Daily Archives: August 2, 2022

In 1900, Smithsonian Institution curator John Elfreth Watkins wrote an article for The Ladies' Home Journal, entitled "What May Happen in the Next Hundred Years," filled with predictions that many of his readers probably scoffed at as ridiculously improbable. Indeed, Watkins was pretty far off about some things. He predicted, for example, that the letters 'C,' 'X' and 'Q' would vanish from the alphabet, streets would be relocated underground, and farms would grow strawberries as large as apples. But what's more impressive is the extent to which Watkins' vision of the future actually has come to pass -- wireless phone networks on which a person in New York could talk to another in China, live TV images being transmitted around the globe, MRI machines, aerial warfare, and high-speed trains traveling between cities at 150 miles per hour. Watkins even predicted the food trucks that have become a fad in cities throughout America [source: Watkins].

Today's futurists -- who aim to forecast trends, inventions and events that will appear in the decades ahead -- would love to be that prescient. But unlike Watkins, who mostly seems to have relied upon his own imagination and wishful thinking, modern forecasters have developed more sophisticated methods for divining what may lie ahead. As Timothy Mack, president of the World Future Society, explains on the organization's Web site, futurists systematically scan the news media and published results of scientific studies, and conduct carefully structured surveys called "Delphi polls" in which they probe the minds of experts in various fields. Many also now create computer simulations and even conduct role-playing games in an effort to foresee what events and trends might result from certain changes, such as worsening environmental problems, the development of new energy sources or changes in the tax system [source: Mack].

Futurists -- whose work often is underwritten by companies and governments trying to prepare for future problems or gain a competitive edge from foresight -- also know that their predictions actually may shape the world ahead. "The main purpose of studying the future is to look at what may happen if present trends continue, decide if this is desirable, and, if not, work to change it," Mack explains [source: Mack].

Here are 10 futurists who've greatly influenced modern society with their predictions of what may lie ahead.

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10 of the Worlds Most Groundbreaking Futurists - HowStuffWorks

What exactly is a Futurist, and How Can I Become One?

by Ben Parsons

You've probably heard me throwing the world "futurist" out there to describe myself fairly frequently in the last few weeks, months, or even years, and might be wondering if I'd possibly lost the plot, or had maybe even traded my teaching textbooks for tarot cards and tea leaves. Well, I'm happy to inform that that's hardly the case. Actually, I think I've always innately been a futurist, despite having only recently realised it, and I believe many of you reading this article are futurists also, perhaps without even knowing it. This article will explain what a futurist is, why I think it's the most important role in a democracy, and how you can become one too, if you aren't one already.

Put simply, a futurist is a person who, using a combination of research, statistics, imagination, and intuition, analyses and makes educated projections and predictions about the future. These projections and predictions can be pretty much about anything: from evolving demographic patterns, to technological trends, to health issues, to trends in education, and to predictions relating to our physical environment. While early futurism began with Sir Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematicain 1967, believe it or not, the concept of modern futurism has its roots with early 20th century science fiction writer H.G. Wells, author of the classic futurist novelsWar of the Worlds and The Time Machine.Futurism as a concept was then propagated and continued by subsequent sci-fi writers well into the 20th century, such as Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Frank Herbert, and others. Midway through the 21st century, futurism branched out into other fields, and became a bone fide occupation, existing in some form in a range of other professions. In fact, most companies probably employ futurists without even knowing, and have them perform some of the most vital roles in the organisation.

In fact, Candy & Schultz (Acceleration Watch) have identified at least twelve different kinds of futurists from a range of fields and disciplines in two major areas.Social Futuristsgenerally tend to predict and project future states for the self, society, and the environment, whereasMethodological Futuristsfocus on the tools of prediction and projection, and how we can claim to make those social projections:

2. Personal futurist:One who uses foresight to solve problems primarily for themselves, within the conventions of society, and whose current behavior is oriented to and influenced by their future expectations and plans.

3. Imaginative futurist:One who habitually develops future visions, scenarios, expectations, and plans in relation to self and others, knowing but sometimes breaking the conventions and norms of society.

4. Agenda-driven futurist:One who creates or works toward top-down developed (received, believed) ideological, religious, or organizationally-preferred agendas (sets of rules, norms) and their related problems, for the future of a group.

5. Consensus-driven futurist:One who helps create or work toward bottom-up developed (facilitated, emergent), group-, communally-, institutionally- or socially-preferred futures.

6. Professional futurist:One who explores change for a paying client or audience, who seeks to describe and advance possible, probable, or preferable future scenarios while avoiding undesirable ones, and who may seek to help their client or audience apply these insights (manage change).

