FUTR 6132S: FUTURES RESEARCH METHODS II

Summer Residential Intensive Masters Program
Dr. Wendy L. Schultz
Infinite Futures

OTHER MODULES:
intro/overview | creativity | facilitation
scenario identification and analysis | scenario building
visions and visioning
strategic planning and change management
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SCENARIOS are IMAGES OF POSSIBLE ALTERNATIVE FUTURES

• Become aware of what is out there
  
• Create a system for classifying and analyzing them
  
• [see handout]
  
• People's perceptions of futures as positive or negative are completely subjective and relative
  
• What sort of questions would you consistently ask in order usefully to compare different images of the future?
  
  EXAMPLE IMAGES of the FUTURE / SCENARIOS from MOVIES and TELEVISION:
  The cityscape from Metropolis by Fritz Lang
  
• Metropolis filmed in 1926
  
• Originally a silent film
  
• Re-released with a sound track
  
• Fritz Lang was inspired by the skyline of Manhattan
  
• 37,000 people in the cast
  
• $2 million to film in 1926!
  
• An historical image of the future
  
• He was visioning ahead to 1965
  
• Magnificent city based on incredible poverty in use of middle and lower classes as slaves
  
• Typical have/have not story
  
• Hilter and Goebbels loved this film
  
• They wanted Fritz Lang to make movies for the Third Reich; he fled to Hollywood
  
• To him this city was a wonderful image of the future
  
• The workers live below the ground
  
• Has a robot that incites the workers to revolt
  Strange Days
  
• Murder mystery with political overtones
  
• Plot twist revolves around a new technology
  
• A recording device that allows memories to be recorded by one person and played back by another with all sensory perception
  
• It is addictive
  
• Set at the turn of the new Millennium
  
• Riots
  
• The one technology change creates a whole set of new issues for society to deal with
  
• Gives rise to a lot of social changes
  
• Politics
  
• Crime
  
• Art
  
• Could people edit their memories
  
• Basically, an implied image of the future
  
• Provocative
  
• Not very explicit
  
• Cf. Brainstorm
  GATTACA:
  
• Genetic engineering
  
• Very detailed
  
• Extrapolates one trend
  
• Very well fleshed out
  
• Exploring this one particular social issue
  
• How easily it would be for society to fall into genetic engineering of all children
  
• Genetic counseling scene
  
• Select the most compatible candidate
  
• Gender
  
• Eyes, hair & skin
  
• "Give your child the best possible start."
  
• "This child is still you, simply the best of you."
  
• Children could sue their parents for wrongful birth for failing to optimize them
  
• Italian scientist plans to do human cloning
  
• There are 400,000 risk factors in the genome
  
• Needs a breakthrough in theoretical mathematics to actually do it
  
• British House of Lords just approved limited embryo cloning
  
• We are on the road to this scenario Deep Impact
  
• She makes up with her father, just before they die
  
• Cf. Armageddon
  Zardoz
  
• Made in the 1960s
  
• Post-apocalyptic future
  
• The Vortex vs. the Outlands
  
• Set in 2293
  
• Viewpoint = Zed's (Sean Connery)
  
• Societal level of analysis
  
• Comparison of the outlands vs. the Vortex
  
• Image of a high tech green future
  
• A transcendent or transformative vision
  
• Zed undoes the Vortex and brings the new technology to all humanity
  
• The horrors of living to the Vortex
  
• Technologies
  
• Antigravity
  
• Antiaging
  
• To what extent is the past included in the image of the future?
  
• A small chunk of humanity has progressed, technologically
  
• The bulk of society has regressed to a nomadic society
  
• Zardoz got its name from "the Wizard of Oz"
  
• Familiar objects in the houses
  
• Spelling was more phonetic
  
• The Vortexes were small bubbles scattered about the planet
  Johnny Mnemonic
  
• William Gibson coined the term "cyberspace"
  
• Corporations opposed by the Lo-Teks
  
• Set in 2021
  
• Johnny is articulating the scenario
  
• Promoting the outclasses (Lo-Teks)
  
• Interest-group focused
  
• Haves (corporate)
  
• Have nots (Lo-Teks)
  
• News broadcast and the advertisements within them
  
• Explains history
  
• Sets the context
  
• Cf. Robo Cop
  
• Familiar technologies
  
• Elevators
  
• Alarm clocks
  
• Taxi cab
  
• Helicopters
  
• Remote control
  
• Technical expertise in Japan (not Mexico)
  
• New technologies
  
• Memory upgrade
  
• TV was telephone as well
  
• Microfilament garrote
  
• Memory input
  
• Body augmentation
  
• We are our tools
  
• Technology is embedded in people
  
• God is embedded in technology
  
• The Internet becomes smart: artificial intelligence
  
• This is a short story from the book, Burning Chrome, by William Gibson
  
• Gibson takes familiar technologies and incorporates them in his transformative futures
  
• Incredible amount of very specific detail
  
• Detail is important
  
• This approach increases our comfort in grappling with the new by providing aspects of the familiar
  
• Acceptability (plausibility)
  
• Focus of those things that have been changed
  
• The chip implant came at the cost of memories of his childhood
  

  Plausibility:
  

• We need to be careful with our clients
  
• When we are playing, we can stretch further
  
• Two kinds of transformation:
  
  • Spiritual
    
  • Technological
    
• Jim Dator is very interested in transformational futures;
  
• he focusses less on plausibility as a mark of quality in a scenario --
  
• You can be as transformative as you want as long as it is internally consistent
  
• What is the purpose of the scenario you are preparing?
  
