Preparing for Heat Waves In a World Primed to Cook
Are we there yet? Have people finally cottoned on to the idea that maybe, things aren’t going so well for the planet and our place in it? Storms, up; floods, up; fires, up; droughts, up; people being displaced by climate events, up. The signals are all around us.
And yet, as a species we struggle to respond fully, deliberately to emerging crisis UNLESS we are viscerally involved. Many of us simply do not know what it means to experience a heat wave event or a flood or poverty until, well, we’re in that state. The paradox – is that until we’re involved, we’re not engaged enough to fully think about what we might do, and that is a huge risk when you’re talking about the welfare of people.
Which is why scenarios are a brilliant way of bringing people to an understanding beyond the spreadsheet data. You aim to make your scenario as neurologically rich as you can, engaging as many senses as you can to help your participants get into the headspace that allows them to appreciate what might be possible. In that space of ‘experience’ they’re able to make better decisions in ADVANCE of when an event might occur.
Coming up in September I’m facilitating the Heat Health Scenario for the City of Greater Dandenong (CGD) as they explore how ready they are to deal with a long standing heat event, who they will have to assist, and what capabilities and other agency resources they may have to draw on to deal with what is a clear survival issue for their residents. It’ll be in a different format from others I’ve conducted for the Dairy Industry, Defence Industry, Manufacturing sector, Waste sector and more. We’ll use the minds of people on stage to advance the narrative in more ‘immediate time’ and help push our thinking as far as we can go to find what gaps might exist in their planning.
What’s significant about this for a Council is that they’re inviting a whole range of other experts from outside Council to help them understand what is and isn’t possible. And using the Drum Theatre as the staging grounds allows a few neurologically engaging elements to be brought into play. It’ll be a challenging day for all both on and off stage stage.
A quick note for the history buffs among us – in this month of August fifty years ago, the first components of the Berlin Wall were constructed with rings of barbed wire severing Berlin into visually distinct west and east Berlin. Russia’s main challenge at that time was the 10,000 or so East Germans each…
Read More >Let me start by saying that my Masters of Science qualification is NOT held in economics and with that said I’m holding an interested person’s perspective toward wanting to know ‘why’ and ‘how’. I have some questions and thoughts about the theory of Supply and Demand and would be happy to have some feedback from…
Read More >Below you’ll find this afternoon’s discussion with ABC Darwin radio in which host Vicki Kerrigan chats with futurist Marcus Barber about the emerging research into lab grown meat as a potential addition to or replacement of, existing livestock farming methods. The program streamed live on 105.7 ABC Darwin this afternoon, discussing the University of…
Read More >Continuing the futures discussions on ABC Darwin Radio, this time with Paul Dale who is filling in for Vicki Kerrigan whilst Vicki is handling the breakfast time slot, we discuss some of the conference sessions at the World Futures Conference here in Vancouver You can listen to the audio stream here and cue this…
Read More >My slides from today’s presentation on ‘Getting You Future Right’ can be found at the link below To those at the session, my apologies for the technical challenges and hope these slides can provide more context for you – contact me if you have any questions. Access the Slides Here
Read More >Here’s the upload of my conversation with Vicki Kerrigan at ABC Radio Darwin. In it I offer the first three of ten steps designed to help you get your future right. In last week’s session I left Vicki with a question to ponder: Is my life headed where I want it to go, and if…
Read More >Futurist Marcus Barber will be joining ABC’s Vicki Kerrigan in Darwin for the first of an ongoing discussion about the future this Wednesday. Each week on Wednesday afternoon’s, Vicki and Marcus will discuss the future of something, how we prepare for the future, what the future looks like for some industries and other related futures…
Read More >The panel session at the National Manufacturing Week 2011 went well though with four of us on the panel, time was quite compressed. Some really good thoughts from Phillip Chindamo from AIG, Damon Cantwell from Deloitte and Erol Harvey from Minifab, delightfully chaired by Sandra George from SEBN at the City of Greater Dandenong. Rather…
Read More >On Thursday I’ll be part of the panel that wraps up the National Manufacturing Week 2011 in Melbourne at the Melbourne Convention & Exhibition Centre under the theme of Meeting the challenges of the next generation of manufacturing with a focus on Innovation and Sustainability. It should be an interesting chat as we consider what…
Read More >There’s lots to like about borrowing ideas from other areas especially where those ideas can lead to a significant positive shift. In the link below, Zaid Ali Alsagoff an educational blogging specialist highlights why the Finnish Education system stands as a potential model to embrace. And whilst there are examples of this type of thinking…
Read More >