8. Alternative futurist:One who explores and proposes a range of possible or imaginable futures, including those beyond one's personal, organizational, and cultural conventional and consensus views.

9. Predictive futurist:One who forecasts probable futures, events and processes that they expect are likely to occur, in a statistical sense, both as a result of anticipated personal and social choices, and for autonomous processes that appear independent of human choice.

10. Evolutionary developmental (Evo devo) futurist:One who explores evolutionary possibilities and predicts developmental outcomes, and attempts differentiate between evolutionary (chaotic, reversible, unpredictable) and developmental (convergent, irreversible, statistically predictable) processes of universal change.

11. Validating futurist:One who seeks to evaluate, systematize, and validate the completeness (for critical and alternative futures) and accuracy (for predictive and evo devo futures) of methodologies used to consider the future.

12. Epistemological futurist:One who investigates the epistemology (how we know what we know) of the future, and seeks to improve the paradigms of foresight scholarship and practice

More recently, however, I think I've fallen very much into the realms ofimaginative futurist, critical futurist,andpredictive futurist.Recently, I wrote a dissertation for my Master's Degree in English that dealt with all three. To put things simply, I argue that science fiction allows readers to better imagine and understand the complex science of climate change, better imagine and understand the potential, abstract, future consequences of climate change, and hopefully imagine the required social, political, and economic transformation that is most certainly going to be required in humanity is to avert climate catastrophe.I also recently delivered a TEDx Talkon the subject, and plan to deliver more.

In my education career, I think I've apredictive futuristquite a lot recently. As an advocate of STEAM and educational technology, and have spent a lot of time researching, training, teaching, and deploying a range of educational technology I see as being the future of education, such as Minecraft, Computer-Aided Design, and 3D Printing. Hopefully, in the coming years, I can delve more into the other schools of futurism.

What kind of futurist are you?

Nothing can possibly matter more than the future. We are literally setting the foundations today for the world our kids and grandkids will inhabit tomorrow. Humans are fully capable of perceiving and realising the consequences of short-term phenomena: if we drop poison into a river, we almost immediately see dead fish. If an oil tanker sinks, we almost immediately see the consequences for surrounding sea life. But, in terms of climate change, how can we perceive the consequences of present-day actions that occur so far into the future? How do we begin to perceive and imagine the social, political, and economic consequences of something as seemingly abstract as releasing an invisible gas, carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere over decades, or even centuries? Animaginative futuristcan provide compelling visions of those consequences, and through science fiction literature, can compel readers to take action. Morecritical and predictive futuristslike myself can explore these visions, analyse them, and write about them, as I'm doing now. As a meta-prediction, I predict that futurism will be one of the defining skills of the 21st century, one that every organisation will need to not just survive in an automated and changing world, but thrive.

Happy futuring, all!

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What exactly is a Futurist , and How Can I Become One?

Great Wall Futurist

This is an installment in a series of posts looking back on show cars that we feel deserved a little more attention than they got. If you have a suggestion for a Forgotten Concept topic, please shoot us a line or leave a comment below.

First Shown: 2020 Beijing Auto Show

Description: Electric hardtop sedan

Sales Pitch: Futurist explores an all-new design that is both retro and high tech.

More Forgotten Concepts

Great Wall Futurist

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First shown at the 2020 Beijing Auto Show, the Great Wall Futurist in a compact electric sedan which seems unlikely to see production in its present form. The retro-themed concept car was designed by one-time Range Rover design head Phil Simmons and has drawn comparisons to a number of classic Japanese and British sedans, as well as the American Studebaker Lark and the classic BMW 2002.

The Futurist features a pillarless hardtop profile, and rear-hinged suicide second-row doors. The cabin combines classic and contemporary styling elements, with the chrome steering-wheel horn ring a definite nod to vintage design.

Per Great Wall Motors, the Futurist is capable of traveling 700 kilometers (about 435 miles) on a single charge of its lithium-free battery. Talk in 2020 suggested that the concept car could see production as part of either Great Walls Haval or Ora sub brands. For those unfamiliar, Great Wall Motors is one of the largest automakers in China, retailing 1.3 million cars in 2021.

Forgotten Concept: AMC AM Van

Great Wall Futurist

CG Says:

Perhaps more overlooked than forgotten, the Futurist is a refreshingly clean and restrained design from a country known for over-the-top concept cars. I love the look, and am most drawn to the cars improbable combination of sleek and stubby elements. Though the Futurist is not destined for productionat least not so far as anyone has reportedperhaps elements of this eye-catching design will eventually hit the road. Sadly, we are unlikely to see the likes of any such car here in North America.

