Ourselves and the Future

When I was a boy, they tried to teach me arithmetic. I said: "I don't want it. I have no use for it." The adults warned me: "Someday you will be sorry." And I replied: "Perhaps—but now I don't want it."

What was happening here? I felt no obligation to the future "I" of twenty years hence. Even the I of tomorrow was uninteresting, and the I of an hour hence was merely a nuisance.

They said I was foolish. But I thought I was merely sensible, practical, realistic. Why should I bother about an "I" that I did not feel as "I"? I could not realise it, could not imagine it. It was just somebody else—a stranger who would someday occupy my place in the world.

But I soon learned to bother about the "I" of tomorrow, and even the I of next year, and ten years hence. And now I bother even over a more remote "I"—the old man I may become.

The upshot is this: we do not bother about a future I unless we have already come to feel it as in fact ourselves. The improvident person cannot be reached by reasoning that assumes the identity of present and future self. They must be reached through imagination—they must be helped to feel the future self as real, as truly "I."

Consider our own eating. We seldom do it "in order to live." We do it because the spirit moves us to it—a habitual response to the dinner bell. Much action of both humans and animals, though biologically serviceable, does not consciously anticipate the future at all.

Yet some animals do anticipate. Köhler's famous apes discovered solutions to problems—stacking boxes, using sticks—to get food they could see but not immediately reach. This requires a kind of mental projection into the future.

Gradually, through evolution and culture, anticipation becomes commoner and more far-reaching. This is the story I want to trace.

Consider the evolution of our awareness of the future:

First, there are creatures that live only in the present—no memory, no anticipation, an eternal present. Even dogs may have no real memory, only sketchy recognition. A bird's nest-building is not genuine anticipation of eggs and chicks, but merely a pleasurable activity triggered by instinct.

Second, ape-men: gleams of real memory and anticipation appear. Perhaps they prepared for tomorrow, perhaps even stored food.

Third, savages: they make boats, houses, earthworks, dams. They store food for winter. They plan expeditions against enemies. The tumuli they built for their dead show concern for something beyond immediate life.

Fourth, barbarians: large-scale buildings appear, often influenced by awareness of death. Pyramids, tombs, palaces, temples—the Egyptians with their mummies planned for eternity.

Fifth, civilized men: roads, aqueducts, castles, harbours. Trading expeditions spanning many years.

Sixth, modern men: large public works—the Suez Canal, large-scale drainage and irrigation, afforestation (though still very backward), electricity schemes like the Shannon project, and scientific research that may not bear fruit for generations.

And yet—we are still very short-sighted. We seldom look further than a few years ahead. Our planning horizon, despite all our technology, remains remarkably limited.

We can also distinguish grades of development in our interest in the future:

First, the primitive momentary "I," not aware of a future or a past—pure present-tense existence.

Second, the "I" that recognizes its future theoretically but cannot be bothered with it. This is the child, like the boy I was with my arithmetic.

Third, the "I" that actually prepares for its future—for tomorrow, next year, and throughout life.

Fourth, the "I" that recognizes a future beyond its own death but cannot be bothered with it.

Fifth, the "I" that prepares for a future beyond its own life—for its children's future, for the future of its firm, craft, college, profession, nation, city, and ultimately for the future of the human race.

These stages represent levels of imagination and intelligence. To each level, the one below seems stupid, and the one above seems madly idealistic.

As our apprehension increases, we conceive wider loyalties. The child scoffs at loyalty to its own future self—but that loyalty inevitably emerges with maturity.

Today, many scoff at loyalty to humanity as a whole. But it too emerges, inevitably, as the world becomes more unified and as knowledge increases—barring catastrophic accidents, of course. The trajectory of human development points toward ever-wider circles of concern.

What factors govern our interest in the future?

(a) The bare apprehension that there is a future arises from memory. Memory gives me my past; what was present is now past, replaced by a new present. From this I expect an infinite series of new presents—the future.

(b) Our apprehension of the future is limited by our power of imagining the circumstances to come. In boyhood, we cannot imagine much of manhood—neither what it will feel like nor what the circumstances will be.

(c) Interest in a future beyond our own lives depends on parental impulses—care for our children or for future generations generally. It also depends on the clarity of our vision. The more doubtful and vague the future seems, the less we are concerned about it.

(d) Extension of interest to the "future of society" depends on how far we can foresee—on how much the present can suggest about what is to come.

