The last Substack I wrote was about hope and how it creates agency. Being curious and also optimistic (as you know), I’ve been investigating useful things that we can do, when life feels so precarious and uncertain.
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Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this poor suffering world, will help immensely. It is not given to us to know which acts or by whom, will cause the critical mass to tip toward an enduring good.[i]
So, I’ve been exploring how to engage in meaningful and useful conversations with people who hold different view to my own. This stems from observing that civil society is becoming increasingly fragmented and I’ve realised that staying in my own ‘bubble’ isn’t useful - for me or my work. Because I think that understanding others is crucial.
The book shares the toolkit that Guzman has developed to help you exit your silo by leaving you assumptions behind, harnessing your curiosity and embracing (and exploring) complexity.
Breaking out of our silos
Guzman introduces a framework called SOS (Sorting – Othering – Siloing) to explain how we categorise, separate and insulate ourselves from different perspectives. We naturally gravitate toward those who think like us—our friends, media, books—but the deeper we settle into our silos, the harder it becomes to see other viewpoints as valid.
The longer you stay in the silo, the harder it gets to climb out. You can get so deep that you can’t imagine how anyone “normal” could think differently from the way you do. For Futures thinking, this is dangerous. It narrows your understanding – it stops you thinking outside your silo/comfort zone and stops your ability to expand your knowledge.
The power of Curiosity
Uncertainty and fear suppress curiosity. When we’re afraid, we shut down rather than engage and truly hear each other’s views and feelings. When you are afraid, you can’t have a curious conversation. These require courage.
To break free, ask the question, “What else? What am I missing?”. Open up to the possibilities that will emerge. It isn’t easy, yet it’s necessary if you are – for instance - Horizon Scanning for futures work. Exploring things that make you feel uncomfortable are necessary to get a clearer view of what is happening around you.
Guzman suggests exposing yourself to opposing perspectives. Read an article or listen to a podcast from someone with a different view, then ask:
“What’s the strongest argument on this other side?”… and “What are the deep-down honest concerns that are animating this perspective?”[ii]
This can lead to an ‘INTOIT’ moment - I Never Thought Of It That Way.
When I was writing our recent book, I was talking to one of my post grad students about it something we were covering. He told me (referring to a particular assertion we had made), “The Majority World wouldn’t see it that way.” My first instinct was to assume he meant people like me – a reaction shaped by my own paradigm. But I caught myself and asked what he meant. He explained that the Majority World refers to what we had previously called The Global South. That moment reshaped my understanding.
My INTOIT moment was that Majority World was a much better description AND that it was so easy to just go with my instinct (paradigm) and not check my assumptions. Recognising the significance of this term, we revised all references in our book to reflect this more accurate and respectful language.
You’ve probably heard the phrase: “Assumptions make an ASS out of U and ME (ASSUME).” Assumptions help you navigate uncertainty, but you must stay aware of them. You can notice what assumptions you make and keep them in mind. In futures work, we build scenarios which based on assumptions — but the key is being aware of them and questioning them. It helps us to write the narrative of each potential future.
I loved the reminder that people’s beliefs (and therefore their opinions) evolve over time, shaped by experience. I think differently now than I did even five years ago, let alone 30 years ago when I started to work in this field.
Building Bridges Through Personal Stories
The most effective and powerful way to connect – to bridge – across differences is through personal experience – sharing personal stories. People respect beliefs more when they are rooted in real-life stories - your personal experiences – especially when you share things that are painful to you and show vulnerability. When you ask how someone arrived at their belief, hopefully you will get stories that help you to understand what their journey was like.
The Courage to be Honest
Curiosity alone isn’t enough. We must also be courageous in our honesty. As Guzman writes:
“So there are two more things we need to do for our questions to get answers worth reaching for. We need to make it a priority to understand each other’s genuine meaning. And then, we need to make it OK for people to share what they really think.”
It means listening beyond just the words, checking for your own interpretations and respecting each other’s perspectives. It requires time, focus and a willingness to engage in genuine dialogue.
Each section of the book includes steps and exercises to practice these skills. I hope that you will find them valuable and that they help you build bridges to conversations rich in meaning and shared understanding.
New research suggests that the shutdown of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, a critical ocean current that is being weakened by climate change, is unlikely to occur this century, even under the most extreme climate scenarios.
2024 was an astonishingly good year for clean energy. The world installed 599 GW of solar panels last year, up by about a third from 2023. Generating power only 15% of the time, those panels should produce about 787 TWh of electricity — equivalent to the output of a third of the world’s nuclear reactors. Add that to the roughly 344 TWh of wind that was connected last year, and the incremental amount of wind and solar added in 2024 alone was equivalent to about 6.2% of all the fossil-fired electricity on the planet. Repeat that trick for 16 years running and hold demand steady, and net zero could, in theory, be solved.Bloomberg 🎁
Europe’s wild predators stage a stunning comeback. Since 2016, golden jackal numbers have surged by 46% to 150,000, wolves have increased by 35% to 23,000, brown bears by 17% to 20,500, and Eurasian lynx and wolverine populations expanded by 12% and 16% to 9,400 and 1,300 animals respectively. The best recovery? Iberian lynx numbers are up from 100 at the turn of the century to over 2,000 today. Guardian
Free AI model creates functional genomes. Scientists at Stanford have released Evo 2, biology's largest-ever AI model, trained on 128,000 genomes spanning all imaginable life forms, from humans to bacteria - the entire tree of life.
Imagine being able to speed up evolution – hypothetically – to learn which genes might have a harmful or beneficial effect on human health. Imagine, further, being able to rapidly generate new genetic sequences that could help cure disease or solve environmental challenges. Now, scientists have developed a generative AI tool that can predict the form and function of proteins coded in the DNA of all domains of life, identify molecules that could be useful for bioengineering and medicine, and allow labs to run dozens of other standard experiments with a virtual query – in minutes or hours instead of years (or millennia).
If you think humanity's still doomed, a reminder from UNICEF… Since 1990, annual under-five child mortality has declined by 60%. Since 2000, the number of children with stunting has declined by 40%. Safe water is available to 2.1 billion more people compared to 20 years ago. In the past 25 years around 1.9 million deaths and 4 million HIV infections have been averted among pregnant women and children. 23 million more girls finish high school each year compared to a decade ago. Open defecation has declined by two-thirds since 2000. 77% of children under five are registered, up from 60% in the early 2000s. Vaccines have saved 154 million lives in the last 50 years.
Scientists develop new malaria vaccine providing 90% protection with just one injection (for context, the two current malaria vaccines being rolled out across Africa require four doses, and are around 75% effective). This new vaccine uses genetically engineered parasites with two key genes deleted, allowing them to replicate in the liver while preventing progression to blood-stage malaria. Clinical trials are scheduled for 2025 in the United States, Germany, and Burkina Faso. Eureka Alert
"Being curious and also optimistic" sounds like a perfect combination.