Institute For The Future

Please join me and create a Future for Good

When I envision a future for good, I see a world in which science has been made accessible to all. This is the future that I have been exploring as...

A Couple Highlights From Our Foresight Practitioner’s Workshop

One of my favorite things from last week’s Foresight Practitioner Training was the combination of discussions around understanding methodological...

Mapping the Age of Networked Matter

Not 25 years ago, access to the Internet was confined to government research labs and universities. Today, the smartphone in my pocket not only...

Will automation lead to fewer jobs in 10 years? Short answer, yes.

Automation is an elephant. It’s been marching forward at a steady pace for two hundred years, give or take. For the vast majority of these...

Giving Back by Giving to the Future | #Give2Future

As we all spend #GivingTuesday thinking about giving back, IFTF invites you to think about giving to the future. See our new map, The Future of...

Follow Highlights from our Foresight Practitioner Workshop

Today – and for the next couple of days – we'll share highlights from our inaugural Foresight Practitioners workshop. Follow...

TEDxMarin Talks From IFTF: Our Germs, Bodies, and Brains

In September, IFTF Research Director Miriam Lueck Avery and Distinguished Fellow Jamias Cascio shared their thoughts on the future of our germs,...

Health Care in a Post-ACA World: Navigating the Second Curve

We are at a pivotal moment for health care in the U.S. We can resist change, and work to keep the status quo in place. We can muddle along and...

The Foresight Advantage: Sudan 2030

Earlier this year IFTF started a new partnership with United Nations Development Program’s Sudan office. Together we are embarking on a long-term...

Games aid preparation for the zombie apocalypse

Kids everywhere have a new excuse for playing games instead of doing their homework—it turns out the right games could improve their likelihood of...

3 New Invaluable Work Skills for 2018

As the nature of work is changing, so too are the skills required to succeed in the workforce. This blog post examines 3 new critical skills for...

From #20forecasts: The microbiome mediates the war on germs

Since James Watson and Francis Crick first described the structure of DNA in 1953, the double-helix has provided a blueprint for creating and...

Health Aware World: Health Horizons Fall Conference

On November 12 and 13 the Health Horizons team will convene an incredible group of experts, entrepreneurs, and healthcare innovators to explore life...

From #10YF2014: Magna Cortica

Featured in The Atlantic: “The Not-So-Distant Future When We Can All Upgrade Our Brains”...

From #20forecasts: Waste mining pushes against planned obsolescence

Did you know one metric ton of circuit boards contains 40-800 times as much gold as one metric ton of gold ore? Not to mention that up to 40% of...

Thought for the Future of Food

In late September, IFTF's Rebecca Chesney shared our food futures research at Five Thot's Idea People Thinking: Food event. From the relationship...

Announcing Human-Machine Futures: Technology Horizons 2015 Research Agenda

Each year, IFTF’s Technology Horizons Program conducts original research examining the underlying shifts taking place in science and technology,...

Cory Doctorow: Redesigning a Broken Internet

Building and maintaining a global communications network is a tremendous accomplishment. Unfortunately, our internet is broken in relation to the laws...

From #20forecasts: "Machines get a social life"

In 1999, then Procter & Gamble assistant brand manager (and now famous MIT technologist) Kevin Ashton pointed out that computers – and therefore the...

From Telepresence to Copresence

Have you seen this hysterical four minute video called A Conference Call In Real Life? If you haven’t, treat yourself to a watch right now:...

From #20forecasts: Spark of a Nanorevolution

It’s the stuff of science fiction. Graphene is two dimensional material that has the potential to change how we interact with our three dimensional...

My Transcontinental Journey to Explore our Food System

What can 10 days on a train teach us about our future food system? Sarah Smith shares what she learned about managing waste, sourcing locally, and...

Reworking Health: Translating Siloed Research into Medicine

The topic receives almost daily media coverage—from the incredible potential and dangers of data mining health records to how big data is changing the...

Artifact Engine

When thinking about the future, it is important to start somewhere. Especially if we believe that the future is something that we, as humans, can...