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Showing The Future

1/7/2014

9 Comments

 
PictureThe mythological princess Cassandra. [1]
Futurists are always mindful of the story about Cassandra. To remind us, Cassandra is the princess in Greek mythology who was both blest with perfect foresight, and cursed by the fact that nobody would believe her visions of the future. We have seen a few Cassandra moments in the past few years. Those alerting us of the inherent instability of a financial system that lent to those who could not afford the repayments were scoffed at. Those who questioned the insane valuations of unproven companies that lacked both earnings and a balance sheet were ridiculed. And those who questioned the wisdom of placing a nuclear reactor by the sea in an area that suffers from tidal waves were seen as uninformed. However, we still experienced the financial crash of 2008, the bursting of the Dot-Com bubble, and a tidal wave inundating the nuclear plant at Fukushima.

Within the world of foresight, there is always a question of how we can get people to pay more attention to our work. In part, we are asking people to give our message more importance than it possibly deserves. There are large numbers of people nowadays who call themselves ‘futurists’, but don’t really bring a vast amount to a conversation. The genius forecasters who pronounce that, “In the future X, Y, and Z will happen!” generally don’t have a great deal of substantive thinking behind their pronouncements, and they are generally vague about exactly when in the future X, Y, and Z will happen. They are easily dealt with by asking them to map out a path by which we get from the present into that future, what forces will shape that future, and exactly when that future will happen. I see this as a lesser obstacle to our cause. Like the pilot fish that congregate around sharks, there will always be fellow travellers who feed off the work of others.

A far greater obstacle to our cause is ourselves. In many cases, the message of foresight isn’t getting across simply because of our inability to convey the message. A cursory review of the majority of foresight output will show two things. First, it is conveyed in a very formal, very serious, very official style. Second, it generally tends to be very poorly written. These two factors combine to make most foresight output very boring to read. It is not surprising that the foresight message is not getting across if it is being used as a cure for insomnia!

This need not be the case. If we make two assumptions, we can achieve much better results. First, let us assume that all futures are works of fiction. I have argued elsewhere that, as the future has yet to happen, an account of the future cannot be factual [2]. It can only convey conjecture, an opinion. Second, the means by which fiction is most effectively conveyed to the reader is at an emotional rather than a rational level. Those who study creative writing – which is what I would argue foresight to consist of – have a technique that they use to describe this. It is called ‘Show, don’t tell’.

The purpose of ‘Show, don’t tell’ is to allow the reader to experience the piece emotionally rather than rationally. The description of events becomes sensory to convey a quality of what is being shown. The writer does this because telling the reader the story leaves little room for the reader to engage with a piece emotionally. It leaves no room for the reader’s imagination to provide a context to the backstory. In a futures context, if we are telling the future, then we are reporting on how we think a future state will evolve. If we are showing the future, we are providing a context which allows the reader to engage with the future at an emotional level. There is a greater degree of involvement to a particular vision of the future by a reader if they have been involved, even at a sub-conscious level, in creating that future vision. It will help to make them want to go out to build that future rather than filing the foresight report, often in the waste-bin.

I often lament how few futures courses give very little consideration to the communication of futures. There are other vehicles, such as video or infographics, but the vast majority of foresight is conveyed by the written word. It is such a shame that budding futurists aren’t taught how to write as a core skill. We seem to be condemned to travel round a loop whereby futurists continue to tell us about the future, which bores the reader, who in turn pays little attention to the work of the futurist.

Perhaps we should give some thought about how to break this loop?


Stephen Aguilar-Millan
© The European Futures Observatory 2014

References:  

[1] Picture credit: http://lfianamind.blogspot.co.uk/2012_05_01_archive.html

[2] http://www.futuretakes.org/SpringSummer2009/vol8no1/lsb1.html#lsb2

9 Comments
Katina Michael link
1/7/2014 06:18:25 pm

I have spent a great deal of my research life pondering on futures/scenarios as a valid tool for looking at what awaits us (technologically) ahead. Readers of this thought-provoking blogpost might be interested to see this work on the topic of microchipping people. Two example papers include: http://works.bepress.com/kmichael/42/ and http://works.bepress.com/kmichael/30/ and a tedx talk featuring 3 scenarios: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnghvVR5Evc I would also highly recommend an article by J Artz titled:, “The role of stories in computer ethics, Computers and Society, pp. 11-13, 1998.

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Stephen Aguilar-Millan
2/7/2014 04:52:51 am

Katina, thanks for sharing these resources, I found them very interesting and useful.