Forgotten Concept: Ford Ranger II

Great Wall Futurist

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Forgotten Concept: Great Wall Futurist | The Daily Drive | Consumer ...

David Houle| Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Columns here over the past few months have dealt with all the changes to Sarasota and Bradenton and that many of them are causing concern. Concern that paradise is no longer. Much of this change is the perpetuation of the way things have always been done.

Frequent readers of this column know the term I use for this is legacy thinking." Thoughts from the past. Meaning doing today what was done yesterday. Therefore today is never new but just a continuation of yesterday. New visions never get developed as the old ones are perpetuated.

That is why the climate crisis is such a good metaphor for how we should look ahead to the future we want.

The climate crisis, simply put, is something that has never happened since homo sapiens have been alive on Earth. The rate of CO2increase in the atmosphere occurring today has not happened for 50 million years. This means that we have no history or experience with what is going on. This provides the cover for both the people who used to be called deniers and all climate scientists. Neither group had any background for what was ahead.

The deniers, at least up to 2000, could be granted a partial pass as something that has never happened is hard to believe will happen. The scientists underestimated the rapidity of global warming, and the consequences as there has never been something that has happened so quickly.

The deniers couldnt understand something that had never happened, and the scientists were winging it on the speed that it would happen. We now know that global warming is incredibly and dangerously real, life-threatening, incredibly costly and that it is happening much much faster that even the top scientists had predicted.

Simply stated, what has happened to the Gulf Coast the past 100 years will not be what will happen this century. Actually, relative to Sea Level Rise, the amount that has occurred on the Gulf Coast since 1900 will be doubled by 2050.This means that new ideas, visions, plans, investments, initiatives and goals need to be new, for this new future.

The climate crisis was not something that had to be factored into future plans last century but is essential for the decades ahead. Whatever the reasons for denial, resistance, and the lack of initiative to face what is clearly ahead, must be set aside.

Unfortunately, people like to be led rather than think independently. For some reason, hard to fathom, the climate crisis has become a political issue.The climate crisis is about everything. Literally everything. There is not a species or a place that will not be affected. Yet so much of what could be done is not occurring, simply due to politics. At this time in our countrys history that is a disaster!

I have spoken about global warming all around the world for decades, mostly in the U.S. I have written a column for this newspaper for the better part of 10 years. Back in 2015, when I published the first of two books on climate and co-founded a Sarasota-based nonprofit to create crew consciousness, I started to write more columns in this space about climate, clean energy, sea level rise and what might be ahead. I received numerous emails from readers, the vast majority positive.

Yet I knew, and know, that anytime I write about some climate-related topic, I will get some highly negative comments that simply doubt both the reality of crisis and malign me personally. None that set forth any intellectual or scientific arguments. I have received a number of emails from readers stating that the only explanation of my comments was thatI was an ultra-liberal, a socialist, and one man called me a communist.

The point here is that communism and democracy have nothing to do with global warming, yet people still think that it does. We have to stop this politicization of what is simply the biggest challenge facing our species.

If we want Sarasota, Bradenton and the Gulf Coast communities near usto thrive, adapt, and continue to be places where we want to live, we must let go of what is clearly dated and replace with new visions that adapt to the new realities coming our way in the 2020s, 2030s and 2040s.

As I referenced in recent columns, will it not be better to accept that all barrier island beaches may be gone in the 2040s and plan for a redefined economy, than to simply do nothing and then panic, react and move when this becomes a reality?

To think that the next 30 years in Sarasota will be like the last 30 yearsis insanity. Do we want insane thinking to guide us? So far the answer seems to be yes.

Do we want our children, our grandchildren and all those yet unborn to look at us with disgust that we sleepwalked when we could have mobilized to create our paradise in the future? I dont think so.

Sarasota resident David Houle is a globally recognized futurist. He has given speeches on six continents, written 13 books and is futurist in residence at Ringling College of Art andDesign. His websites aredavidhoule.comand the2020sdecade.com. Email him at david@davidhoule.com.

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DAVID HOULE: Desperately seeking new ideas, visions, plans, and goals - Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Pink Sauce: the condiment thats trending for all the wrong reasons. Its a lesson in TikTok hype, hive mind kayfabe, and perhaps most of all, the importance of the FDA. And at the end of the day, its just bad mayonnaise with just enough pink dye to look like Pepto Bismol. Instead of hitting this horrible sauce, we recommend five condiments that are worthy of going viral. Viral in a good way, not the painful stomach bug way.

