In the Academy of Sciences (F7) and clicking on the various techs, sometimes you can go forward and reach the future of technologies and ideas in order to have an understanding of what's coming and when, and invest accordingly. You can even go backwards in some of the future techs to see the confluence of two or more previous ones, that otherwise cannot be seen since they weren't available since the beginning.
However, there is a small number of technologies that is not reachable at the moment (late 1850s), so I guess you can only see their branch once you discover or invent the root. For example, "Stormtroopers", I can't seem to reach them even if I try, nor do I know what I have to invent to get there faster.
Last, can anyone tell me in which files are the texts of the various techs stored? (the explanations, not their game effects)