Social Problems: Chapter 16 - What problems are on the way?

Genius forecasting

is a method that relies on intuition and insight. Many insights turn out to be wrong, but others are right. As Malcolm Gladwell has argues, individuals make very rapid intuitive judgments, decisions, and predictions, and many of them turn out to be correct. The likely reason that this method works as well as it does is because it builds on our own experiences.

Devil-Hunters

A category of utopian critics who are concerned with the importance of overcoming original sin or, at least, the notion that humans are unable to change their ways significantly.

Democrats

A category of utopian critics who think that utopia may invoke dictatorial tendencies.

Scenario Method

A narrative forecast that describes a potential course of events. It considers events such as new technology, population shifts, and changing consumer preferences. Scenarios, written as long-term predictions of the future, force decision makers to ask: (1) Can we survive the worst possible scenario? (2) Will we be happy with the most likely scenario? (3) Are we able to take advantage of the Best possible scenario?

Andrew Hacker

An American social theorist who decided that critics of Utopian thinking fall in to three categories; Democrats, Dialecticians, and Devil-Hunters

Panopticon

An all-seeing eye of authority, as proposed architecturally for maximum prison surveillance by the English utilitarian social philosopher Jeremy Bentham. A century and a half later the French social theorist Michel Foucault used bent hams concept of the panopticon as a metaphor for the modern-day surveillance society embodied in contemporary institutions.

Information Economy

An economy in which information is treated like any other commodity and can be bought, sold, traded and so on

Byrne

Our single best guess about the future is that people will continue to respond positively to new opportunities, and that new opportunities will continue to be provided by new technology among other things.

Noam Chomsky

Pessimistic view on the prospects of futures research: 'The record of prediction in human affairs had not been inspiring, even short-range. The most plausible predictions that any prediction about serious matters is likely to be off the mark, except by accident.'

Dystopias

Picture important negative principles of social organization - Things to avoid. (George Orwell's "1984" which miswritten to show the dangers of Soviet totalitarian government.

Utopias

Places where everything work in perfect harmony. Book written by Sir Thomas More

Dialecticians

a category of utopian critics who believe in the value of discovering historical law.

Functionalism

- Futures studies look into alternative futures and identify the most probable trend -Forecasting contribute in to today's decision making and planning by helping politicians devise social policies. -Looking into the future encourages people to reflect on current patterns of events and to make adjustments in preparation for the future

Environmental Damage

-Growing social problem - Scientist and environmentalists believe that even immediate changes would still result in more severe, and intense environmental complications in the future. -Global rise in temperature has resulted in droughts, famines, higher rates of skin cancer, and more extreme weather conditions throughout the year.

Feminist theory

Despite ongoing efforts made by women to overcome gender discrimination, inequalities in wage and job opportunities will continue to persist. Modern mothers must learn to negotiate a fine balance between work and family responsibilities as their participation in the labour force increases.

Conflict theory

Different forecasting and simulation methods produce different insights into the nature and probability of occurrence of certain events that may favour one population subgroup over another. Various interest groups compete for gov't support by raising and perhaps exaggerating particular concerns.

Trend Extrapolation

Extrapolation examines trends and cycles in historical data; it uses mathematical techniques to predict the future from the past (predicting birthrates in Canada in 2050 from the birthrates between 1950 and 2006). The weakness is that, with this method, the futher into the future we try to forecast, the less certain the forecast becomes

Consensus Methods (Trend Extrapolation)

Forecasting complex systems involves seeking expert opinions from more than one person

Symbolic interactionism

Gossip and rumour may spread misinformation and create moral panic or fear. The rise of cyberspace and virtual communities hides many social factors that often prevent similar people from interacting with one another.

Decision Tree

Graphical devices that help illustrate the relationships between choices. Decision theory, based on decision trees, is based on the idea that the expected value of an outcome variable can be calculated as the average value for that variable (i.e. the value of a decision is the value of the outcome it produces)

Desirable future

If a goal of forecasting is to create desirable futures, then the forecaster must ask the ethical question of 'desirable for whom'? Forecasters should at least try to engage as many people as possible in the forecasting process to increase their understanding and accuracy. According to Alexis de Tocqueville and Adam Smith, such widespread engagement will yield collective well-being through the pursuit of informed personal well-being.

Rumours

Information diffusion in which the content is not pure misinformation but is conceived for a purpose with limited reliability. As information provided to solve an ill-defined problem, rumours based on stereotypes or ideal images are likely than other rumours to gain media and popular currency and to resist denial.

Cyberspace

The abstract concept of 'where' computer-stored information is exchanged.

Genetic Manipulation

The altering of genes to produce a more desired physical trait. The dominant concern, is the ability to use technology in ways we have never used it before, due to a lack of government/institutional regulation.

Future Studies

The area of research concerned with forecasting possible scenarios - technological, economic, political, social, environmental - in order to prepare for and shape what may come.

Delphi Method

The best known consensus method - where a series of predictions are made based on the judgments and likelihood of certain outcomes, and then evaluate the answers given by peers. This approach is intended to produce a rapid narrowing of opinions among judgments by individual geniuses, and makes better use of expert knowledge than mathematical trend extrapolation

Social Constructionism

The future is a social construct, a form of propaganda designed to evoke a particular set of behaviours. -Media portrayals of social problems and trends exert a large influence on people's perspectives of society,may spark social movements, and contribute to policy making.

Technology

The manifestation of human knowledge and ingenuity applied to the solution of a problem or need: applied science.

The problem of aging

The variation in age composition within a society is important, because people of different ages behave differently. The aging of the Canadian population is mainly a result of continual drops of fertility, and increased longevity. Concern for whether or not young people can continue to support and ageing population and whether the health-care system can cope wight eh demands for better healthcare can be seen. First, childbearing generations can be encourages to increase the number of children produced. Second, Canada's immigration policy laws could be changed to allow more young immigrants from countries with high fertility. Third, a larger portion of the national budget could be invested in healthcare.

Millennium Project

a global participation system that collects, synthesizes, and feeds back judgements on an ongoing basis about prospects for the human condition. Reports such as State of the future, and futures research methodology help policy makers and educators add focus on important issues. The study was intended to explore social policy and ethical issues that arise in the future. -First Round asked participants to add future ethical issues to a list, and to discuss issues that are subject to change over the next 25 to 50 years. -Second round, participants were asked to rate a subset of these future ethical issues and value modification.

Data Smoothing (Trend extrapolation)

separate historical data into trends: seasonal and random parts.