{Radio} Science Fiction is innovation’s inspiration
There’s an ongoing debate among Futurists of whether science fiction is a useful foresight tool or not.
Some fellow futurist argue that today’s’ populist science fiction is all doom gloom, dystopian, blowing up the world and technology running amok, others, including me, see it as the spark of childlike imagination that takes hold in some and causes them to make the impossible possible.
It’s also a tool I use regularly in my workshops and 1 of the 26 modules in my online Futurist Innovation Hack program, imaging big, by shifting our thinking and limitations from the ordinary and known, into the extraordinary and uncomfortably possible.
In this week’s on air chat with MMM Breakfast’s Anthony Tilli we go in search of retro future’s and look at the influence Science Fiction has had on the origin of many of today’s great inventions:
Mobile Phones – Start TrekSpace Travel – Jules Verne 1865 From the Earth to the MoonSubmarines – 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea – Nautilus manned by Captain NemoHelicopters – Leonardo Da Vinci, Jules Verne’s in Robur the ConquerorTV News – Jules Verne’s 1989 article “In the Year 2889” also wrote about skywriting and videoconferencingEar Buds –Ray Bradbury (22/08/1920 – 6/6/2012) had in ear buds called “seashells” in Fahrenheit 451 (1953)Credit Cards – Edward Bellamy’s (26/3/1850 – 22/5/1898) book Looking Backward (1887)Smart watch – Dick Tracy, James Bond, Star TrekCyborgs – 6 million dollar manSkype / Video Chat – Hugo Gernsback 12 part sci-fi novel serial called “Ralph 124 C 41+” written in 1911 for Modern Electrics magazineiPad / Tablet – Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. Fritz Lang’s Woman in the Moon (1929) showed us a rocket taking off to the moon, 28 years before Sputnik attempted itAntidepressants – Aldus Huxley Brave New World 1931Connected World – Arthur C Clarke “The Space Station”Electric Cars – John Brunner in 1969 published “Stand on Zanzibar” also mentioned a Detroit wasteland, decline in marriage replaced with short term hook ups
Listen now (4 minutes 56 seconds):
There’s an ongoing debate among Futurists of whether science fiction is a useful foresight tool or not. Some fellow futurist argue that today’s’ populist science fiction is all doom gloom, dystopian, blowing up the world and technology running amok, others, including me, see it a.
When signals like Science Fiction is innovation’s inspiration emerge, organisations that engage early have the advantage of choosing their response rather than reacting to events. That gap between those who prepared and those who did not is where competitive positioning is actually made or lost.
The most important question is not whether Science Fiction is innovation’s inspiration will matter, but how quickly it will matter in your specific context. Leaders benefit most from mapping the ripple effects early — not just the direct impact but the second and third-order consequences that arrive later and hit harder. That is the practical work of foresight.
