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Ari wallik is a futurist and a host of
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the new PBS series a brief history of
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the future the show examines the ways
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people are problem solving and working
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to improve the world for the next
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Generations I welcome it I wish I was a
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f futurist so Ari explain what a
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futurist is so you know look there
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there's two different ways of thinking
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about what a futurist there's the way
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that people think about it in the kind
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of common way which is we have a crystal
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ball and we go into a rumor we go onto a
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stage and we tell and we predict this is
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what tomorrow is going to be the reality
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is it's it's a much more structured
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Endeavor so a lot of what we do is we
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look at Mega Trends we look at things
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that have been happening for for for
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several years often time decades and
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then we start to extrapolate what those
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would be like moving forward the next 5
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10 15 20 years and then within that we
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build scenarios or stories about what
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might happen not best case not worst
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case but probabilistically what is
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likely to occur giving these Mega Trends
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so that that's what kind of professional
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futurists do so in this series you're
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really offering a positive view of the
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future there's so much just you know
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especially in science fiction elsewhere
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you're trying to move away from Doom and
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Gloom and dystopia um why did you feel
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it was important to explore and I'll
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just make a note here it's one of the
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things I've been trying to do a lot more
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lately about where the good parts are
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especially around Ai and we'll get into
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that and Lydia will have some questions
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um but as you say in the show um we're
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currently at a sort of inflection point
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to decide Our Fate around the especially
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in the environment but also Ai and all
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kinds of of things talk a little bit
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about why you did the positive Spin and
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what the inflection point is look it
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look for 20 years I've been a futurist
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and I've been going into rooms and what
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more what happens more often than not is
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CEOs or government leaders will will say
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the same thing what's the worst thing
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that's going to happen and how do we
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position ourselves not to be part of the
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worst thing it's not how do we position
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ourselves not to contribute to it but
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how do we avoid it um and so it occurred
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to me I I have 15-year-old twin
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daughters and I look at their bookcase
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in their room for young adult fiction
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every single book that takes place in
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the future is dystopian and then when we
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look at youth today where depending on
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which poll you look at anywhere from 70
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to 80% say they they have kind of dread
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towards the future I think back about
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when I was their age uh in the 90s and I
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was optimistic about the future now
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obviously there were very different
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Trends happening at the time but net net
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and this goes back to sports psychology
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you know I if if you can't see it you
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can't be it and if all we're showing is
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Doom and Gloom and this is not to take
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away from the Doom and Gloom of the
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current moment that is what we are going
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to head towards right if we look back at
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the last time there were good stories
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about tomorrow that took place not in a
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perfect future but in a better future we
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have to go back to the mid 1960s to
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start Trek right there was the first
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interracial kiss on Star Trek decades
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before we actually saw anywhere else on
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TV um that hasn't happened for quite
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some time so people who don't know that
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was Ura and Shatner I believe but go
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ahead I I was going to say that but I
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realized I'm I'm in the company that
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someone can the name drop so it was them
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and so look my the responsibility of a
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futurist isn't just to kind of help your
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clients win the future right I mean look
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I don't begrudge folks who do that I
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decided several years ago that that's
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not going to be the way that I'm going
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to do it anymore for me no longer you
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know client a wins and client B loses
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for for me now I I view this as much as
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a much kind of larger Homo Sapien
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project we either all win or we all kind
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of lose and we have to enter it into
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that way all right Lydia I mean it's
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it's really fascinating and I I come at
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this I mean Ari your your your work is
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so interesting and I come at this um
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from having been a a foreign
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correspondent um and I remember I wrote
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I wrote a um a piece uh you know many
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years ago when I was covering the in
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darur which is you know the region of
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Sudan there was a you know ethnic
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cleansing and all these horrible things
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were happening and a thing that I
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noticed was just that like the the the
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the the every interview that I do with
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someone who was like living in a straw
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Hut you know having been chased from
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their home was like I here's my baby and
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I'm hopeful for my baby's future you
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know um and and like so I did some
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research about this and I found that
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like there was actually like you know uh
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that Africa was actually the most
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optimistic continent on the earth um
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that the Gallup polling showed that so I
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mean one of the things that I think is
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really fascinating about the work that
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you're doing in this series is like you
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really went all around the world and
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talked to lots of different kinds of
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people and the it's often the people
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that you think have the least reason to
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be optimistic who have um the most hope
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for like what the future could hold um
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and and I'm curious like what what did
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your what did your sort of reporting and
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research show about that well it's
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interesting so the way I kind of I
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mentioned several years ago I decided to
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make this switch into a kind of more
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protop or optimistic future not polanish
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but protop protan we'll get to that
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we'll get to that in a second uh where
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that came from was I was doing work for
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the UN Refugee agency and we were in the
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Horn of Africa and to your point Lydia
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more often than not those were the most
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optimistic folks about the future the
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people that were literally on the run
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for their lives um whereas people in the
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global North or in America were the most
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dystopian the most Doom and Gloom and we
