Future Tense
Episodes
Drones, witnessing and the view from above
06 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Advocates claim drones make war safer for civilians and soldiers by making it more technical and precise. But drones are also being used as a “wit...
Banning books and floating suburbs
27 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Banning books belongs in the dark ages and is anathema to modern liberal democracy, but in the United States there’s a widespread campaign underwa...
Fashion’s fast future
20 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Fashion is getting even faster, but there are also efforts underway to rein-in the waste and make fabrics from more environmentally-friendly material...
Space pollution, stunted high-rise and the joy of missing out
13 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As Earth’s upper atmosphere becomes more congested, it’s also becoming more polluted, and the impact could be dire. Also, why doing without could...
The opportunity costs of global pollution
06 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Pollution has long been seen as a health problem, but increasingly its being redefined as an opportunity cost to both individuals and society - and...
Rare Earths and the difficulties of supply
30 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Rare Earths are essential to modern life, but their extraction comes at a price. So, how do we clean-up mining efforts & build a diverse network ...
Is dumbness our destiny?
23 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Most of us are healthier, wealthier and better educated than ever before. We have greater access to knowledge and expertise than any previous generat...
Litigating our way out of climate change
16 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Responses to climate change are often marked by frustration as much as fear. Those seeking to end our fossil-fuel dependency are increasingly turning...
The power of storytelling – a cautionary tale
09 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Stories like opinions have become a necessity of modern life. Everybody is encouraged to have an opinion and everybody – in the vernacular of cou...
Is the process of ageing inevitable?
02 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Some animals, like sea sponges, can live for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years. They also never get cancer. Understanding why that’s the case ha...
Rewilding to safeguard biodiversity
26 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Rewilding is a conservation approach based on the reintroduction of lost animal species to their natural habitats. Its original manifestation was con...
Social media: harm and transformative justice
19 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Despite increased safety features, policies and content moderation practices, social media platforms continue to be sites where people perpetrate and...
Coming to terms with noise
12 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
When the global pandemic struck the world’s major cities were plunged into silence. But were they? New research casts doubt on just how quiet it re...
Geopolitics in a post fossil-fuel world
05 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
What will the global political landscape look like when the world’s dependency on fossil fuels is finally over? Adjustments are already being made,...
Our adolescent future and reassessing human rights
28 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Paul Howe has a novel theory that could help explain the current state of humanity. Adolescence, he says, isn’t so much a time of life as a state o...
The new globalisation
21 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Historian and economist, Marc Levinson, argues we’ve entered the fourth age of globalisation. An era, he says, that will be driven by the movement ...
Technology: Questions of ethics and fairness
14 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The technology sector has a long history of designing devices to lock in customers and accelerate consumption. But “planned obsolescence” as it’...
An international approach to regulating AI
07 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Simon Chesterman argues for a new global agency to regulate the development of artificial intelligence. One that would also ensure an equitable distr...
An update on nuclear energy
31 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
If you think coal is controversial, spare a thought for nuclear energy. It may not be everybody’s choice as a replacement for fossil fuels, but the...
The positive side of monitoring
24 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Surveillance has become mainstream in the 21st century. It’s now so ubiquitous that many of us no longer notice its intrusion in our personal lives...
Disappearing cookies and a shortage of chips
17 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Google has affirmed its decision to ban all third-party cookies from its popular Chrome browser by the end of 2023. Cookies have long under-pinned th...
Planning for a problematic future
10 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
We all know the value of planning, but in a complex, complicated and often confounding world it can be difficult knowing how to start. Scenario Plann...
The atomisation of religious belief
03 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The big traditional religions of the world are losing followers, but not just, as is commonly thought, to atheism and secularism. Religion as such wo...
Should we really aim for sustainable development?
26 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The terms “sustainability” and “sustainable development” are now so commonplace as to be meaningless – according to the sceptics. Worse sti...
The Metaverse – turning life into one big online experience
19 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Facebook’s CEO has spoken about changing the social media platform into a “metaverse” company and he’s pledged billions to the cause. The met...
