Of course it can, that's what you use to write your test plan. But I never (ever) rely on those predictions alone. Everyone who has done this long enough knows that if you don't test your code well enough before you push it out, it will fail. Hell, it'll even fail sometimes when you did thoroughly test it.
If you had to push code and wait a year for feedback then how you tested and pushed code would change dramatically.
Now imagine the environment you were pushing code to was
1. Always changing in very small ways that could sometimes have huge affects due to completely random variable changes you had no control over. 2. Every host your ran your software on 'could be' different in ways that are incompatible and you have no way of testing all of them.
Welcome to the problem space of biology.
That reminds me of the first atomic bomb test. We weren't 100% sure that the atmosphere wasn't going to ignite with an atomic bomb, but those that knew the physics knew it was almost impossible.
> "If, after calculation, [Compton] said, it were proved that the chances were more than approximately three in one million that the earth would be vaporized by the atomic explosion, he would not proceed with the project. Calculation proved the figures slightly less -- and the project continued."
https://www.insidescience.org/manhattan-project-legacy/atmos...