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can get into that in a second but that's
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what I found as I traveled the world
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were
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people who could look at the future I
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don't want to be binary about it but
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either again looking at it as a place
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that it was this noun that they were
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hurdling towards or they looked at the
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future as a verb it's a thing that they
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were making and that they were actually
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a participant in it varied where I went
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in the world but in generally that
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mindset was the key differentiator
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between folks and how they thought about
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tomorrow and that's what I found you
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know it was in Morocco 4 hours through
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the Atlas Mountains that I met with
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someone who's running one of the largest
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concentrated solar power plants in the
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world and he said we're going to be
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energy independent and eventually much
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like bug Mr Fuller talked about decades
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ago we will link with other energy grids
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around the world you don't hear that
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talk in America you hear about the grid
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failing there you hear about Futures
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that we want to live in as opposed to
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Futures that we want to run from well
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you hear about the grid failing but you
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also hear about um you know well I don't
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want that solar array in my backyard or
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you know so it's it's this combination
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of like already having a certain amount
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of resources and power that you don't
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want to give up that you know prevents
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you from imagining Futures that might
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change yeah I mean look one of the more
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interesting look every conversation was
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interesting around the world but what I
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I met with a woman Yasha wac who's kind
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of considered uh she wrote the book afro
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futurism and in in our in our
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conversation she's written a lot more
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since then um she said look to be clear
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she's like she's like we she was talking
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about Black Americans but in general she
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was saying we've been living in a
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dystopia for 400 years right so we've
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now kind of gone through it and we are
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looking at this on the other side about
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what Futures do we want to build so you
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don't necessarily have to travel to kind
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of these exotic you can go to Chicago
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and find people who understand that so
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much of the future is dictated obviously
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by our past you can you know she and I
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recently talked about Haiti in the same
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way right you can look about where we've
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come from as a Harbinger not just of
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where we might go but where also where
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we don't want to go and it's again this
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is It's a subtle mindset shift but I
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found as I traveled the world that folks
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who were willing to go there which was
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to say the the the path the the past is
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not a path dependency there is a
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different future and it's not a rainbows
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and unicorns future but there's a
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different future that we can choose that
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centers Humanity as opposed to centering
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technology or late stage capitalism or
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Silicon Valley ethos that can get us to
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where we want to go the most important
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thing though that I found in the
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reporting was that people had to have a
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pretty good idea of where they wanted to
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go and again this wasn't a Utopia but it
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was a world that they wanted that they
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were okay with themselves living in but
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more importantly with their descendants
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living in Generations from now right
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yeah let me ask you uh you you talk
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about you met with a bunch of
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interesting people in unusual jobs
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including a circular Economist a Futures
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generation commissioner death doua who
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really blew you away with the
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perspective you just mentioned someone
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who obviously did but named one or two
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who I mean um look I love going to you
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know Lawrence Livermore lab and seeing
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the fusion Center and seeing all the I
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grew up on pop saigh and wir and all
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this stuff but you just mentioned who
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really blew me away which was Al Lua
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Arthur who's a death Doula and the
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conver you know what's a death dla doing
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in a show about the future but what a
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lot of what she and I talked about was
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the the kind of the reality that until
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you can Envision a world beyond your own
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lifespan you kind of get over your own
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lifespan bias it's very difficult to
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take actions for the far future and in
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the west we have death anxiety and in
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more Eastern cultures there's more death
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awareness that's deeply tied into kind
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of cultural and religious underpinning
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of how they think about death a lot of
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what she does and we visit her in the
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high mountains of Arizona where she was
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doing a death duela training is getting
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people to be comfortable with the idea
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of Their Own mortality and we and and we
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know that as people go through that as
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they move from from Death anxiety to
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death awareness they are able to take
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better actions and decisions for the far
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future that blew me away this was going
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to be a show about everyone thought oh
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this is a show about monals and jetpacks
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and Quantum and Nano why is there a
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woman racking people in death shells but
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that's partly how we get to where we
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want to go well yeah 100% it's it's
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actually it informs everything I do
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actually but it's with interesting is
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the people I cover tend to be much more
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how am I going to stop death that that
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that that's where they're moving now
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well you know life extension and
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everything else which is kind of the
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opposite no I mean it's it's fascinating
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so so so as it as it happens my my wife
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is a is a social worker and she focuses
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on on hospice and end of life and um at
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one point I asked her you know what what
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is it that you actually do in this work
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and um you know she said a bunch of
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things that are you know obviously
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important but uh the one that really
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really stuck with me was that she helps
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people um uh increase inre their
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tolerance for uncertainty and um and I
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think that that's what you're talking
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about with the death Doula right I mean
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it's partly sort of like creating this
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death awareness but I think it's also
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being comfortable with the idea that we
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actually don't know you know like you
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don't know how long you're going to live
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you don't know what the future's going
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to look like but creating that sense of