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Chris Evett link
1/7/2014 09:48:41 pm

Hi Stephan, great ideas here, thanks for sharing. I agree with what you're saying on the need to tell a clearer story. One thing I'm also interested in is, how does a forecaster illustrate their assumptions and the range of data they have collected in a manner that is fulfils the criteria you describe? Will 'data story telling' be the core skill for futurists in the future and where do you think creative exercises can be best used in generating imaginative yet quantifiable and accountable forecasts? All the best
Chris Evett

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Stephen Aguilar-Millan
2/7/2014 05:03:56 am

Hi Chris, there are two possibilities. The first is to use a selection of fan charts to highlight the margins of error in forecasting. The sort of thing I have in mind is on Page 2 of this PDF:

http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/inflationreport/2014/ir14mayo.pdf

A good narrative would say that, within the next three years there is as much chance that the UK will go back into recession as there is for GDP growth to exceed that of all other industrialised nations.

If that doesn't quite do the trick, we can migrate to the second technique, one of describing scenarios. This would be along the lines of (a) if the UK goes back into recession, then ABC will result. But if (b) UK GDP grows at a rate faster than other nations in the industrialised world, then XYZ will result.

This rather reinforces my view that, from the perspective of 2014, both ABC and XYZ in 2017 are equally likely and both are equally fictitious. Which one do we buy into? The one that tells the better story!

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Daren Wood
2/7/2014 06:56:08 am

Much in this I can recognise. I work primarily in transport, in a sector dominated by various civil and mechanical engineering disciplines. To often in looking forward, there is a reluctance to look beyond physical objects. I've been at sessions recently where past visions of the future are mocked because they were hopelessly wide of the mark in describing what transport looks like and we lose sight that they actually hada great story about society and changing human needs and behaviours. This is where all the great stories reside, but not always where the audience wants to listen.

Reply
Stephen Aguilar-Millan
3/7/2014 07:59:21 pm

Dear Daren, I find much of the futures agenda consists of finding like minded people. The point about the story of Cassandra is that, although she had perfect foresight, her contemporaries mocked her for her outlandish visions. One of the skills that a professional futurist has to learn is how to have a thick skin. When we are mocked, we take solace in being a bit ahead of our time.

An example of that springs to mind. In 2008, as part of our globalisation of crime project, we presented a paper in Washington that took the view that illegality in Northern Mexico could become a failed state. We were mocked about this at the time by none other than the future President of Mexico. Four years later when he took office, the top of his list of things to do was to resolve the issue of Northern Mexico becoming a failed state.

My take away from this is that futurists tend to have the last laugh. You should remember that when your colleagues mock you.

Reply
Rob Gear
2/7/2014 11:58:24 pm

An excellent and thoughtful post Stephen and echoes my own sentiments having struggled through several substantive scenario reports recently.
I think the idea that scenarios should be emotional narratives is a strong one and I have been experimenting recently with approaches involving video animations and illustrations in a graphic novel style. My experience is that these have been generally well-received particularly where a bit of time has been spent on using narrative techniques to build some emotional connection with the characters involved.
At the same time, I think it's important to acknowledge that there are those who like detailed data and some of the 'drier' supporting insight. I can see no reason that this information cannot be conveyed more engagingly, e.g. via an infographic or app which will also draw in the reader more immersively.

Looking forward to catching up with you soon!

Rob.

Reply
Stephen Aguilar-Millan
3/7/2014 08:03:47 pm

Hi Rob, I freely acknowledge the importance of animation, video, and graphics. They help to move a story along. A good film or a strong image does really move us emotionally. I like the sound of graphic novels as a communication device because they allow us to abstract away from the unnecessary parts of reality (as good fiction does) to focus on the core message. As far as I can see, the only real obstacle is the cost. I believe that it costs far more to produce a graphic novel than it does a written piece. Am I right there, or is there a low cost way of producing good cartoons?

Reply
Richard Yonck link
4/7/2014 12:51:28 am

Thanks for the excellent post, Stephen. I completely agree that if we're to better engage the public with futures work and promote foresight in general, we need to improve our messages and how they're gotten across. The mediums we use to do this can certainly be expanded, but of course some of these may be cost and/or time prohibitive, depending on the project.

Science fiction is often pointed to for its prescience, but of course even the best of these works don't adhere to futures methodologies because they are first and foremost about telling stories.

The power of storytelling is in how it connects the audience to the message, drawing on biological pathways and cultural subtexts that go back to the dawn of humanity. While we have to remain rigorous in our futures groundwork, fiction and storytelling certainly need to be more frequently used tools in our toolkit. Videos, graphic novels, radio plays, etc. are all good potential implementations, but in the end they're all vehicles for the most fundamental medium of storytelling. It's definitely something I want to use more in my own work.

I'm sorry I won't see you at WorldFuture next week, but I hope we'll meet again soon. Have a wonderful summer.

Richard

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