Hope and Sensemaking in a Pandemic? A "Futuring" Conversation with Thomas Homer-Dixon & More

Sustain What?

October 2, 2020

Thomas Homer-Dixon, the bestselling author of The Upside of Down and other books exploring pathways through complexity, joins Sustain What host Andy Revkin and two special guests in a bracing discussion of the themes of his latest work: "Commanding Hope: The Power We Have to Renew a World in Peril." (https://commandinghope.com/)
The guests are:
- Susan Cox-Smith, a partner and futurist at Changeist, a consultancy and training organization that curates and creates "experiences that stretch strategic thinking, materialize the new, and connect with people about what comes next." She's a contributing editor of the new book "How to Future: Leading and Sense-making in an Age of Hyperchange." Learn more at http://changeist.com
- Michael Garfield, a philosopher, musician, painter and writer who blogs for Long Now Foundation and hosts the Future Fossil podcast.
His Long Now posts: https://blog.longnow.org/0author/michaelgarfield/
Future Fossils: https://shows.acast.com/futurefossils/episodes
Homer-DIxon sees three paths to bending humanity's curve away from a long descent after the last century of zooming progress. As he writes"
"At this crucial moment in humanity’s history, I argue, three changes are essential to keep us from descending into intractable, savage violence.
First, we need individually to better understand how and why we see the world the way we do and what makes other people’s views sometimes so different from ours. Second, instead of passively accepting a dystopian image of what will come tomorrow, we need to actively create together from our diverse perspectives a shared story of a positive future — including a shared identity as “we” — that will help us address our common problems and thrive. And, finally, we need to fully mobilize our extraordinary human agency to produce that future."
More on the book and his research and other output:
http://homerdixon.com