Key Selling Point: Get in on the next big condiment craze before everyone else does.

Are you familiar with chili crunch? The popular Asian condiment is having a bit of a moment right now, and its about to go big time. You know, the way Sriracha took over the hot sauce world around the early 00s. Its a blend of sesame seeds, chilis, shallots, garlic, and a bunch of other tasty stuff steeped in oil which makes for a bright red sauce thats fiery and flavorful without being too spicy. Its great on noodles, rice, and the best thing you could ever dip takeout gyoza into. This ones recipe was crafted by Chef David Chang, so you can pretty much guarantee that its going to be tasty as hell.

Key Selling Point: Taco-truck tastiness in a charming squeeze bottle.

Its so very difficult to find a bottle of salsa on a store shelf that hits quite as good as one made by your friendly neighborhood abuelita. For those of us who arent within driving distance of a taco truck, theres the Herdez Taqueria Sauce Verde. Like any great green taco sauce, its made from charred poblano and jalapeno peppers and comes in an easy squeeze bottle. Its great on tacos, nachos, and a plate of huevos rancheros, but it would work equally well as a marinade or even salad dressing. Its not as good as homemade, but its pretty darn close.

Key Selling Point: A flavor profile from Washington D.C. ready to make a 50-state sweep.

When salty meets sweet, some of the tastiest matches are made, from chocolate-dipped pretzels to the ever-reliable peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Capital City Mumbo Sauce is sweet, salty, and even packs a good bit of heat, for a condiment thats not just delicious, but damn near universal. While it is primarily a sauce intended for wings, its great as a finishing glaze, marinade, and anything and everything bound for the grill. Its also totally vegan, without an ounce of high fructose corn syrup.

Key Selling Point: An unnecessary, but deliciously innovative way to enjoy your next burger.

Have you ever stared at a burger and thought, I need to make this unhealthy meal downright hedonistic? The Heinz Dip and Crunch Burger Dip is a little extra, but not an altogether terrible idea. While you do need to supply your own burger, this package not only comes with a dip to dunk your sandwich in but a small pile of crushed potato chips. You know, for texture. Its not just a dipping sauce, its an experience. And it may just change the way you eat burgers forever.

Key Selling Point: Why choose between drinks and dessert when you can have both?

Fruit and wine go together like beer and cheese. Separately, they compliment each other, but together, some seriously tasty alchemy happens. These Wine-Infused Dessert Sauces are crafted in small batches, with an ingredients list you can actually read. Wine, fruit, sugar, and little else, so the flavor profiles within these sauces can truly shine. Available in three tantalizing flavors including Blackberry Merlot, Dark Cherry Zinfandel, and Mango Pinot Grigio, which are great one ice cream, yogurt, sourdough toast, or simply eaten with a spoon at 2 am in front of your fridge. No judgment.

This post was created by a non-news editorial team at Recurrent Media, Futurisms owner. Futurism may receive a portion of sales on products linked within this post.

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5 Tasty Condiments That Aren't Pink Sauce - Futurism

Okay, that's pretty grim.Mass Extinction

A new climate modeling studyis offering an ominous glimpse into the future of pretty much every species on the planet, ScienceAlert reports.

Scientists believe life on Earth's has been shaken by several mass extinction events over the last half a billion years or so. These events have most often followed sweeping periods of climate change, which has historically been triggered by a number of natural factors including asteroids and volcanoes.

Over the course of each climate catastrophe, various species of plants and animals have had to adapt to survive or risk disappearing forever.

But according toa new study by Tohoku University climate scientist Kunio Kaiho, which was published in the journal Biogeosciences last month, the human-made climate change we're dealing with today will likely take place over a much smaller period of time than previous extinctionevents leaving species everywhere with far less time to adapt.

The greatest known mass extinction occurred over the course of about 60,000 years. According to Kaiho's worst-case prediction, the Earth could reach a roughly 16-degree Fahrenheit increase in just a few hundred years enough to trigger another event, but substantially less time for evolution to catch up.

Upon examining the severity of each mass extinction event, Kaiho found a linear relationship between the degree of temperature change and the plight of plants and animals. Essentially, the more extreme the planetary heating or cooling, the harder it was for species to survive.

While these changes will take place over several hundred years, humans, plants, and animals are already facing climate change-induced catastrophes.

All the more reason not to leave all of the cleanup to our descendants that is, if humans will still be around by then.

More on extinction: Zoo Saving DNA from Rare Animals in Case They Go Extinct

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Scientists Warn of Devastating Mass Extinction Event Caused by Climate Change - Futurism

A development proposal calling for the replacement of a disused multiplex movie theatre and a nightclub in Vaughan would add some bold new landmarks to the city's burgeoning downtown, a change representative of the inner-905's shift from suburban to a transit-connected extension of the big city.

