02/09/2024
ABOUT OUR NEXT BOOK : FUTURE IN ACTION WILEY PUBLISHER :
We would like to highlight the specific features of this work and its singular value in terms of the evolution of foresight. It is also important to draw some conclusions about the future of foresight and how we can continue to move forward in this context.
This book is unique in that it gives a voice to futures in action and strategy practitioners working in very different contexts. The study of the world’s most dynamic innovation ecosystems[1] has shown the significance of dialogue between companies, regions and universities in the dynamics of innovation. In particular, this book shows that foresight work is becoming essential in this “triple helix” dynamic. The Anthropocene era, marked by the exorbitant power of human beings over the planet’s future, creates dialogue on the unavoidable future, at both the local and global level. This book puts territorial, entrepreneurial and academic foresight into perspective in a context of global transition and civilizational transformation.
One of the key jobs of the future is, and increasingly will be, strategic data analysis. However, this analytical work cannot be carried out without a deep, long-term understanding of what is at stake. That is why it is so important for the study of the future to be taught from the earliest age in primary and secondary schools, and to be taught in higher education, leading to bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees.
The practice of studying the future, understanding the issues and mastering futures analysis, gives young people the opportunity to give meaning to their lives. In the same way that the Renaissance invented perspective in the two-dimensional representation of space, the 21st century, through the dissemination of the study of the future, enables us, moment by moment, in the present, to construct meaning.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres understood this very well in his speech on April 25, 2024: “We can’t solve 21st century problems with 20th century tools. We need a strengthened and updated United Nations, built around data, innovation, digital solutions, foresight and behavioural science to better reach and support the people of the world”. This book is perfectly in line with the United Nations’ call to rethink our development on new foundations.
Futures Studies, or foresight, was developed after the Second World War, in the context of global reconstruction based on industrial development. This first phase of development corresponded to the planning of the thirty years of the so-called “The Glorious Thirty[MOU1] [cd2] ”, which were marked by a level of global development that was unprecedented in the history of mankind.
From the 1970s onwards, market saturation, the oil crisis and technological disruptions made predictions increasingly difficult. The utopia of a predictable future allowing for controlled planning was becoming increasingly difficult to achieve. Systems theory, systemics, the study of complexity and chaotic processes, all help us to better understand the impossibility of totally defining the future. Interactions of all kinds, and the resulting chaos and butterfly effects in a complex world, make prediction increasingly difficult. As a result, we cannot really predict the future, but we can prepare for different possibilities and broaden our strategic vision. By opening up new strategic possibilities, the study of the future enables us to pave the way through creative ways to avoid confrontational competitions.[MOU3]
More recently, the amplification of major global risks such as nuclear proliferation, global warming, the collapse of biodiversity, the limits of natural resources and the exponential nature of artificial intelligence, have made foresight a necessity in order to avoid bad outcomes when it is still possible. In the Anthropocene era, foresight has gone from nice to have to must have: the study of the future is becoming essential at all levels of scale, from local to global.
The aim of the International Foresight Research Network is to gain a better understanding of global issues, and to create a triangle of reflection between universities, territories and companies. The nature of this foresight network is therefore collaborative and fractal at different levels of scale. This exchange network responds to the UN’s request to work between stakeholders, at the core of the global debates organized by the UN and UNESCO. This new network must also retain an informal aspect, in order to create spaces where everyone can speak freely and develop exploratory knowledge outside work pressures.
In this last part of the conclusion – the conclusion of the conclusion – it is worth opening the debate on the future of the future. The question of the future fundamentally leads to the question of what time is. Time as it was conceived by hunter-gatherers over a million years ago, dominated by various forms of shamanism; time as it was conceived by farmer-breeders from the Neolithic period onwards, through the emergence of the great religions and the great systems of analogical thought; time as it has been measured by science with increasing precision since the Renaissance, with the advent of industrial development; time as quantum physics describes it, with the rise of the society of information creation and communication.
These four ways of imagining time are very different, yet they continue to bring the world’s imagination to life, by mixing, as well as continue to create civilizational conflicts of representation that can be seen everywhere.
Thinking about the future means thinking about the epistemology of knowledge. How is knowledge constructed? How can we distinguish between different narratives and their underlying axiomatic foundations? How can we distinguish between truths on which to base a discourse on the future, and the lies and inconsistencies that falsify the future?
