Responsible Anticipation A curated conversation Ted Fuller (U Lincoln) Riel Miller (UNESCO Roberto Poli (U Trento) Bruce Tonn (Three3) Markku Wilenius (Finland Futures Research Centre) Second International Conference on Anticipation University College, London November 2017

Themes Key Theme: Who owns and governs the future? Subthemes How to keep the future open? How do we understand anticipatory differences? How does the future get made? What is the relationship between an idea of the future and action in the present?

Agenda Markku Wilenius: How is an age of responsibility to be practiced and what role does anticipation play? Ted Fuller: How are values inherent in anticipation, does anticipation effect change in values? Brue Tonn: Is it possible to identify plausible unintended consequences? Riel Miller: In the context of human development how can anticipatory power effectively enhance social justice? Roberto Poli: Is responsible anticipation possible?

Agenda Ted Fuller: How are values inherent in anticipation, does anticipation effect change in values?

How are values inherent in anticipation, does anticipation effect change in values? Thesis: The connection between anticipation and norms is that anticipation has causal power to change social norms and social norms have causal power in framing anticipation.

Ethical security “The character of a predictive model assumes almost an ethical character even in a purely abstract context. We might even say that the models embodied in an anticipatory system are what comprise its individuality; what distinguish it uniquely from other systems. As we have seen, a change in these models is a change of identity…” (Robert Rosen et al., 2012, p370)

Modeling relations In an anticipatory system the modeling relations synthesize entailments in a natural system by inferential entailments in a formal system. The relational model is a set of inferential entailments. Inference is a judgmental process, Rosen 1985, p72

Emergence of social structures The Emergence Paradigm (Sawyer 2005:211), showing the ‘circle of emer-gence’ (p220), i.e. that area which is subject to social emergence

Causation and emergence Micro-interactional mechanisms (Sawyer 2005) Relational Morphogenesis (transformation) / Morphostasis (Archer 1995) Redescription Principle (Elder-Vass 2008) The emergent form has causal power because the parts and their relations are contained within it. Norm group/circles (Elder-Vass 2008/2010) The only representations or beliefs held in social institutions are the individual normative beliefs of the individuals concerned […] mutual commitment to endorse and enforce the practice concerned In this emergentist view of social institutions, then, this type of social structure is causally effective because real social entities (norm groups) have emergent properties (institutions) that arise from the way their parts (human individuals) are related to each other (through their mutual commitment to endorse and enforce the practice concerned).(Elder-Vass 2008:292)

Prospection and norms A causal force is implied: Morality and social norms, as with laws and technologies add structure to the future, making otherwise unavailable actions and outcomes possible (Railton 2016:22). ‘To want to take an action because we like the idea of what that action might yield, even if that is remote in time or novel in character.’ (p. 21). ‘In a sense, the future’ is a ‘product of collective imagination and agreement. The Group imagines it together […] people in the group cooperate to impose their collective imagination on top of some physical or anticipated facts’ (Baumeister 2016) A causal force is implied: the idea of future benefits or costs which regulates or motivates action In M. E. P. Seligman, P. Railton, R. F. Baumeister, & C. Sripada (Eds.), Homo prospectus, New York: Oxford University Press.

Anticipation is a ‘causal mechanism’ in the process of emergence The natural disposition to anticipate may be causal of social change Stability Action Instability Anticipatory Judgement of future value

Conclusion What is taken as desirable or undesirable motivates anticipatory action The relationship between anticipation and norms is not a passive relationship nor necessarily a natural one. Impredictivity is to be avoided Anticipation can act to stabilize practices to avoid undesirable outcomes or to destabilize practices in a transformational process. The appearance of ephemeral (short lived) emergent norms can be stabilized by the actions of individuals within the group in anticipation of futures value. Similarly, existing norms can be maintained while ephemeral emergents are extinguished by reactions to an anticipated loss in value. The anticipatory mode of normative judgement is material in the stabilizing and transformation of human society. Dispositions to anticipate and the anticipatory actions initiated by this anticipation provide some explanation of social transformation. Impredicativity, i.e. where internal causality is self-defined and thus not predicated on causes in the environment, is to be avoided. Powerful narration of particular prospects can form and modify modelling relations, our inferential judgements about the world made in the process of our actions. The avoidance of impredicativity requires a continuous critical reframing of the ‘modelling relations’ (between inference mechanisms and natural systems) to prevent a divergence between assumed reality and experienced reality.

Discussion How can responsible anticipation be framed? What can be known, such that responsibility can be taken, and by whom? Is it possible to be responsible without anticipating? Is responsibility inherent in anticipating because the disposition to act on anticipation creates consequences? What modes of governance should guide anticipation?