The plan is part of Menkes Developments'enormous vision for the southern Vaughan Metropolitan Centre, or VMC South area. Block 6 East of the community would occupy an entire city block extending north from Interchange Way, just east of Highway 400.

The site is currently home to a handful of buildings, including a large structure that was formerly home to one of the few locations of AMC Theatres until 2014. The building to the west continues to house nightclub Luxy, a bastion of 905 bro culture

Menkes intends to tear it all down to build a modern residential complex supporting almost 1,950 new homes along with retail and public spaces at ground level.

Designed by Turner Fleischer Architects and Giannone Petricone Associates, the development would add five towers with varied forms and exterior treatments to the fast-growing Vaughan skyline, with heights of 46, 40, 30, 14, and 15 storeys.

Over 4,000 square metres (almost 44,000 square feet) of the complex base would be devoted to retail space, while the towers above are proposed to contain a total of 1,945 residential units.

The buildings are positioned around a central plaza operating as a privately-owned public space measuring over 4,500 square metres. At its south end, the plaza branches off into a pair of pedestrian paths etched between the tower bases.

The plaza's north end aligns with a pedestrian mews being built into the development immediately to the north, part of the area's comprehensive public space master plan.

On its east side, the plaza connects with an over 5,500 square-metre park occupying the northeastern quadrant of the site to form a continuous public space with a generous size of around 10,000 square metres.

It can be a challenge forsuburban master-planned communities on vast swathes of land to feel like a natural progression in a city's organic growth, but the range of design styles and ample public space shown in renderings could make for an interesting addition to both the local skyline and pedestrian-level experience.

In the interim, Menkes has been making good use of the space, which currently hosts a temporary park and festival space known as Assembly Park.

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Futuristic towers to replace nightclub and abandoned movie theatre in Vaughan - blogTO

ModPods International will be delivering a number of houses to the city in partnership with Citizen Housing

A forward-thinking Warwickshire company is working to help solve a stark housing shortage across Coventry and the West Midlands. ModPods International is a leading innovator in the construction of modular homes offering houses that are 'affordable and sustainable in a third of the time when compared with traditional builds.

ModPods manufactures the homes at a 200,000 sq ft site in Stoneleigh and says they can be delivered for same-day occupancy. Each one is fabricated utilising hot and cold rolled steel and can be customised with sustainable, reusable technology in addition to the structure which has thermal properties that make them an environmentally sensible option.

Launched in 2019 by enterprising Coventry pair Pete Farrelly and Steve Smith, ModPods is working with local authorities across the Midlands to help solve the housing crisis. "It all started when Birmingham City Council approached Pete about six years ago and asked him to convert a shipping container into a house," Steve said.

READ MORE: Coventry home maker to create 125 new jobs after investment boost

"That was something we decided we did not want to do, but we offered to go and develop them a modular house. That was delivered about four years ago and it was a great success. We have since gone on to deliver about 100 units to local authorities and housing associations."

ModPods will be delivering a number of homes in Coventry in partnership with Citizen Housing, with 24 properties in the first phase consisting of one-bedroomed bungalows, two-bedroom semi-detached houses and three-bedroom homes. All properties are currently under construction at the site ready for delivery in the coming weeks.

Steve said the company has seen exponential growth in recent times due to the number of homes required to support the 'housing crisis' in the UK. Around 300,000 new homes have to be built to get people off the streets and out of sheltered accommodation, he said.

"I think there are something like 10,000 families currently in sheltered accommodation, which has increased 350 per cent in the last decade, so there is a huge need for what we are doing," said Steve.

Steve and Pete are extremely passionate about training local talent as they both completed apprenticeships at the start of their careers. Both have invested heavily in their 'Training Academy' and currently have seven apprentices which will increase to 14 in the coming months.

ModPods has a strong order book and contracts with local authorities and housing associations and is looking to recruit staff as they expand. Steve said: "Our pipeline is potentially in excess of 250 million and we are investigating building a super-factory within the Coventry area to support that growth.

"We have currently identified a couple of 12-acre sites. This expansion would create a significant number of local jobs."

Jobs currently available include trainee and apprentice positions as well as skilled electricians, plumbers, boarders, bricklayers and carpenters. Applications can be sent to: info@modpodsinternational.com.

Take a look inside ModPods International below...

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Inside the company creating hundreds of futuristic homes in Coventry and West Midlands - Coventry Live