[tt] [SALT] Past vs. Future (Ferguson-Schwartz debate)

[Eugen Leitl]

----- Forwarded message from Stewart Brand <sb at gbn.org> -----

From: Stewart Brand <sb at gbn.org>
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:11:24 -0700
To: salt at list.longnow.org
Subject: [SALT] Past vs. Future (Ferguson-Schwartz debate)
Reply-To: services at longnow.org


In what turned out to be a riveting evening, historian Niall Ferguson 
and futurist Peter Schwartz fire-hosed each other with enough ideas, 
frames of reference, ripostes, and eloquences to lead to a clear 
conceptual divergence.  At the same time, the two were discovering, 
live in front of an audience, new ways they might work together on 
future projects.

Ferguson began by pointing out that while we face many futures, there 
is only one past, and its residents outnumber us--- only 6 percent of 
all humans are now alive.  Historians, he said, "commune with the 
dead.  We re-enact their thoughts, in their context and ours."

Historians look for rough regularities, such as he found in his 
analysis of the wars and hatred played out in the 20th Century.  In 
his book, WAR OF THE WORLD, he describes how the combination of 
economic volatility, ethnic conflict, and failing empire always led 
to spirals of lethal violence.  The advance of science and technology 
has not eliminated the possibility of violence but may have made it 
more powerful than ever.  The three causes are still in play.  "Our 
job is to keep them from coinciding again."

Ferguson ended with a critique of Schwartz's book on scenario 
planning, THE ART OF THE LONG VIEW, which he thought showed signs of 
"heuristic bias."  When Schwartz asked Ferguson to expand on that 
idea, Ferguson pointed out there was a whole chapter in the book 
about "The Global Teenager," which seemed spurious.  It merely 
reflected Schwartz's personal experience: "You were a teenager when 
teenagers mattered. "

Historians also have heuristic biases, Ferguson added, such as their 
expectation that "great events should have great causes."  Historians 
have much to learn from complexity theory and evolution, he said. 
His own work with "counter-factual history" helps expose critical 
moments in history and provides a way to "think about what didn't 
happen."  The counter-factual technique is an application of scenario 
thinking to the past.

In Schwartz's opening remarks, he said that his plans to write a book 
titled THE CASE FOR OPTIMISM were derailed by reading Ferguson's WAR 
OF THE WORLD.  He's been grappling with the issues Ferguson raised 
for 18 months.  "You do alternative pasts, I do alternative futures. 
Where historians commune with the dead, futurists have imaginary 
friends."

Schwartz characterized Ferguson's view of history as basically down, 
with an upside possibility, whereas his own view was of history as 
basically up, with always the possibility of getting things wrong. 
For Schwartz, the second half of the 20th Century showed an upside 
momentum, with a fraction of the violent deaths---5% of humans killed 
violently in the first half, 0.2 % in the second half.  The Cold War 
ended quietly.  Women were liberated.  China took off.  Prosperity 
accelerated.  Everything from Wikipedia to cellphones empowered the 
grassroots.

In response, Ferguson noted Schwartz's "faith in technology" and 
proposed it reflected his training as an engineer.  "Aren't you like 
the pre-1914 people who said that war was impossible because of all 
the new technology and commerce?"  Schwartz agreed that the parallel 
is worrying.

Ferguson said, "I think our difference is that I'm a pessimist and 
you're an optimist.  You're Pangloss and I'm Cassandra."  Schwartz 
noted that since his parents were in slave-labor camps in World War 
II, and he was born in a displaced-person camp after the war, "It 
would be churlish not to be an optimist."  Ferguson said, "That would 
make me skeptical about technology.  The world leader in science and 
technology in 1940 was Nazi Germany."

Questions from the audience ended with one asking whether optimism or 
pessimism was a more useful way to think about the future.  Schwartz 
said, "Optimism lets you imagine how you can overcome problems, and 
those possibilities motivate change."  Ferguson said, "You must 
always focus on worst-case scenarios, and history will teach them to 
you."

					--Stewart Brand


-- 


Stewart Brand -- sb at gbn.org
The Long Now Foundation - http://www.longnow.org
Seminars & downloads: http://www.longnow.org/projects/seminars/

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Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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