Create Tomorrow, The WGSN Podcast 92. Scenarios of the Future with Climate Fiction Writer Kim Stanley Robinson
Oct 6, 2023
Kim Stanley Robinson, award-winning climate fiction novelist who blends rigorous research with speculative storytelling, joins the conversation. He explores how fiction makes futures tangible and combats cognitive dissonance. Discussion covers storytelling’s role in shaping meaning, AI’s limits, humans as multi-species ecologies, practical nature engagement, and economic ideas like carbon payments and greening finance.
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Episode notes
Fiction Makes Futures Feel Real
- Fiction creates a 'thick texture' that readers co-create by suspending disbelief.
- That lived imaginative experience makes future scenarios emotionally real and memorable.
Sci‑Fi Builds Useful Cognitive Maps
- Regularly reading science fiction builds cognitive maps that reduce surprise about real events.
- Aggregated genre visions create cultural expectations of possible futures.
Keep Your Macronarrative Flexible
- Update your macronarrative when new data arrives so your story of the world stays accurate.
- Use storytelling to sort information and keep your ideology responsive rather than fixed.
