Recently Expanded to31 Nodes

Futures Methodologies & Global Foresight Research

New Institiutional host with theWorld Federation of United Nations Associations

Trans-Institutional in Organization

The Millennium Project of WFUNA is a global participatory futures research think tank of futurists, scholars, business planners, and policy makers who work for international organizations, governments, corporations, NGOs, and universities.

WFUNA Millennium Project

Enclosed CD contains over 6,000 pages

…invaluable insights into the future for the UN, States, and

civil society.

--- Ban Ki-moon Secretary-General

United Nations

The Millennium Projects Annual Publication

The State of the Future

Types of Futurists

• The Synoptic Generalist

• The General Forecaster

• The Normative Generalist

• The Pop Futurist

• The Multi-Identify Futurist

• The Specialized Futurist

Mainstream Futurists Marginal Futurists

• The Futurized Specialist

• The Closet Futurist

• The Future Futurist

• The Forgotten Futurist

• The Pseudo-Futurist

• The Straw-Man Futurist

Non Futurists

• GLOBAL WARMING• RATES OF CHANGE• TURNING POINTS• CHAOS POINTS• DARK AGES AHEAD• MACRO-SHIFT

WHAT ARE FUTURISTS WRITING ABOUT

Just 25 years ago, there was no…

•Internet, WWW, PCs, or mobile phones

•Euros, WTO, or NATO in Afghanistan

•Talk of globalization, genetically modified food, stem cells, or AIDS pandemic

•WWW Augmented Asymmetric warfare

•… and most believed that a nuclear WW IIIwould have destroyed the world by now

0

100,000,000

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400,000,000

81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04

In mathematics, the point where the value of an otherwise finite and continuous function becomes infinite is called a "singularity, the point where all mathematical modelling breaks down.

?

It is not only Korea, accelerating rates ofchange have impacted most of the planet.

SINGULARITIES

AHEAD

2007

20252050

Wikipedia

The Future will be more …than most people think

Acceleration of change...…changes what we believe is possible

Ubiquitous computing, nano-bio-Info technology, and cognitive science

…accelerates that acceleration

… and the next 15-25 years? • With falling birth rates much of the work force with be older people AND Robots.

• Lines of genetic code written like software code to create new forms of life, some merges with computational intelligence (AI)

• Epigenetics changes one generation to the next, safer than genetic engineering

• More than half the world spends more than half its time in cyberspace being more “real” that 3D reality - cyber space blurring distinctions

• Life extension begins to look like a realistic option

• 3-D printing of human organs, and other things

• Conscious-Technology becomes an HR Focus

Futures Research MethodsIntegral Futures and the Soft Side of Futures Methodologies

Roots of Futures MethodologiesPre History • Ancient Times • Middle Ages Modern Era

Utopians • Mercier • Condorcet • Turgot

Philosophers • Fourier • Comte • Marx

ScienceFiction • H.G. Wells, • Jules Verne

Divination • Shamanism, • Mythology, • Taoism • Oracle Delphi

Pantheism Science & Religion

Visionaries • Arthur Clarke • Bucky Fuller

Positivism

Futuribles • B. de Jouvenel • Dennis Gabor

Futures Research • Club of Rome • Hudson Institute

Meta Industrial Era

Visionaries • Oscar Ichazo • John Lilly • W.I.Thompson • Willis Harman • Mark Markley

Integral Futures • Ken Wilber • R. Slaughter • S. Inayatullah

TransPersonalVisionaries • Descartes • DaVinci • Newton • Pascal

Modern Roots of the Transpersonal• Gurdjieff ’s Fourth Way

• De Chardin’s Noosphere

• Ichazo’s Arica Institute

• Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

• Grof’s Altered States of Consciousness

• Jung’s Collective Unconscious

Types of FuturesMethodologies

Quantitative Qualitative NormativeExploratory

We will draw two broad distinctions

• Typically inspired by analytic empirisist thinking

• Typically inspired by moral, humanistic, & appreciative inquiry. Integral Futures.

