Robert Hickson • Jul 15, 2017 •
A few weeks ago I gave a conference talk about using stories to look at the future. I focused on the need to pay more attention to creating stronger story lines and characters. That’s because it is more important to stimulate the audience to explore a range of possible futures than to try and predict what you think may happen. Read More
Robert Hickson • May 21, 2017 •
Futurists, on the whole, tend to be optimistic. On the other hand, Frank Bures wondered last year why many people (at least in the “West”) tend to gravitate to dystopian futures in novels and films. Is this a challenge for futurists? Bures’ thoughts have now been turned into a short video: The “good” times are here … Read More
Robert Hickson • Apr 21, 2017 •
A small German-based company, Lilium, has announced that they have successfully tested an electric “flying car”. A ducted fan mini-plane really. Others are also looking at developing small air-borne taxis. But Lilium is the first to have a working prototype. Initially piloted, but Lilium hopes it can become autonomous and able to be summoned using a smart … Read More
John Pickering • Feb 03, 2017 •
Big data and big science are buzz phrases in health research at the moment. It is not at all apparent what the exact definition of these are or should be and whether they will be short lived in our lexicon, but I think it reasonable to assume that where there is buzz there is honey. Big Data I think of … Read More
Robert Hickson • Jan 25, 2017 •
If you look beyond the current concerns of rising populist authoritarianism there is a greater threat. It’s what Nik Gowing and Chris Langdon in the UK have called the failure to “think the unthinkable”. Based on interviews with a range of Chief Executives and other senior people in the public and private sector they highlight that current institutional … Read More
Robert Hickson • Nov 13, 2016 •
SingularityU’s summit happens in Christchurch this coming week. It’s purpose is to see how to “… thrive in an exponentially changing world” I’m not a fan of SingularityU. They seem overly enamoured with exponential change, rather than taking a more considered approach to looking towards the future. However, as an event to highlight emerging technological trends it is … Read More
Robert Hickson • Oct 12, 2016 •
A US meat company is now an investor in vegan burgers, and selling them alongside meat patties. That’s just one of the signals pointing to big changes in food production systems in affluent nations. Lab-grown meat gets the headlines, but burgers made from plant proteins are well ahead of that, and likely to have a much lower yuck … Read More
Guest Work • Jul 11, 2016 •
By Paul Levy, University of Brighton The race is on to bring a jetpack to market. New Zealand-based Martin Aircraft has a jetpack which is due to go on sale this year and US-based JetPack Aviation is working on a more streamlined offering. So aviation junkies with the cash to spare will soon be able to get … Read More
Robert Hickson • Jun 26, 2016 •
In my previous post I noted that the last 90 years saw a tremendous amount of change. Are the next 90 going to be as, or more, turbulent? Or as “golden”? Given that no one in 1926 could predict what the world in 2016 would be like, what’s the point now of looking ahead? One reason is … Read More
Robert Hickson • May 21, 2016 •
Here’s a really absurd mis-reading of biology from a Professor of History in a Huffington Post interview: The whole of biology since Darwin can be summarized in three words: “Organisms are algorithms.” I wasn’t aware that we were living in the Matrix. This is the type of talk you most commonly hear from Silicon Valley folk talking or writing about technological progress and what … Read More