Abstract
The future is explored and created through language. Terminology, concepts and definitions form fundamental ingredients for foresight, leading into inferences, conjectures, narratives and stories. Many futures methods rely on a specific lingo, some of which has even been trademarked. Although not always duly recognised, the importance of language as an instrument for foresight cannot be overstated. Or, in the words of Richard Slaughter (1996), introducing his Advanced Futures Glossary: “It’s well known that concepts and words are bearers of thoughts and ideas. What’s less well known is that the language of Futures Studies is a rich and powerful symbolic resource in its own right that opens up new worlds of understanding and possibility”.
Once having recognized that the dictionary is not a stable and univocal image of a semantic universe, one is free to use it when one needs it. Umberto Eco
This chapter was inspired by the work of Working Group Zero on Concepts and Definitions of the European COST Network on Foresight Methodologies (COST A22).
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For a complete overview of Polak’s contributions to the futures field, see Van der Helm (2005).
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Cole’s work on content analysis is based on word count within the body of futures literature (in particular, the journal Futures). Unfortunately for the scope of our work, his approach largely overlooks how these concepts are defined and interpreted by their authors and how the meanings of concepts (and different concepts with similar meanings) evolve over time. Two of his cases that would warrant more in-depth research are the distinctive use of “future” (singular) and “futures” (plural) and of “futures studies” and “foresight” over the years.
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For this reason the Working Group on Concepts and Vocabulary of the COST A22 which inspired this chapter abandoned the idea to work on vocabulary in favour of working on the theoretical underpinning. Some of the work has been assembled in a special edition of Futures (2008). See Mermet et al. (2008).
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Much can be said about the differences between glossaries, dictionaries and encyclopaedias, but this debate goes beyond the scope of our undertaking (for an overview, see Eco 1984). For the purposes of our discussion, we follow in general the name that the authors have given to their work. In some cases, we may add some remarks regarding the justification of the name with the intention to focus the reader on what can actually be found in the text concerned.
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The book has been out of print for a long time. Thanks to LIPSOR at the French Centre national des arts et des métiers (CNAM), the complete volume has been made available via the Internet and can be downloaded from http://www.cnam.fr/lipsor/eng/data/langageprevision.pdf .
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We refer here to the glossary which is part of the CDROM: Knowledge Base of Futures Studies, Millennium Edition CD ROM, since it has been part of a milestone project to establish the foundations of futures studies. This glossary is dated in 1996. An updated version of the glossary (Advanced Futures Glossary 2005) can be obtained from Foresight International (www.foresightinternational.com.au). The glossary can also be consulted online.
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Reference date: 2 January 2009
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A clear example from the futures field has been delivered by Wendell Bell, who argues that the term “paradigm” should no longer be used, due to the wide array of different meanings. Instead, he proposes to use “transdisciplinary matrix” for one of the submeanings attributed to “paradigm” (Bell 2003: pp. 184–187).
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Even though one could question whether this is done based on the correct underpinning, plausibility may indeed be a subjective criterion, but this does not necessarily lead to a normative definition. Furthermore, the author does not explain why coherence would not lead to a similar dismissal. For a more in-depth reflection on the concept of plausibility, see Van der Helm (2006).
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van der Helm, R. (2013). Defining the Future: Concepts and Definitions as Linguistic Fundamentals of Foresight. In: Giaoutzi, M., Sapio, B. (eds) Recent Developments in Foresight Methodologies. Complex Networks and Dynamic Systems, vol 1. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5215-7_2
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