Futures Research Methods

• The Futures Wheel

• Scenarios

• Participatory Methods

• Simulation and Games

• Genius Forecasting, Vision, and Intuition

• Normative Forecasting

• The Multiple Perspective Concept

• Causal Layered Analysis

Best Suited to Integral / Soft Side Approaches

An NSF vision of the ideal Engineering Curriculm

• Rustum Roy’s STS programsUniversity of Pennsylvania’s Materials Scientist “Rusty” Roy spear-headed a widely adopted Science Technology and Society program.

• The WPI Plan Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s dramatic shift to it’s now famous WPI Plan for Project Centered Engineering Education

Integral Influences in Engineering Education

The WPI Plan

• MQP Major Qualifying Project

• Real World Experience

• IQP Interactive Qualifying Project in Humanities

• Highly Collabarative & Interdisciplinary

• Student Designed Major

Future Learning & EducationPossibilities by the year 2030

An international Assessment of 19 possibilities as to:

1. What might make the possibility a reality2. What would be the positive effects of each3. What might prevent the possibility4. If it does occur, how might it have negative impacts

Learning & Education Possibilities 20301. National programs for improving collective and individual intelligence

2. Just in time knowledge and learning

3. Individualized education

4. Use of VR simulations

5. Continuous evaluation to prevent instability and/or becoming mentally ill.

6. Improved individual nutrition

7. Genetically increased intelligence

8. Use of global on-line simulations as a primary social science research

9. Use of public communications to reinforce pursuit of knowledge.

10. Portable artificial intelligence

11. Complete mapping of human synapses to discover how learning occurs

12. Means for keeping adult brains healthier for longer

13. Chemistry for brain enhancement

14. Web 17.0

15. Integrated life-long learning systems

16. Programs aimed at eliminating prejudice and hate

17. e- Teaching

18. Smarter than human

19. Artificial microbes enhance intelligence

CYBER Town www.cybertown.com

Virtual Reality-continues to grow

Working in audio space, video space,several kinds of cyberspace and 3

Dimensional Space at the same time

http://www.jvrb.orgwww.jvrb.org

TextTextText

VirtualWorlds

3-D Multi-User Virtual Worlds

• Good News

• Bad News

A Quick Travelogue Through a Variety of

Virtual Worlds--------

These are all 3D Multi-

User Worlds, Not

Illustrations

How to Create Collective Intelligence

• Combine people, software, hardware, and information into a system that learns though feedback and that makes better decisions than the separate elements

• Two examples:• Futures Intelligence Scanning System• Just in Time Collective Intelligence

Press ReleasesNewsletters

JournalsKey Persons

Tracking Conferences

SeminarsKey Word Internet

SearchingMonitor Specific

Websites

SCANNING

WeblogDatabase

Management

Feedback&

New Requirements

Analysis & Synthesis

Individual Staff Management

Decisions

Future Oriented understanding and learning

Futures S&T Intelligence System

Just in Time Collective IntelligenceUSER example

Politician during a Hearing

Collective Intl. System Integrating

live experts and data bases

Live ExpertsOn-Line

Staff

Other sources Knowledge base+mashup

data bases

• Using steam to pump water to water wheels instead of driving the mill directly

• Including buggy whip holders on the first automobiles

• Constraining computer mediated communications to function like regular mail.

• Using multi media to produce interactive Books and Movies or otherwise emulate existing media.

• Comparing Cyberspace to the Interstate Highway System

Examples of Functional Fixedness:

Familiar Metaphors encourage Functional Fixedness

Psychological Fixation Blocks Creativity & VisionMaking it hard to adapt to such rapid change

Functional FixednessA Legacy of Positivist Thinking that is one of the Greatest Barriers to Mastering the Soft Methodologies

Human/Organizational Challenges

• The Hanover Principles

• Focus on Meaning & Purpose

• SOCBED (Self Organizing Community-Based Economic Development

• Convolving Space & Cyberspace

• Lessons for Planning New Cities

1.Insist on rights of humanity and nature to co-exist in a healthy, supportive, diverse and sustainable condition.

2.Recognize interdependence. The elements of human design interact with and depend upon the natural world, with broad and diverse implications at every scale. Expand design considerations to recognizing even distant effects.

3.Respect relationships between spirit and matter. Consider all aspects of human settlement including community, dwelling, industry and trade in terms of existing and evolving connections between spiritual and material consciousness.