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possibility and that that ability to
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kind of live with and and and and be in
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equinity with an uncertain future um you
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know to me feels like a like a really
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really important not skill for dying but
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actually like skill for living with the
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world in we living right now and that's
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the look what we talk about in episode
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two is that we're in this intertitle
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moment right we're on the kind of tail
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end at least in the at least in the west
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of this kind of Enlightenment
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rationality thinking right if we can
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quantify it if we can measure it we can
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we can own it it's man over nature and
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we're seeing that didn't get us as far
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as we wanted to get us right and so In
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This intertitle Moment between what was
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and what will be um that uncertainty
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leads to a certain sense a heightened
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sense of anxiety which then leads people
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to become more short-term in their
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thinking right they're less likely to go
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out 10 15 20 years let alone hundreds of
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years and they're going to think about
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the next six months and so that's why
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being able to live with that uncertainty
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is so important in this moment let me
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ask you a question we talk a lot about
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AI in the future in these in in on this
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podcast um and excitement but also the
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dangers are you dug into both in the
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series talk about that that's another
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inflection point
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obviously yeah I mean one of the things
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that became became very apparent as we
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traveled the world meeting both both
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with experts in artificial intelligence
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and also folks who are kind of AI
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adjacent is that what we are building
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what we are coding right now and this
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dovet Tales of what we were just talking
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about are these Immortal machines right
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so it's not just about what we do right
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now which is very important but it's the
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fact that we are coding in either
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optimistic visions of tomorrow or
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significant bias that will be with us
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much like the cobal programming and Air
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Traffic Control Systems that's still
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with us 50 years later that's what we're
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coding in right now so how we think
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about Ai and what we do or do not do
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right now isn't a six-month thing isn't
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a two-year thing it could be a 20 or a
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200y year thing right absolutely alydia
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last question what is your favorite um
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protop and piece of culture is there
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something that that comes to mind that
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you're like this is an example of like I
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wish that there was more of this because
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you talked about your daughter's
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bookshelves and dystopian books and
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things like that um i' I'd love a
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recommendation for something that could
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maybe evoke that feeling that you're
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talking about of like possibility well
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obviously the first thing is a TV show
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because that's why we made it right to
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evoke that feeling that sense of
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possibility uh you know I'm actually
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going to go a little bit backwards here
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um I look it it was the old show on NBC
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called Parenthood I look both my my
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mother passed away a few years ago my
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father passed away when I was 18 I had a
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loving amazing family that being said
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I'm now a parent and it's like how do
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you model the best behaviors that you
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want both in yourself and in your
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children because that is future making
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and in that in the TV show Parenthood
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that's been off the air for several
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years now I you know look it wasn't
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perfect those families weren't perfect
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but the way the parents modeled a way of
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interacting with Society culture and
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their children was protop for me that's
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great protop I'm gonna go back and
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revisit that so speaking of that
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yeah it's a great show speaking of kids
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um this is my last question um you came
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out of this feeling optimistic about our
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future our kids Futures I have a lot of
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kids um you have kids um I think about
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the future a lot like almost constantly
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in everything I do and that's why not
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just their not just my children um but
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their children and everything else and I
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think it's easier to be more positive
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you have to kind of force yourself when
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you have children but I don't know about
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that I don't know some people are quite
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AR um did you come out feeling
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optimistic about our future and point to
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one thing that makes you
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optimistic so look I I I went into the
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show a a little bit down on the state of
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the homo sapien project to be totally
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honest uh just because like like you all
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I I read the news this is what I do is I
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look at I'm kind of like an
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anthropologist from the future looking
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backwards like where did it go right and
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where did it go wrong and I try to trim
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tabas towards the right uh so I went
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into it a little bit less than where I
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wanted to be I came out of it highly
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optimistic because what I found was
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every single individual that I met with
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had an optimism that was buied by a
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sense of pragmatic sensibility around
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where we are as a species and how much
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there is left to do so they weren't
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seeing this as chapter 10 of 10 they
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were all seeing it as chapter one or two
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of a 20 chapter book um the thing look
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outside of Amsterdam we visited a place
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called HC which is also known you know
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they call it a dementia Village and what
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they've done in short is instead of
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putting people who are in a Memory Care
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situation with neurogenerative disease
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and kind of locked Wards they've
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actually built Villages for them where
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they can shop they can go to restaurants
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all in a safe environment it took a
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tremendous amount of willpower by the
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founders of hevc to convince people that
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this was a good idea I came out of it
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optimistic the entire show coming out of
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hoic cuz realized yeah the technology
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stuff was fascinating in the show don't
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get me wrong but seeing that people
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could come together and rethink their
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base assumptions about how we care for
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one another in the present and therefore
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in the future changed how I thought we
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could actually tackle some of our
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biggest uh most wicked social problems
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well that's true someone who's dealing
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with us right now it's it's got to
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change it absolutely
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does