Beyond the nature of time, the study of the future raises an even more fundamental and ontological question: what is truth? The future of the human species raises the question of humanity’s uniqueness, of what it means to be human today and tomorrow.
Humanity will not be able to face up to the major risks it faces without overcoming the nationalist logic and wars that have dominated its history. Today’s challenges can only be faced through inter-civilizational global dialogue and mutual understanding. A third world war against a backdrop of global warming, resource scarcity and nuclear proliferation would only accelerate the end of our species, the end of humanity, like we have already done for many animal species in the past. Pollution knows no borders, and lies even less so!
In-depth understanding of the extraordinary contribution of each culture, rediscovering an understanding of our different histories with their rituals, myths and beliefs, is an element of enrichment and pacification that lives within us all. The 21st century calls for open science, an art of understanding, a spirituality of the other. If humanity is to make sense of this small, extraordinary planet teeming with life in the midst of an infinite mineral desert, it is essential that we all make peace with ourselves and with others, recognizing unity in diversity. Our differences are what make us rich. The extraordinary development of our means of communication and exchange has transformed the planet into a gigantic global brain which, through the connection of eight billion brains, elaborates new knowledge at the speed of light. Today, we produce more knowledge in a single year than we ever did in our previous history. This explosion of knowledge allows us to imagine a more humane future for each and every one of us. How can we spread truth and goodness today in all its glory, during humanity’s incredible adventure towards knowledge and wisdom?
Another obvious aspect of transforming the very nature of our future will be the exponential development of artificial intelligence over the next few years.
By automatically synthesizing all human knowledge at any given moment and making it accessible to any individual according to their ability to understand, artificial intelligence infinitely multiplies the possibilities for developmentally-adapted education. Each of our brains is unique, in ways infinitely more complex than our fingerprints. Enabling each person to develop their brain’s potential in their own way, according to their specific abilities, could lead to a civilization that specifically recognizes each person’s unique genius.
Artificial intelligence not only enables us to model the unique semantics of a work and develop infinite extensions – for example, to continue Mozart’s work based on a semiological understanding of his work – but above all, it enables us to encourage everyone to invent their own semantics potentially knowing everything that has existed before[MOU4] .
Artificial intelligence already offers the possibility of infinitely and systematically exploring new cognitive combinations at unprecedented speed, for example in the exploration of molecular chemical combinations for various treatments, but it also allows each individual to offer an analytical mirror of their cognitive history, enabling them to fully develop it from one moment to the next.
To understand the future is to understand the past, and artificial intelligence, with its extensive capacity to synthesize all the data of the past, will be an extraordinary vector for understanding our present and building desirable future scenarios. Just when it seems that our contradictions, our strife and the adverse effects of our development are showing us the very limits of our conscience and intelligence, artificial intelligence can open up new paths for us at a time when it is cognitively impossible for us to do so.
From our very first foresight studies 40 years ago, for the French Ministry of Research and the Centre de prospective et d’évaluation, for the book 2100 récit du prochain siècle, we were clearly impressed by the fact that, of all the factors driving global transformation, the decisive one was the development of education. Education was reinvented in the context of the industrial era from the Renaissance onwards; education today must be reimagined in the context of a society characterized by the production of knowledge, an information society, a civilization where work will be essentially dominated by the manipulation of knowledge, creation and communication.
We need to think about the future of education beyond the vertical expertise that is necessary, but not sufficient, in order to make each and every one of us global citizens that are capable of inventing and creating a desirable future. It is important to think holistically about our ability to build horizontal interdisciplinary coherence, so as to meet the challenges of the 21st century. In today’s era, when knowledge as a whole, in its more specialized forms, is becoming obsolete faster than it can be disseminated, it is essential for each student to acquire the cross-disciplinary skills that will enable them to interact creatively with others, developing their own individuation, their own genius, their uniqueness, in peaceful recognition of the individuality of others.
Making peace with ourselves, making peace with others, making peace with our past, fully being in the present, bring about a bright future: these are the issues at the core of the transformation of our human consciousness.
The 21st century could be the time of a profound transformation in the very nature of our consciousness: a future for the human species made possible through “collaborative individuation”.
The history of our humanity has been marked by scientists, artists and spiritual wisdoms, through their mutual recognition and the incredible cognitive journey that is the essence of humanity.
Revealing the genius and talents of each individual is the prerequisite for all humanity to flourish in unity and diversity.
[1]. This study led to the publication of the book Écosystèmes innovants (ISTE Edtions 2021).