4.Accept responsibility for the consequences of design decisionsupon human well-being, the viability of natural systems, and their right to co-exist.

5.Create safe objects of long-term value. Do not burden future generations with requirements for maintenance of vigilant administration of potential danger due to the careless creation of products, processes or standards.

6.Eliminate the concept of waste. Evaluate and optimize the full life-cycle of products and processes, to approach the state of natural systems, in which there is no waste.

7.Rely on natural energy flows. Human designs should, like the living world, derive their creative forces from perpetual solar income. Incorporate the energy efficiently and safely for responsible use.

8.Understand the limitations of design. No human creation lasts forever and design does not solve all problems. Those who create and plan should practice humility in the face of nature. Treat nature as a model and mentor, not and inconvenience to be evaded or controlled.

9.Seek constant improvement by the sharing of knowledge. Encourage direct and open communication between colleagues, patrons, manufacturers and users to link long term sustainable considerations with ethical responsibility, and re-establish the integral relationship between natural processes and human activity.

The Hannover Principles of Sustainable Development by William McDonough

Broaden the bandwidth of communication technology to encourage emergent communication & organization styles

Refocus on Human Meaning & Purpose

Abraham Maslow’s Hierachy of Needs

A Humanistic Guide to Homo Digitalis

A Template for specifying design parameters for new technologies to ensure the emergence of Humanism in the Digital World.

From Survival to Self Actualization

Self ActualizationIs Not An End PointBut a Self Renewing Drive

Group Methodologies

Require Unusual EnvironmentsFor Best Results

• Temporary Autonomous Zones

• Open Space Technology Meetings

• Adventure Theater

• SYNCONS

Cultivating the Network of Minds• Learning Community/

Appreciative Systems

• Storytelling - Indigenous Wisdom

• Transpersonal & Quantum Metaphors

• Multi-Spectral Work Place Environments

• T. Autonomous Zones

Adventure Theater

110 Executives from Sprint experience a 4 day adventure in a remote Sedona, setting.

Participatory Methodologybased on principles of Social Architecture.

Cultivating the Mind of the Network

• Self Org. Community Based Economic Dev.

• Social Network Agents

• Active Packets - Beneficial Viruses

• Convolving Cyber and Physical Spaces

• Serious Games...

Emerging Maps of Ubiquitous Convolved Cyber-Space

A visual taxonomy of different modes of communication and interaction created by designer Nathan Shedroff

FullyConvolved

MetaVerse

Cultivating Emergent Business Models

• Maruyama’s Morpho-Genetic Joint Ventures

• Open Source- Cathedral & the Bazaar, Clue Train Manifesto

• Temporary Autonomous Zones as Incubators

• Positive Sum Serious Games, Increasing Returns

WayFinders Cybercafe & Community Visioning Center

Self Organizing Community Based Economic DevelopmentSOCBED

A Participatory Futures Research Methodology

A learning community action research experiment in Maui, Hawaii. Starring the Ke Ala Hoku children’s Vision for Hawaii’s Future.

“The way forward is paradoxically to look not ahead but to look around” - John Seeley Brown

Beyond New Urbanism - Transforming & Reinventing Korean Cities

Male Female

Korean Population DeclineAt Current Birthrates

Reviving Passion for LifeDecreasing Population MeansIncrease in Vacant SpaceAs the Lights slowly go out in Seoul

“Significant problems cannot be solved at the same level of thinking that created them.”

-Albert Einstein

Leads to Major Shifts in Real Estate Value and Use.

New Ways of Thinking About Cities & CommunitiesLead to New Meaning & Purpose

Cyberspace & Real SpaceCombine in New FormsTo Create A NewOpen SourceEconomy based on

Peopleware

The Meta-Industrial VillageEmerges As Humanities

New Footprint On

Planet Earth

Radically Redefining

Work Family Community

Patterns of Living

“We find ourselves at the end of one era, and not yet at the beginning of a new one.

We are the citizens of closing times, and this makes us pioneers of opening time, bridge builders and architects, the ones who will make it happen. “

Dawn of a New Era

- Jean Houston