In normal times we go about our lives oblivious to the structures, institutions, processes, and shared values that shape our behaviours. In powerful times like ours, deep structures of love, power, and justice are brought to light. International Futures Forum has been tracking three emergencies: a real emergency (the challenges we face in the world), a conceptual emergency (making sense of the world to take on those challenges), and an existential emergency (how all of this leaves us feeling). It is the existential emergency, the human consequences of living in powerful times, that dominates the scene. Together we need to support individuals, groups, organisations, communities, institutions, human beings in all formations to expand, to develop, and to grow, to rise to the occasion. This booklet proposes 3 steps: Section 1 explores the context of our times and how we can read the landscape more effectively, coming to feel more at home in it. Second 2 focuses on transformative growth, both what we need to develop in ourselves and how we can do so. Section 3 moves to transformative action that will shift our systems and patterns of activity towards our aspirations for the future.

__________ If you live on planet Earth, you're probably scared about the future. Terrorism, complicated international relations, global warming, killer viruses and a raft of other issues make it hard not to be. Watching the news you have to wonder: is it safe to go out there or not? In The Day It Finally Happens, Mike Pearl games out many of the 'could it really happen?' scenarios we've all speculated about, assigning a probability rating, and taking us through how it would unfold. He explores what would likely occur in dozens of possible scenarios - the final failure of antibiotics, the loss of the world's marine life, the abolition of the British monarchy, and even the arrival of aliens - and reports back from the future, providing a clear picture on how the world would look, feel, and even smell in each of these instances. Hilarious, enlightening, and terrifying, this book makes science accessible and is a unique form of existential therapy, offering practical answers to some of our most worrisome questions. Thankfully, the odds of humanity pulling through look pretty good. __________ For fans of such bestsellers as What If?,The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook and The Uninhabitable Earth, as well as Steven Pinker and Malcolm Gladwell, this is a book about future events that we don't really understand and getting to know them in close detail. Entertaining speculation featuring both authoritative research and a bit of mischief: a look at how humanity is likely to weather such happenings as the day nuclear war occurs, the day the global internet goes down, the day we run out of effective antibiotics, and the day immortality is achieved.

'David Christian's approach to understanding history can help all of us learn to prepare for the future' - Bill Gates A user's guide to the future: from the algorithms in DNA to why time is like a cocktail glass, interstellar migrations, transhumanism, the fate of the galaxy, and the last black hole... Every second of our lives - whether we're looking both ways before crossing the street, celebrating the birth of a baby, or moving to a new city - we must cope with an unknowable future by telling stories about what will happen next. Where is the future, the place where we set those stories? Can we trust our future stories? And what sort of futures do they show us? David Christian, historian and bestselling author of Origin Story, is renowned for pioneering the emerging discipline of Big History, which surveys the whole of the past. But with Future Stories, he casts his sharp analytical eye forward, offering an introduction to the strange world of the future, and a guide to what we think we know about it at all scales, from the predictive mechanisms of single-celled organisms and tomato plants to the merging of colossal galaxies billions of years from now. Drawing together science, history and philosophy from a huge range of places and times, Christian explores how we prepare for uncertain futures, including the future of human evolution, artificial intelligence, interstellar travel, and more. By linking the study of the past much more closely to the study of the future, we can begin to imagine what the world will look like in the next hundred years and consider solutions to the biggest challenges facing us all.

OUT NOW: the new book from the bestselling authors and hosts of the wildy popular 'The Skeptics Guide to the Universe' __________ Our predictions of the future are a wild fantasy, inextricably linked to our present hopes and fears, biases and ignorance. Whether they be the outlandish leaps predicted in the 1920s, like multi-purpose utility belts with climate control capabilities and planes the size of luxury cruise ships, or the forecasts of the '60s, which didn't anticipate the sexual revolution or women's liberation, the path to the present is littered with failed predictions and incorrect estimations. The best we can do is try to absorb from futurism's checkered past, perhaps learning to do a little better. In The Skeptics' Guide To The Future, Steven Novella and his co-authors build upon the work of futurists of the past by examining what they got right, what they got wrong, and how they came to those conclusions. By exploring the pitfalls of each era, they give their own speculations about the distant future, transformed by unbelievable technology ranging from genetic manipulation to artificial intelligence and quantum computing. Applying their trademark skepticism, they carefully extrapolate upon each scientific development, leaving no stone unturned as they lay out a vision for the future of tomorrow. __________

