Every hard trend or predictable future we find allows us to better filter all the complexity and information in our world, and to stop wasting our limited time and energy exploring unlikely or impossible futures.

Learning involves understanding the past and the present, to orient us toward the future.

Be prepared The purpose of forecasting, and even of prediction, is not just to know the future as an abstract description but rather to prepare for it. The objective is not just to know what will happen but to be ready whatever does happen. Almost none of the plausible futures will actually occur. But when one does, one is happy to have made adequate preparations. That’s success from a futures point of view. The objective is not to be too tight (which is impossible), but rather not to be wrong — not to be surprised. Surprise means inadequate preparation, late response, risk of failure, even chaos or panic. Preparing for the full range of plausible futures is the objective of foresight, reducing the element of surprise. Foresight is not even that unusual in daily life. Most people buy insur- ance against catastrophic loss — such as of life, health, or home. They consider a range of plausible futures, albeit negative ones, and prepare for their occurrence. They are not expected to predict which year their house will burn down or which month they will go to the hospital. They realize that predicting those things is impossible. So they carry insurance the whole time. They don’t get to the end of the year and kick themselves because they didn’t use their medical or auto insurance that year. In fact, they are happy that those bad things did not happen. And they don’t try to guess whether they will need the insurance the next year; they pay up and feel comfortable that they are covered no matter what happens. People in dangerous occupations think this way all the time. It’s their way of staying alive. The police officer on the street or the soldier in combat is continuously thinking about what could go wrong, how they might be surprised, because they know they are in danger when they are surprised

I. "The future" cannot be "predicted" because "the future" does not exist.Futures studies does not--or should not--pretend to predict "the future." It studies ideas about the future--what I usually call "images of the future"--which each individual (and group) has (often holding several conflicting images at one time). These images often serve as the basis for actions in the present. Individual and group images of the futures are often highly volatile, changing according to changing events or perceptions. They oftenchange over one's life. Different groups often have very differing images of the future. Men's images may differ from women's. Western images may differ from nonwestern images, and

Solarpunk tends to be really interested in solutions to climate change and ways that we might reimagine our communities to make us more dignified and happy. It tries to be a re-evaluation of what high technology means.”

I often think a big question right now is what messages will make us act, andwith the speed and urgency required – what, above all will create seriousgovernment and systemic action, but also make us act as individuals, voters,workers, consumers?

“We can still prevent the worst impacts of climate change by acting boldly—the Biden administration has pledged to lower carbon emissions by 50% within ten years. The congressional reconciliation package currently working its way through Congress contains key climate provisions including a clean energy standard that would require utilities to move rapidly toward clean energy. There are also provisions that support resilience and adaptation, and that’s important since a certain amount of climate change is already baked in now. But there is no amount of adaptation that will allow us to contend with the impacts of climate change if we fail to act to reduce carbon emissions dramatically over the next several years.”