
Future Shock Documentary (1972) [video] - mindcrime
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkUwXenBokU
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techstrategist
I just read a related book, “The Shockwave Rider” from 1975, which apparently
Brennan said was derived from “Future Shock”. Despite some big misses in
predicting future tech, it was a very interesting exploration of the effects
of rapid change on individuals and society, and of course the protagonist
smart enough to ride the wave. Looking forward to watching this and reading
Future Shock.

Some highlights:

\- Plug in culture for skilled workers, seamlessly moving from city to city
and leaving everything behind.

\- A few asteroid mining companies have huge clout with government and
dominate the economy. Huge benefits and protections for executives. Higher
access to restricted data.

\- Average joes reduced to tribalism and street fighting.

\- Delphi prediction market allowing people to bet on and influence social
change.

~~~
adgasf
The Shockwave Rider is part of a sort-of-series of near-future novels by John
Brunner. The others are Stand on Zanzibar (overpopulation), The Sheep Look Up
(ecological catastrophe) and The Jagged Orbit (interracial violence).

~~~
mindcrime
I've read _The Shockwave Rider_ but not the others... definitely looking
forward to digging into the rest of the John Brunner catalog at some point.
Thanks for highlighting those!

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staticautomatic
Toffler and other "futurists" have always struck me as complete and utter
charlatans. His predictions or whatever you want to call them always seem to
fall into one of two categories: Things that are already happening or things
that have maybe a 50/50 chance of happening. As Filip Buekens wrote in "The
Dark Side of the Loon: Explaining the Temptations of Obscurantism"
([https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/55704402.pdf](https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/55704402.pdf)),
"[The] promise of a deep insight into intriguing subject matters is often
sufficient to lure the audience into a futile quest for understanding."

~~~
JakeAl
Toffler made predictions about culture and society, not tech. He "predictions"
were about about the impact of tech on the systems of society and culture as
dictated by the major waves of tech evolution since the dawn of man. The Third
Wave outlines the waves of history, Future Shock is about the friction of
assimilating to rapidly changing tech and culture, Powershift is about the
shift in power from a top down system to a producer-consumer system due to
decentralization and Revolutionary Wealth is about the revolution where new
business and economic models emerge such as patreon, bitcoin and the Gig
economy. I recommend all of these books as they outline a framework for
understanding the nature of the technological imperative.

~~~
staticautomatic
Using observational data to make inferences about what might happen in the
future is not called "futurism." It's called "intelligence."

~~~
mindcrime
That doesn't really matter. The point is, Toffler provided a useful framework
for thinking about the world and certain changes going on in the world.
Whether you call it "futurism", "intelligence", "black magic" or
"quxxikigibikig" is irrelevant.

And to your earlier point... no, "futurists" aren't always going to be right
about specific details of their predictions. And I doubt many of them would
claim that they are, or that that's even the goal. I think the real point of
"futurism" is to stimulate thinking about certain plausible events and
outcomes, and equip people to gain a small edge in gauging the probability of
certain events, or classes of events. In this regard, "futurism" is still
valuable, even if the crystal ball is a little fuzzy.

~~~
staticautomatic
A) It's not irrelevant at all. These people call(ed) themselves futurists. You
can't hand-wave away its semantic significance and pretend we don't need to
talk about how that word is bullshit.

B) I could hardly think of a less compelling defense of futurism than "a fuzzy
crystal ball is better than no crystal ball."

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octosphere
We live in a post-post-modern world. These days it's more relevant to read
Rushkoff and look into his 'present shock' idea:
[http://www.rushkoff.com/books/present-
shock/](http://www.rushkoff.com/books/present-shock/)

> In his new book, PRESENT SHOCK: When Everything Happens Now (Current; March
> 15, 2013), Rushkoff introduces the phenomenon of presentism, or – since most
> of us are finding it hard to adapt – present shock. Alvin Toffler’s radical
> 1970 book, Future Shock, theorized that things were changing so fast we
> would soon lose the ability to cope. Rushkoff argues that the future is now
> and we’re contending with a fundamentally new challenge. Whereas Toffler
> said we were disoriented by a future that was careening toward us, Rushkoff
> argues that we no longer have a sense of a future, of goals, of direction at
> all. We have a completely new relationship to time; we live in an always-on
> “now,” where the priorities of this moment seem to be everything.

~~~
__s
This reads as if they didn't read Future Shock. The book outlines Future Shock
as experiencing culture shock merely through observing that the future has
happened & what you grew up understanding is no longer sufficient to relate to
your surroundings

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bogomipz
Wow, Orson Welles is the host! I was not expecting that. I had no idea a
Future Shock documentary existed. Thanks for sharing.

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justtopost
For some reason I was expecting Herbie Hancock, even though I knew the album
came out later. Tangental, but that album lived up to the name. It was the 1st
to feature record scratching, and an early mastery of digital sampling.

This is a classic that I think should be shown in schools. And as much as I
abhor remakes, its time may be coming however. I just hope it can capture some
of the magic. The Cosmos continuation with Tyson is great, but it just doesnt
capture the joyous wonder for me that Sagan's did. I feel this film would lose
much of the awesome but sinister undertone without Welles.

~~~
gonzo
Hancock was early, but far from first.

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jacknews
It seems to still be completely relevant.

I wonder if Ridley Scott was inspired by 34:45 - 35:30

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dredmorbius
This documentary and the book it's based on are hugely relevant to the
present. I'd also recommend Herbert Simon's works (referenced in _Future
Shock_ ).

