PB4 Anticipation, Peter Bishop

University of Houston, Certificate in Strategic Foresight
Anticipating the future
P Bishop, Jan 2011

Introduction
The future develops out of the combined influences of the world and of ourselves. Futurists deal with each of these sources of change in the two branches of their field — describing what might happen in the future (inbound change) and then influencing those outcomes toward more preferred futures (outbound change).

This first unit, describing the future, is entitled Anticipating the Future. Anticipation is a better word than describing or even forecasting because it’s active. It carries the connotation of expectation, of leaning forward, of waiting for something. It’s how a tennis player waits for the serve; how a child feels on Christmas morning; what a mother does in the last month of her pregnancy. Waiting (and wanting) for the future to come, oh so quickly.