• Futurists are often:
  
  • Overzealous in predicting what will change in the short term
    
  • Underestimate what will happen in 50 years
    

DISCUSSION OF READINGS
"Afterword" from Earth, by David Brin

• The words to describe inventions are from the language of the inventors
  
• Change the language to convey changes that have occurred in the future
  
• "The door 'irised' open."
  "Escape Routes" from The Language of the Night, by Ursula K. Le Guin
  
• She condemned escapism
  
• This was written in the mid-1970s, at the time of renaissance of science fiction
  
• The author
  
• Our context drives how we think and what we do
  
• K stands for Kroeber, both of whom were anthropologists
  
• They had high academic standards
  
• She is defending science fiction as serious literature
  
• Futurists get accused of the same thing
  
• This is entertaining, but what's the point
  
• Science fiction offers literature the opportunity to face an open universe (p. 207)
  
• Sturgeon's Law
  
  • Critic: "95% of science fiction is shit."
    
  • Sturgeon: "But 95% of everything is shit."
    
• Escapism
  
• She overlooked the value of it
  
• Escapism allows the average person to envision
  
• Escapism encourages a freer mindset
  
• Scenarios help us to articulate our values
  
• Take a big picture view
  
• Suggestions for improving science fiction
  
• Intellectual coherence
  
• Scientific plausibility
  
• Stylistic competence
  
• Different roots
  
• US is fascinated with technology and the frontier spirit
  
• Europe is fascinated with political and social impact
  
• Cf. Artistic corollaries between what science fiction artists drew 20 years before NASA created things
  
• Art can precede technology
  
• Science fiction was a source of creativity
  
• Read the nominees for
  
  • Hugo awards
    
  • Nebula awards
    
  "The Futurist Tells Stories" by Donald N. Michael
  
• Suggests criteria for good scenarios
  

• Brainstorm ideas to help you create a critical framework in order to complete assignment one, which asks you to analyze three different scenarios.
  
• Think about how you want to compare them;
  
• What is important in comparing different images of the future?
  
• Creat a comparative framework that could be used for images of the future in many different media.
  

• Which characters are the primary stakeholders?
  
• What message(s) is the image trying to convey about our present?
  What is the social scale?
  
  • Individual
    
  • Group
    
  • Society
    
• How does the image portray society, as we know it?
  
• Which class takes social precedence in this image?
  
• What pieces would have to fall into place for this to happen?
  
• What key things are required for this image to become a reality?
  
• How widely usable is the scenario?
  
• How similar/different is it from the present?
  
• What aspects intersect?
  
• What is ambiguous?
  
• What is women's position in the image?
  
• Historical links: when is this future taking place?
  
• Are the characters in the image plausible?
  
• What is familiar?
  
• What laws of science are broken?
  
• Is there a connection to the present?
  

• Is it fundamentally hopeful or a warning?
  
• Who wins and won loses?
  
• What values are embodied in the image?
  
• Which do you prefer?
  
• What has been gained vs. what has been lost?
  
• How many clients could the image benefit or impact?
  
• What companies or special interest groups?
  
• Who has the most fun?

• To what extent does image cover changes across all the STEEP categories?
  
• What are the communication and transportation technologies?
  
• What is the mainstream of educational tools?
  
• Is the environment green or safe?
  
• How will the environment be impacted?
  
• Which image is most plausible?
  
• Is there any type of underground activity?
  
• How ethnically diverse is the image?
  

• Where are the images in conflict?
  
• Overall, how detailed is the image?
  
• What is the theme/focus of the image?
  
• What type of transformational change overall (technological or psychological)?
  

• Origin
  
• Where?
  
• Who created it?
  
• Why did they do it (agenda/purpose)?
  
• Who is the intended audience?
  
• When was it created?
  
• Where was it created?
  
• How was it created (what method)?
  
• In what language was it created?
  
• Who paid for it?
  
• Medium: how was it expressed?
  
  • Movie
    
  • Book
    
  • Advertisement
    
  • Screenplay
    
  • Poetry
    
  • Music
    
  • Crossword puzzles
    
  • Pamphlets
    
  • Theater
    
  • PowerPoint
    
  • List of phrases
    
  • Report
    
  • Mathematics
    
  • Style
    
  • Comedy
    
  • Drama
    

NEXT MODULE:
Ten different examples of scenario building techniques;
give a five minute presentation on them
(also can be used for one of your scenarios; they are examples of different methods):


• Global Business Network on education
  
• Wired scenario re plague
  
• Health futures in England
  
• Hawaii Office of State Planning
  
• SRI corporate planning
  
• Hanapepe Community Study
  
• Demos scenario building
  
• Seven Tomorrows by Hawkins
  
• Beyond the Limits
  
From quantitative, through structured to artistic/inspirational