Stepping Stones and Bridges
As a methodology for approaching future scenarios, I’ve identified what I’m calling stepping stones and bridges. These methodologies are based on my personal experience and are useful as metaphors for describing my thought processes. I’ve talked about them in my thesis report, and I actually wrote this post before the thesis report process, but I figure it’s good to post this stuff online too.
Bridges: Projecting into the future by building a tenable link between the present and the future situation.
Stepping stones: Using existing circumstances to project a possible future as a guide-post for future development. The connection between present and future is uncertain.
When building bridges, you look around and assess the situation and use that situation in a literal sense. This approach affords you a specific and concrete implementation which is limited by the physical constraints of the real world, in terms of people, objects, technology, infrastructure, etc.
When using stepping stones, you acknowledge the present circumstances and then throw a concept (stone) into the water ahead of you. Based on the relationship between that stone and the shore you’re standing on you can get a sense of the directions it enables and the challenges it poses.
You might guess that I’m a proponent of stepping stones, and I am. I see several benefits. You might have to toss out several stones before finding a direction that works, but the overall cost of doing so is probably less than building a bridge and realizing halfway through that it’s not heading in the right direction. Even if a particular concept doesn’t work, it’s still out there and can serve as a guidepost as you proceed along a different path. And who knows…paths based on stepping stones tend to be crooked (or at least the interesting paths are), so it’s quite possible that a particular concept may become useful further on in your journey.
I’m certainly finding that the previous work and concepts I’ve developed over my thesis year haven’t gone to waste: in some way they are all present in everything else I do. Perhaps it’s cherry-picking, but perhaps it just makes sense. Not everything is going to work, so pick the best parts of everything you’ve done and see what develops.