(e) Crucially, we are interested in the future of some object or other, not in "futurity" as an abstraction. We care about the future of "I," of children, of group, nation, or world.

The reach of our interest depends on the object's prospect of life. The momentary self has no prospect beyond the moment. "I" sustains interest up to its death—perhaps seventy years. A group like a college might last decades. A nation might last centuries. But humanity has a prospect of millions of years. If we can learn to identify with humanity, our interest extends correspondingly.

Now let me talk about future events themselves—the grades of futurity, from near to far:

First, the nearest of all futures—fractions of a second. The approaching missile, when it is too late even to blink.

Second, less near but still very near—seconds. The approaching tennis ball. The shell has burst—will a splinter get me?

Third, quarter hours and hours. Am I going to bore you? Shall I catch the train home?

Fourth, months, weeks, days. How shall I pay the January income tax?

Fifth, years and decades. How educate one's children? How establish them for life? How provide for one's old age? How will England emerge from this crisis?

Sixth, centuries and thousands of years. What happens when oil is exhausted? When coal runs out?

Seventh, hundreds of thousands to millions of years. When we are fully clear of the effects of the previous ice age.

Eighth, hundreds of millions to thousands of millions of years. When all existing mountains have been worn flat. When the next mountain-forming age comes.

Ninth, millions of millions of years. When the Earth itself becomes uninhabitable.

Tenth, millions of millions of millions of years. When the universe has run down completely—the final heat death of all things.

The scale is almost beyond imagination. Yet all these futures are real, and some of them should concern us.

Today, what futures concern us? We should distinguish what futures do concern us from what futures ought to concern us.

First, each of us is chiefly concerned with our own future, near and far. What shall I do tomorrow? How meet next year's problems? How meet old age?

Second, many are concerned with the future of their children—education, career, establishment in life.

Third, all are concerned, as citizens, with the future of the nation. But mostly we feel we cannot do much about it, save through mass movements of opinion.

Fourth, all ought to be concerned with the future of humanity. Individual acts may seem ineffectual, but massed opinions and acts are important. Public opinion does control public policy—in the long run.

Note that the future of humanity reaches further than the future of any nation. Humanity will outlast nations, just as humanity is older than nations. Nations are temporary arrangements; the species is (relatively) permanent.

But in a comparatively near future, the good of one nation may conflict with the good of humanity as a whole. Policies that would preserve a particular nation might harm humanity—either soon or in the long run. This is the fundamental problem of nationalism: loyalty to a part that may conflict with loyalty to the whole.

Should we bother about the future of humanity? There are arguments against:

(a) Humanity is too diverse, too vague, too unreal to appeal to us. What have the races in common? We cannot get in touch with each other. English and French will never agree. "East is East and West is West." The Chinese eat birds' nests!

Answer: The world becomes more and more one—not necessarily in political organization, but in common interests and culture. Nations cannot afford to be exclusive. Trade, communications, and shared problems bind us together whether we like it or not.

(b) Present races will not last forever. In a thousand years, nations and races will be quite different from today.

True—but this is an argument for thinking in terms of humanity, not against it. What persists through all changes is the human species, not any particular nation or race.

What can we actually do about the future of humanity?

First, we can avoid acts which would jeopardize it or wreck such civilization as we have. A really destructive war. Wasteful consumption of irreplaceable resources—oil, nitrates. Undermining human nature itself through misguided social policy or reckless biological control.

Second, we can learn to think and feel in terms of humanity, and in terms of a long future. This means using our imaginations. This is our chief task at present: to familiarize ourselves with the idea of "Man"—to feel humanity as a real entity whose future matters, just as we have learned to feel our own future selves as real.

Third, we can begin to form an ideal of what humanity should do with itself. For example:

(a) Produce beings capable of richer experience—profounder knowing, finer feeling, more reasonable will. Each individual should be self-harmonious, an integrated personality.

(b) To achieve this, produce very diverse, original beings—not stereotyped, not mass-produced minds.

(c) Beings in perfect accord with one another—not merely tolerating each other but genuinely appreciating and complementing each other.

(d) A society of just the right size—achieving the proper balance between organization and freedom.

Further ideals will emerge as we proceed. The vision grows clearer as we approach it.

Fourth, practical steps: world organization and, perhaps, careful eugenics—though we must be very cautious here, having learned the dangers of misguided biological intervention.