How do I deal with making decisions about an unknowable future?

Your job is to put numbers on futures nobody can actually see, and when you look straight at that, the guesswork underneath unnerves you. That unease is honest. You are being asked to be precise about the fundamentally uncertain, and part of you knows the precision is a kind of educated guess. Feeling that is not a flaw; it is clear sight. But consider what your work really is. You are not claiming to know the future. You are studying patterns across many lives and making the best estimate anyone could from them. That is not fraud or false confidence. It is exactly how humans act wisely under uncertainty, in your field and in life. No one gets certainty. The good ones just guess carefully and honestly. When the unease rises, remind yourself of the difference between a reckless guess and a disciplined one. You use real data, sound method, and humility about the error. That is all anyone can do with an unknowable future. Do it well, hold your estimates loosely, and let the impossible demand for certainty go.