Two-faced
Future visions projected out 200 years into the future can be both uplifting or depressing, depending on ones' perspective. A single vision can prompt different reactions from different people.
The concept of the automobile brought a vision of excitement and new freedom to many people at the beginning of the last century. It also brought relief from horse pollution of our city streets. To others employed in the then horse dependent transportation system, it brought the loss of occupation and livelihood.
Visions 2200
For the most part, the visions on this website are selected for qualities of optimism, variety and opportunity - at least from the point of view of this visionary.
Technology is key to the implementation of these visions. If technological progress falters, especially if no alternative source of cheap energy arises prior to the exhaustion of oil and the other fossil fuels, visions like these will not come to pass.
Other visions represent current trends projected out over 200 years. These latter may indicate a less optimistic future.
To provide some context, underlying beliefs are enumerated which mold the vision creation process and affect the visions ultimately chosen for this website.
As the website evolves, the visions presented will be augmented with new material and revised where needed to improve clarity and integrate new ideas and discoveries.
Visions often do not see the light of day because they (1) fail to meet the ‘reality’ test (as determined by trend analysis or current technology) or (2) transcend the boundaries of the visionary's employer (academic discipline, government jurisdiction or corporate mission).
Two hundred years out, with no boundaries, gives sufficient freedom from 'reality' to encourage the most creative of visionaries.
This long leap forward to the twenty third century has these additional benefits:
- minimizes dependence on current social trends or the state of scientific knowledge,
- limits parochial decisions based on whom would ‘win’ or ‘lose’,
- removes any immediate threat to current technology and persons living today arising from the vision's implementation (An analogy would be the horse dependent blacksmiths, wagon makers, stable owners and hay farmers devastated by the revolution in transportation of the early 20th century) ,
- enables visions to be valued for their own qualities, not their ‘reality’ based on current boundaries, politics, trends, technology or land ownership and development patterns,
- more fully highlights the implications of certain trends evident today,
- eliminates possible obsolescence in the near future if the vision fails to occur due to an overly optimistic time frame (Witness the 1968 movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick).
