Gordon Brander on Scenario Planning

In this episode, Samuel Arbesman speaks with Gordon Brander, a technologist and researcher currently building Deep Future, an AI tool designed to facilitate scenario planning. Gordon has worked in design and engineering at organizations including Mozilla and Google, where he used scenario planning in practice—and he’s now aiming to democratize the framework more broadly.

Together, Samuel and Gordon explore the history and mechanics of scenario planning: what it is, how it works, and what it’s actually useful for. They dig into risk versus uncertainty, epistemic humility, and Knightian uncertainty, along with the research process behind building scenarios—and the common perils and misuses that can turn the practice into self-deception. They also discuss Gordon’s AI-powered approach with Deep Future (which Samuel is advising) and how scenario planning has reshaped Gordon’s understanding of society and the world.