What can we learn from sci-fi movies, books, TV series and cartoons about plausible and surprising aspects of future everyday life? And what can we learn from diverse value studies regarding people’s wishes and expectations for the future? Motives & Fiction is a project that reflects on these questions – it aims to explore interesting overlaps and differences between the science fiction genre and value studies.
Confronted with increasing complexity and uncertainty, organizations need to make sense of changes in their business environment and find ways to prepare for an uncertain future. Using science fiction novels and movies can help to access a variety of scenarios of how the future might be.
This website provides a structured repository of science fiction movies and novels with different scenarios for specific aspects of future everyday life.
The analysis of sci-fi stories is combined with a look at studies on motives and values – thus, drivers of human behavior and facets of imagined future life come together.
Science fiction author William Gibson famously noted: “The future is already here – it's just not evenly distributed.”
The vanguard is far ahead of the general public, and the pioneers are constantly venturing into new territory, in science as well as in science fiction. Science fiction novels and movies provide a huge repository of potential future scenarios on pretty much all aspects of life, e.g. mobility, communication, health etc. In a way, the future is already present in science fiction, though it may be biased, distorted or difficult to access.
A key aspect of science fiction is its narrative format. These narratives on the future stimulate our imagination and conjure up vivid images of how the future might be. We store these images in our brain, forming what cognitive scientists refer to as a ‘memory of the future.’ And if we, and of course organizations as well, need to imagine what the future might be and how it could be different from today, we may refer to these memories of the future.
It has been argued that in fast-moving and ever changing business environments defined by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (VUCA), imagination is a key strategic asset. Imagining the future and starting to discuss the implications for your organization may help you develop foresight.
With this project and website we would like to accomplish two things:
First, we want to establish science fiction as a relevant source for organizations to develop foresight. Second, we aim to provide a repository of science fiction novels and movies with suggestions for which industries or fields of application these may be of interest.
The results are based on a collaboration between the first batch of students of the master program “Global Foresight and Technology Management” at the Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt, Germany and the Foresight Academy, a cross-industry initiative.