[This was a live-blog of Gary Golden’s keynote at PCNC 2012. I’ve gone back and edited it slightly, mainly for grammar and flow.–jpb]

Gary Golden is a futurist. Apparently traveling to the future is good, because he looks very young. Golden’s card does read “futurist.”

What does a “futurist” do? According to Golden, futurist thinking is grounded in sociology. This field grew out of a NASA program, which attempted to look forward and try to predict social change. This brand of thinking looks at how society adapts to change, and in part, how individuals address change. Golden mentions that a futurist tries to introduce some “structure” to change.

A futurist is interested in understanding how the world is changing and seeks to address these issues from the “outside/in.” According to Golden, often, institutions are trying to address change from inside/out, which doesn’t work and leads to problems. Perhaps this is why the last 20-30 years has been so bumpy in the U.S. (my own point of view). Continue reading →