Big tech’s big challenge
12 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
New legislation aimed at curbing the power and influence of the big technology companies has been drawn up in both the United States and Europe. Whil...
Our long-term battle with short-term thinking
05 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Is our inability to think long-term influenced by the sheer number of threats we face? In times of crisis, it seems, human beings find it harder to t...
Link rot, pay walls and the perils of preservation
29 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The cliché is that once something goes online, it’s up there forever. But the truth is that the Internet has a memory problem and some of what we’...
AI inventors; “Affectivism” and the problem with Virtual Reality
22 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An Australian court has given inventor status to a piece of Artificial Intelligence. It’s big news in the tech sector, but does it have real world ...
Bitcoin: silly speculation or the future of finance?
15 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Almost every week, Bitcoin makes the headlines. Rollercoaster prices, environmental concerns and even the latest scams regularly make the news. But t...
A new alliance of democracies
08 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
President Joe Bidden wants to establish a new alliance of democracies to counter the rise of authoritarianism. He’s planning a global summit for ...
Outsourcing, automation and the messiness of global labour
01 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Automation and outsourcing are dirty words for many people in Western countries worried about their future employment prospects. Developing countries...
The trouble with Tech-driven farming
25 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
New technologies are transforming agriculture, but getting farmers to experiment with different tech combinations remains an issue. A technologically...
Ransomware – a very 21st century crime
18 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The rush to go digital during Covid-19 has coincided with a marked rise in ransomware attacks. Some have a political dimension, some are merely oppor...
A non-proliferation treaty for fossil fuels
11 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
It’s time to attack the “supply side” of fossil fuels, activists argue. And the best way to do that is by establishing a fuel non-proliferation...
Litigating our way out of climate change
04 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Responses to climate change are often marked by frustration as much as fear. Those seeking to end our fossil-fuel dependency are increasingly turning...
Some foresight about the future of foresight
27 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Trying to predict the future is a timeless and time-consuming pursuit. Artificial Intelligence is increasingly being enlisted to the cause, but so t...
What role will hydrogen play in our future?
20 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Hydrogen is the energy du jour. It’s seen as a clean, smart alternative to fossil fuels, and major investments in its future are being made around ...
Rewilding: part two
13 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In this edition we examine the natural forces at play in Europe where abandoned farmland is increasingly being reclaimed by wildlife. We also hear ab...
Rewilding to safeguard biodiversity
06 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Rewilding is a conservation approach based on the reintroduction of lost animal species to their natural habitats. Its original manifestation was con...
Is the process of ageing inevitable?
30 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Some animals, like sea sponges, can live for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years. They also never get cancer. Understanding why that’s the case ha...
Is dumbness our destiny?
23 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Most of us are healthier, wealthier and better educated than ever before. We have greater access to knowledge and expertise than any previous generat...
When satellites collide…
16 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
There’s been a huge increase in the number of satellites orbiting Earth with private companies and governments planning to launch hundreds more. Ne...
Teaching AI to fly like a bee
09 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists in the UK have developed a form of artificial intelligence that mimics the brain functions of a honeybee. The results promise to make dron...
The power of storytelling – a cautionary tale
02 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Stories like opinions have become a necessity of modern life. Everybody is encouraged to have an opinion and everybody – in the vernacular of cou...
Are Sovereign Wealth Funds the best way of safeguarding the future?
25 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Sovereign Wealth Funds come in all shapes and sizes. They act as government-backed investment vehicles. They’re used to fund specific social projec...
Enterprising ways to make and shift electricity
18 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Imagine if you could use your own body heat to recharge your smart phone? That’s just one of the ways scientists are trying to decentralise energy ...
Locking down nature in order to liberate it
11 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a serious campaign underway to have 30 per cent of the Earth designated as a giant conservation zone. The target date is 2030.The eventual ...
The Privacy Paradox
04 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
How many private details are you revealing online – and how valuable is that information? And more importantly what steps can you take to protect y...
The strange case of the trees that grow metal and how to harvest them
28 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Agromining is a new process for extracting large quantities of metals such as cobalt and nickel from the sap and leaves of rare plants known as hyper...