Author: John Urry
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745696570
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description
Thinking about the future is essential for almost all organizations and societies. States, corporations, universities, cities, NGOs and individuals believe they cannot miss the future. But what exactly is the future? It remains a mystery – perhaps the greatest mystery, especially because futures are unpredictable and often unknowable, the outcome of many factors, known and unknown. The future is rarely a simple extrapolation from the present. In this important book, John Urry seeks to capture the many efforts that have been made to anticipate, visualize and elaborate the future. This includes examining the methods used to model the future, from those of the RAND Corporation to imagined future worlds in philosophy, literature, art, film, TV and computer games. He shows that futures are often contested and saturated with different interests, especially in relation to future generations. He also shows how analyses of social institutions, practices and lives should be central to examining potential futures, and issues such as who owns the future. The future seems to be characterized by 'wicked problems'. There are multiple 'causes' and 'solutions', long-term lock-ins and complex interdependencies, and different social groups have radically different frames for understanding what is at stake. Urry explores these issues through case-studies of 3D printing and the future of manufacturing, mobilities in the city, and the futures of energy and climate change.

Author: William MacAskill
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541618637
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 423

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Book Description
An Instant New York Times Bestseller “This book will change your sense of how grand the sweep of human history could be, where you fit into it, and how much you could do to change it for the better. It's as simple, and as ambitious, as that.” —Ezra Klein An Oxford philosopher makes the case for “longtermism” — that positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority of our time. The fate of the world is in our hands. Humanity’s written history spans only five thousand years. Our yet-unwritten future could last for millions more — or it could end tomorrow. Astonishing numbers of people could lead lives of great happiness or unimaginable suffering, or never live at all, depending on what we choose to do today. In What We Owe The Future, philosopher William MacAskill argues for longtermism, that idea that positively influencing the distant future is a key moral priority of our time. From this perspective, it’s not enough to reverse climate change or avert the next pandemic. We must ensure that civilization would rebound if it collapsed; counter the end of moral progress; and prepare for a planet where the smartest beings are digital, not human. If we make wise choices today, our grandchildren’s grandchildren will thrive, knowing we did everything we could to give them a world full of justice, hope and beauty.

Author: Tim O'Reilly
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062565729
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 245

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Book Description
WTF? can be an expression of amazement or an expression of dismay. In today’s economy, we have far too much dismay along with our amazement, and technology bears some of the blame. In this combination of memoir, business strategy guide, and call to action, Tim O'Reilly, Silicon Valley’s leading intellectual and the founder of O’Reilly Media, explores the upside and the potential downsides of today's WTF? technologies. What is the future when an increasing number of jobs can be performed by intelligent machines instead of people, or done only by people in partnership with those machines? What happens to our consumer based societies—to workers and to the companies that depend on their purchasing power? Is income inequality and unemployment an inevitable consequence of technological advancement, or are there paths to a better future? What will happen to business when technology-enabled networks and marketplaces are better at deploying talent than traditional companies? How should companies organize themselves to take advantage of these new tools? What’s the future of education when on-demand learning outperforms traditional institutions? How can individuals continue to adapt and retrain? Will the fundamental social safety nets of the developed world survive the transition, and if not, what will replace them? O'Reilly is "the man who can really can make a whole industry happen," according to Eric Schmidt, Executive Chairman of Alphabet (Google.) His genius over the past four decades has been to identify and to help shape our response to emerging technologies with world shaking potential—the World Wide Web, Open Source Software, Web 2.0, Open Government data, the Maker Movement, Big Data, and now AI. O’Reilly shares the techniques he's used at O’Reilly Media to make sense of and predict past innovation waves and applies those same techniques to provide a framework for thinking about how today’s world-spanning platforms and networks, on-demand services, and artificial intelligence are changing the nature of business, education, government, financial markets, and the economy as a whole. He provides tools for understanding how all the parts of modern digital businesses work together to create marketplace advantage and customer value, and why ultimately, they cannot succeed unless their ecosystem succeeds along with them. The core of the book's call to action is an exhortation to businesses to DO MORE with technology rather than just using it to cut costs and enrich their shareholders. Robots are going to take our jobs, they say. O'Reilly replies, “Only if that’s what we ask them to do! Technology is the solution to human problems, and we won’t run out of work till we run out of problems." Entrepreneurs need to set their sights on how they can use big data, sensors, and AI to create amazing human experiences and the economy of the future, making us all richer in the same way the tools of the first industrial revolution did. Yes, technology can eliminate labor and make things cheaper, but at its best, we use it to do things that were previously unimaginable! What is our poverty of imagination? What are the entrepreneurial leaps that will allow us to use the technology of today to build a better future, not just a more efficient one? Whether technology brings the WTF? of wonder or the WTF? of dismay isn't inevitable. It's up to us!

