs fMRI, extensive training per person and the person's willing cooperation; captures meaning, not exact words.
- AGAINST Tech demo takes brain scan, creates a picture of what you're looking at. The Register, 2023-03-07. Viewed images rebuilt from fMRI; it needs a scanner and about an hour of lying still.
- FOR Insurance fraud and social media. Milliman, 2016-07-20. Claims investigators search social media for evidence against claimants; posts count as public unless restricted.
- FOR 5 ways to fight insurance fraud with social media. Digital Insurance. Describes investigators combining social media, public records and telematics to test claims.
- AGAINST Insurance fraud and social media. Milliman, 2016-07-20. Warns that checking every claim this way is costly and could slow payments, so it is used selectively.
- FOR Waymo co-CEO Outlines Path to 1 Million Weekly Trips in 2026. Claims Journal (Bloomberg), 2026-02-12. About 400,000 fully driverless, fare-charging rides a week in six US cities.
- AGAINST CPUC pulls Cruise robotaxi permit after DMV suspension. TechCrunch, 2023-10-24. California suspended Cruise's driverless permits after a pedestrian was dragged.
- CONTEXT Crocodile (Black Mirror). Wikipedia. Records Toyota's e-Palette and Pizza Hut's delivery concept in January 2018 and the show's reply.
- FOR Cognitive interview. Wikipedia. Developed by Geiselman and Fisher in 1984; uses mental reinstatement of context to improve recall.
- AGAINST Misinformation effect. Wikipedia. Later information can make recall of an event less accurate; leading questions are one cause.
- CONTEXT Identifying the Culprit: Assessing Eyewitness Identification. National Academies Press, 2014-10-02. Review of eyewitness research with recommendations for police and courts.
Ledger updated 7 Nov 2026. All works on the P(n) Board · Method