How Beliefs Influence the Future

As a futurist, I spend a lot of time studying history.  Why?  As Aerosmith frontman, Steven Tyler sings, "We are all somebody from somewhere."  And that somewhere is often revealing.  We can see patterns in history.  Patterns that just might extend from the past to the future.  

One of the surprises of history is what historians refer to as the, "Special Century."  From 1870-1970 massive improvements in the standard of living were achieved across many regions of the world all at the same time.  These levels of improvements had never been seen before. During this period, we went from riding horses to landing on the moon!

A look at the history of technology and we see that during one 5 year period during the Special Century, 1875-1880, telephones, internal combustion engines, electric light bulbs and phonographs were all created.  During another 5 year span, 1900-1905, we invented the radio, air conditioning, vacuums and airplane flight!  Huge inventions that are still in our lives today.

The big surprise was not that these inventions and innovations happened, as the age of enlightenment, the scientific revolution and the industrial ages had already occurred, but why hadn't our standards of living increased earlier?  

For the majority of human history, people just tried to stay alive. There was no real hope or belief that things would be better for the next generation. 

For thousands of years parents believed they should have as many children as they could feed before they died.  Since the average person died at around 30 years of age - they had to get busy! Children, in their parents' minds, represented income, labor, and a support network.  Their belief and strategy, according to Thomas Robert Malthus, author of the Malthusian Poverty Trap, was to maximize the number of children one could have with the hope this would improve their lives.  Whenever there was more food, you had more children. The problem with this belief is one could never escape the poverty trap if you followed it.  Thousands of years of subsistence farming proved this.  No matter how many "subsistence farmers" you birthed, it never increased your standard of living!

The word "belief" is key here.  Studying history we see time and time again that beliefs could significantly impact, for good or bad, a people's standard of living.  The growing belief that families and their children could live a better life, and increase their standard of living through education, is one positive example of this. People had to stop believing that maximizing births and living as subsistence farmers was the answer, and start believing in the ROI of education, and the possibility of a better future.  People had to believe their children would be better off getting educated, rather than working 18 hours a day in dangerous factories, or in the fields. People had to first believe workers deserved a living wages, before activism could be organized.  People had to believe in the value of safe working conditions, before rules and regulations could be developed and enforced.

During the Progressive Era, (1896-1917) in the USA and other places people began to recognize and believe that technology alone wasn't going to make the world a better place. It would take a change in thinking and beliefs.  We needed to believe that humans were valuable and worthy of policies that support a better life and a higher standard of living.  Improved standards of living did not just happen. It took human agency.  It took belief, organization, collaboration and action. This belief inspired all kinds of actions and activism in the Special Century such as:

• Regulating big businesses to eliminate monopolies, unethical and unfair business practices
• Fighting for the 8-hour work day
• Reducing corruption
• Restricting child labor
• Requiring higher wages
• Requiring safe working conditions
• Women's Suffrage
• Improved access to education and technical training
• GI Bill
• Civil Rights

It was the convergence of science, technology, societal changes, geopolitical, economic and philosophical forces all at the same time, PLUS the belief that humans could and should influence their future by organizing and creating policies that improved the lives of other people that was key to improving the overall standard of living.  

Often when change is involved, even though it might be a positive change, our human brains resist.  Human's fear the new and uncertain.  Often in history we see that it takes a major catalyst, a shock, before we begin to change our traditional ways of thinking.  We see events like WWI, the Great Depression and WWII as catalysts that forced many to start thinking differently and evolving their beliefs.  History shows that unless we update and adjust our own beliefs, it's hard to recognize the full benefits of positive change.

From a technological perspective, we must recognize that while technology can facilitate positive changes, the outcomes depend significantly on the belief systems individuals and societies have, and how they choose to use and govern technology.   

What beliefs are you holding onto that prevent positive change entering your life?

*I use generative AI to assist in all my work.

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Kevin Benedict

Futurist at TCS

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***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.