Author: Andrew Maynard
Publisher: Mango Media Inc.
ISBN: 1642502642
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 150

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Book Description
A scientist offers compelling visions and potential pitfalls of the future—in “a journey through time, space, and the human experience” (Dr. Tanya Harrison, coauthor of For All Humankind). Humanity has gained the ability not only to imagine the future, but to design and engineer it. At times entertaining, and at others profound, Future Rising provides an original perspective on our relationship with the future. As a species, we’ve become talented architects of our future—yet we often struggle to come to terms with what this means. As innovation and rapidly shifting norms and expectations drive our world at breakneck speed, we sometimes need to find a still, quiet place to pause and think. Future Rising creates such a place, where we can take advantage of our species’ knowledge of world history and the importance of science to piece together a positive future. To create a good future, we must rediscover the past. Our relationship with the future is inextricably intertwined with where we’ve come from, who we are, and what we aspire to. Future Rising starts at the beginning of all things with the Big Bang and traces a pathway along the emergence of intelligent life, through what makes humans uniquely capable of imagining and creating different futures. In a series of sixty short reflections, Andrew Maynard, a former physicist and nationally recognized expert in technology and society, will take you on a journey into: What “the future” actually is How it molds and guides our lives How we can use the history of the world to change our future “A thoughtful and thought-provoking response to the moment we’re in, chronicling how we got here, where we’re going, and what role we have in that journey.” —Ramona Pringle, Director of Creative Innovation Studio and Associate Professor, Ryerson University

Author: Richard N. Cooper
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262532044
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 300

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Book Description
This book considers how we might think intelligently about the future. Taking different methodological approaches, well-known specialists forecast likely future developments and trends in human life.

Author: Committee for the Study of the Future of Public Health
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309581907
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
"The Nation has lost sight of its public health goals and has allowed the system of public health to fall into 'disarray'," from The Future of Public Health. This startling book contains proposals for ensuring that public health service programs are efficient and effective enough to deal not only with the topics of today, but also with those of tomorrow. In addition, the authors make recommendations for core functions in public health assessment, policy development, and service assurances, and identify the level of government--federal, state, and local--at which these functions would best be handled.

Author: Christiana Figueres
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 052565836X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
A cautionary but optimistic book about the world’s changing climate and the fate of humanity, from Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac—who led negotiations for the United Nations during the historic Paris Agreement of 2015. The authors outline two possible scenarios for our planet. In one, they describe what life on Earth will be like by 2050 if we fail to meet the Paris Agreement’s climate targets. In the other, they lay out what it will be like to live in a regenerative world that has net-zero emissions. They argue for confronting the climate crisis head-on, with determination and optimism. The Future We Choose presents our options and tells us what governments, corporations, and each of us can, and must, do to fend off disaster.

Author: David H. Autor
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262367742
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 189

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Book Description
Why the United States lags behind other industrialized countries in sharing the benefits of innovation with workers and how we can remedy the problem. The United States has too many low-quality, low-wage jobs. Every country has its share, but those in the United States are especially poorly paid and often without benefits. Meanwhile, overall productivity increases steadily and new technology has transformed large parts of the economy, enhancing the skills and paychecks of higher paid knowledge workers. What’s wrong with this picture? Why have so many workers benefited so little from decades of growth? The Work of the Future shows that technology is neither the problem nor the solution. We can build better jobs if we create institutions that leverage technological innovation and also support workers though long cycles of technological transformation. Building on findings from the multiyear MIT Task Force on the Work of the Future, the book argues that we must foster institutional innovations that complement technological change. Skills programs that emphasize work-based and hybrid learning (in person and online), for example, empower workers to become and remain productive in a continuously evolving workplace. Industries fueled by new technology that augments workers can supply good jobs, and federal investment in R&D can help make these industries worker-friendly. We must act to ensure that the labor market of the future offers benefits, opportunity, and a measure of economic security to all.

Author: Brian Solis
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 111845653X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 229

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Book Description
"In today’s rapidly changing digital environment, Darwinism is alive and well. What’s the Future of Business doesn't just explore trends and theories; it introduces a dynamic, actionable path to transformation." —Evan Greene, CMO, The Recording Academy, Producers of the GRAMMY Awards Rethink your business model to incorporate the power of "user" experiences What’s the Future of Business? will galvanize a new movement that aligns the tenets of user experience with the vision of innovative leadership to improve business performance, engagement, and relationships for a new generation of consumerism. It provides an overview of real-world experiences versus "user" experiences in relation to products, services, mobile, social media, and commerce, among others. This book explains why experience is everything and how the future of business will come down to shared experiences. Aligns the tenets of user experience with the concepts of innovative leadership to improve business performance and engagement and to motivate readers to rethink business models and customer and employee relationships Motivates readers to rethink business models, products and services, marketing, and customer and employee relationships with desired experiences in mind Brian Solis is globally recognized as one of the most prominent thought leaders and published authors in new media, and is the author of Engage! and The End of Business as Usual! Discover how user experience design affects your business, and how you can harness its power for meaningful revenue growth

Author: Eric Holthaus
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062883186
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 226

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Book Description
The first hopeful book about climate change, The Future Earth shows readers how to reverse the short- and long-term effects of climate change over the next three decades. The basics of climate science are easy. We know it is entirely human-caused. Which means its solutions will be similarly human-led. In The Future Earth, leading climate change advocate and weather-related journalist Eric Holthaus (“the Rebel Nerd of Meteorology”—Rolling Stone) offers a radical vision of our future, specifically how to reverse the short- and long-term effects of climate change over the next three decades. Anchored by world-class reporting, interviews with futurists, climatologists, biologists, economists, and climate change activists, it shows what the world could look like if we implemented radical solutions on the scale of the crises we face. What could happen if we reduced carbon emissions by 50 percent in the next decade? What could living in a city look like in 2030? How could the world operate in 2040, if the proposed Green New Deal created a 100 percent net carbon-free economy in the United States? This is the book for anyone who feels overwhelmed by the current state of our environment. Hopeful and prophetic, The Future Earth invites us to imagine how we can reverse the effects of climate change in our own lifetime and encourages us to enter a deeper relationship with the earth as conscientious stewards and to re-affirm our commitment to one another in our shared humanity.