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We are routinely reminded of the social and environmental issues pervading the present: pollution, global warming, species extinction, social volatility, fake news, the growing disparity in wealth. These issues prompt us to act but leave us to decide which of the many proposed solutions will deliver the future we hope for. Should we put our faith in technology, innovation, the market? Should we trust science, change our behaviour, adjust our lifestyles? Should we just carry on as usual?
Our decisions will necessarily influence our future.
Framework for Our Future treats our current circumstance as part of a dynamic, complex human-environment system. It describes how we (as individuals), our culture and the environment interact, with feedback, over a wide range of scales to form the humanenvironment system and the constraints this imposes on our lives. It provides a model of the system that helps us to more fully appreciate how we arrived at our current circumstance, our contribution to it, how we change and our views about our possible futures. With this in place, Framework for Our Future asks us to consider an alternative possible future, viability, and suggests how we might gain the wisdom, and make the decisions and changes, to achieve it.
Framework for Our Future is an abridged version of Viability, Complexity and Us: The Framework Constraining Our Future (Knight 2019).
John Knight
Dr John Knight is Associate Professor in Biomedical Science within the College Of Human and Health Sciences at Swansea University. For the last 20 years he has taught Anatomy, Physiology and Pathophysiology on a wide variety of professional degree and diploma programmes including: Health and Social Care, Paramedic Science, Nursing and Midwifery. John′s first degree is in microbiology; additionally he holds a Ph.D. in immunology and has over 50 published articles in peer reviewed journals. His teaching at Swansea University has recently been recognized by the presentation of a Distinguished Teaching Award; John has a variety of research interests including the evolution of immune responses, the physiological effects of ageing and immobility and the use of Virtual Reality simulations in the teaching of Anatomy and Physiology.
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