New Philosophies, New Foresight Perspectives

on-going research

in ‘Ethics and Philosophy of Futures’, Open Discussion #5, Association of Professional Futurists, online event, 2022.

Hosted by Sylvia Galluser, co-curator of the APF program, this webinar was an opportunity to share the philosophical reflections and references mobilized in the methodological research and experiments carried out at TAC Future Lab (Axis 1 and 2).-The wide-open and speculative horizon of alien cosmologies requires to be positioned at the frontier and even at the forefront of new approaches to knowledge, philosophy, foresight or even art and fiction: speculative realism and extro-science fiction (Meillassoux), theory-fiction (Negarestani), non-standard philosophy (Laruelle), and post-humanist philosophy (Ferrando), are among the authors who inform the work of TAC Future Lab, as well as pre-modern philosophies (Lull, Leibnitz).-As an introduction to the session, we invited Pr Javier Carrillo to present his book Knowledge For the Anthropocene (Elgar, 2021), in which we initiated these post-humanist considerations.

Presentation

Building on her recent chapter ‘Designing post-human futures’ in Knowledge for the Anthropocene (eds, Carrillo, J. & Koch, G.), and current exhibition/lab ‘Toward Alien Cosmologies, prospective of an anthropological reset’ in Geneva, Raphaële Bidault-Waddington will introduce the diversity of emerging philosophies that she mobilizes to open, think and structure new future perspectives.

The Anthropocene, but also the AI era and the post-truth paradigm, currently shake all our anthropological foundations, ranging from our terrestrial anchoring and (toxic) lifestyles, to anthropocentric value-systems, rationality principles and forms of consciousness. How can we design resilient future worlds, or even cosmologies, to navigate these uncertain and blurry horizons? As Professor Carrillo will highlight in the introduction, the epistemological (and ethical) challenges raised by this unprecedented planetary context require innovation in both our foresight and cognitive practices.

Presenting LIID’s on-going R&D future lab, Raphaële will highlight non-conventional philosophies, such as post-humanist philosophies (Ferrando), speculative and non-standard philosophies (Meillassoux, Laruelle) and theory-fiction (Negarestani) among others, to explore new future rationalities and methodologies.

This research also includes reflections on knowledge formats and art-based experiments. Mixing her experiences in knowledge economy, conceptual art, urban design, academic research and pedagogy, Raphaële will show how she designs hybrid future labs and heuristic devices (conceptual maps, artistic installations, fiction and image-based speculative experiences, etc.) to address the complexity and cognitive challenge of the future. Her practice resonates with current foresight explorations on world-building and transition design (Zaidi), and with futurescaping practices (Jain).