What good is scientific rigor when nobody gives a shit?

This note is based on a Twitter thread I wrote while attending a futures studies conference.

My eternal question to academic futures studies: What good is scientific rigor when nobody gives a shit? I’m not asking you to give it up but rather that you put as much effort into having an actual impact.

Futures play too much of a central role in society to leave the public discourse around them to the trend gurus, tech evangelists, and advertising agencies.

At the moment, there seem to be two poles in futures work: on the one end, you have the academic futures studies focused on scientific rigor. On the other end, you have the design-thinking-ish workshop-driven futuring approaches (lots of canvases). Both have little impact for opposing reasons.

I’m interested in the space in between. I want to do deep work routed in theory and proper methods, combining it with participatory and critical approaches while minding the politics from the beginning with the goal of as much impact as possible.

One exemplary expression of that: Can we teach students foresight methods and, simultaneously, prepare them for the backlash and politics they will experience once they try to apply future thinking in their future work contexts?

This text is a seedling, which means it is an unpolished thought or idea that will grow and mature over time. For this purpose, it has been planted in the garden. Let me know your questions and thoughts via email.

No such thing as “future-proof”

That’s it. It’s relatively easy. There’s nothing that can be future-proof. No matter what some marketing material or keynote speaker wants to promise.

We can prepare for different futures. We can work on resilience or anti-fragility, or adaptability. But there is no way to ensure that anything from an organization to a building or a strategy is “future-proof.” The future doesn’t work that way.

Until the future becomes the present, it is open and uncertain. And as long as we can’t be certain about the future, we can’t be sure that our plans will work out until they have to prove themselves in the future present.

Sure, the term is often used when talking about preparing for the future in general. “Future-proofing” refers to keeping devices compatible and buildings adaptable to future use.

But I find using this specific term—which suggests certainty—fascinating, primarily when used in marketing. It’s a strong signal for the human yearning to know what’s ahead and to be prepared. And the more known unknowns we become aware of, the stronger the urge becomes to go for the solution that promises to be future-proof.
And thus, as usual, “future-proof” has nothing to do with the future presents and everything with present futures. The future is not real until it becomes the present. It only exists in our heads as images, hopes, dreams, fears, wishes, anticipations, and expectations.

“Future-proofing” means doing something in the present to keep the anxieties about the future at bay. And that’s completely fine and can be helpful. But we should not fool ourselves by thinking that because something is labeled as “future-proof,” it will be safe in the future.

This text is a seedling, which means it is an unpolished thought or idea that will grow and mature over time. For this purpose, it has been planted in the garden. Let me know your questions and thoughts via email.