Lean Logic is David Fleming's masterpiece, the product of more than thirty years' work and a testament to the creative brilliance of one of Britain's most important intellectuals. A dictionary unlike any other, it leads readers through Fleming's stimulating exploration of fields as diverse as culture, history, science, art, logic, ethics, myth, economics, and anthropology, being made up of four hundred and four engaging essay-entries covering topics such as Boredom, Community, Debt, Growth, Harmless Lunatics, Land, Lean Thinking, Nanotechnology, Play, Religion, Spirit, Trust, and Utopia. The threads running through every entry are Fleming's deft and original analysis of how our present market-based economy is destroying the very foundations-ecological, economic, and cultural- on which it depends, and his core focus: a compelling, grounded vision for a cohesive society that might weather the consequences. A society that provides a satisfying, culturally-rich context for lives well lived, in an economy not reliant on the impossible promise of eternal economic growth. A society worth living in. Worth fighting for. Worth contributing to. The beauty of the dictionary format is that it allows Fleming to draw connections without detracting from his in-depth exploration of each topic. Each entry carries intriguing links to other entries, inviting the enchanted reader to break free of the imposed order of a conventional book, starting where she will and following the links in the order of her choosing. In combination with Fleming's refreshing writing style and good-natured humor, it also creates a book perfectly suited to dipping in and out. The decades Fleming spent honing his life's work are evident in the lightness and mastery with which Lean Logic draws on an incredible wealth of cultural and historical learning-from Whitman to Whitefield, Dickens to Daly, Kropotkin to Kafka, Keats to Kuhn, Oakeshott to Ostrom, Jung to Jensen, Machiavelli to Mumford, Mauss to Mandelbrot, Leopold to Lakatos, Polanyi to Putnam, Nietzsche to Naess, Keynes to Kumar, Scruton to Shiva, Thoreau to Toynbee, Rabelais to Rogers, Shakespeare to Schumacher, Locke to Lovelock, Homer to Homer-Dixon-in demonstrating that many of the principles it commends have a track-record of success long pre-dating our current society. Fleming acknowledges, with honesty, the challenges ahead, but rather than inducing despair, Lean Logic is rare in its ability to inspire optimism in the creativity and intelligence of humans to nurse our ecology back to health; to rediscover the importance of place and play, of reciprocity and resilience, and of community and culture. ------ Recognizing that Lean Logic's sheer size and unusual structure could be daunting, Fleming's long-time collaborator Shaun Chamberlin has also selected and edited one of the potential pathways through the dictionary to create a second, stand-alone volume, Surviving the Future: Culture, Carnival and Capital in the Aftermath of the Market Economy. The content, rare insights, and uniquely enjoyable writing style remain Fleming's, but presented at a more accessible paperback-length and in conventional read-it-front-to-back format.

Neoliberalism isn't working. Austerity is forcing millions into poverty and many more into precarious work, while the left remains trapped in stagnant political practices that offer no respite. Inventing the Future is a bold new manifesto for life after capitalism. Against the confused understanding of our high-tech world by both the right and the left, this book claims that the emancipatory and future-oriented possibilities of our society can be reclaimed. Instead of running from a complex future, Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams demand a postcapitalist economy capable of advancing standards, liberating humanity from work and developing technologies that expand our freedoms. This new edition includes a new chapter where they respond to their various critics.

""Should We Risk It?" is a timely and unique book. Its 'hands-on' approach to diverse risk problem-solving and decision-making methods fills a long-existing void. Using real-world problems, it introduces basic and more advanced methods in a clear, evenhanded, and thought-provoking manner. The more people who read it--both those already active in risk policy and those with a general interest--the better we as a society will be ready to cope with increasingly complex risk decisions. This book will improve both risk-based decisions and the associated public discourse."--William Ruckelshaus, former Administrator of the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency

"This is a splendid book. It should be of interest to a wide range of students and professionals across the environmental and health sciences."--John Harte, University of California, Berkeley; author of "Consider a Spherical Cow"

"Dan Kammen and David Hassenzahl have filled a long-standing need and have done it brilliantly. Their book provides the bridge between the technical tooks of risk analysis and the real world of health and environmental problems. Mastering the contents of this book should be a requirement for anyone--student or policy maker--who wants to understand risk analysis."--J. Clarence "Terry" Davis, Director, Resources for the Future Center for Risk Management

"The authors have done a remarkable job of showing the common structures underlying the variety of risks that we face in our personal and professional lives. Moreover, their approach allows integrating the diverse forms of knowledge needed to address these complex problems. Readers will think differently after reading this book."--Baruch Fischhoff, Professor of Social and Decision Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University

"This book will be very useful as a text in a risk-analysis class. It will also be a valuable reference for practitioners of risk assessment in industry, government, and consulting. . . . The organization of the book is logical and effective."--James K. Hammitt, Harvard University