[On Sept 17, 2014, I presented the same material as a webinar to the INCOSE Central Arizona Chapter. Here is the video of the presentation if you're interested. All my references are the same below. I'd like to thank the CAZC Board -- Joe Marvin, Carl Landrum, and Chris Giudice -- for setting it up.]
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Last night, Aug 20, 2014, I had the privilege to speak to the INCOSE WMA Chapter, the largest chapter on the planet. I want to thank Kevin Weinstein, the Chapter President and Dr. Steven Dam, the Programs Chair for inviting me.
It is extremely difficult to predict the future. But I say System Engineers should be at the forefront of innovation and invention as we bring a holistic point of view to these complex and world-spanning problems. So take your place in making a better world and a brighter future.
You can download my "Prezi" presentation as a PDF if you want but it will be hard to follow without the words and the cool zoom-in and zoom-out feature of Prezi. However, I do have links to most of my references within the pdf document.
Here is the YouTube Video "Joy" from the National Academy of Engineering. More inspiring video can be found on their website: http://www.engineeringchallenges.org/
Just to set last night’s lecture in context, back in February I gave a lecture on INCOSE Vision 2020 to the INCOSE CAB Webinar Series and wrote it about in my blog post: The Future of Systems Engineering (Vision 2020). It was fairly successful so when Dr. Dam asked if I wanted to speak at one of the WMA’s monthly meetings I suggested the same topic but I’ll update it for the INCOSE Vision 2025, which would be released later in the year. We settled on an August meeting. Then I got invited to be the moderator at the closing Plenary for INCOSE International Symposium 2014, it was a panel discussion on the just-released INCOSE’s SE Vision 2025. All and all I’ve been immersed in this stuff. Below are references I alluded to during my talk.
The Vision Documents
- INCOSE Vision 2025
- US National Academy of Engineering (NAE) identified Grand Engineering Challenges for the 21st Century.
- Longitude Prize 2014
- X PRIZES Foundation
Books and Articles
- McPherson, S. S. (2013). War of the Currents: Thomas Edison Vs Nikola Tesla (Scientific Rivalries and Scandals). Minneapolis: Twenty-First Century Books.
- Petroski, H. (1990). The pencil: a history of design and circumstance. New York: Knopf
- Sobel, D. (1995). Longitude: the true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time. New York: Walker.
- Fast Company had an article called, “Industrial Research Looks into the Future, and You Can Too!” where they outlined the processes that companies can use to “predict the future”
Planet Money Podcasts
The June 2014 issue of IEEE Spectrum was dedicated to “The Future we Deserve.”
“Applying the rules of reason, the findings of science, the aesthetics of art, and the spark of creative imagination, (Systems Engineers) will continue the tradition of forging a better future.”
- Great issue filled with hopeful articles on the Next 50 years in Biomed, Space, Science, Movies, Energy, Cars, Mobile, and Robots. They even have side articles on “What could possibly go wrong” just to be sure the full consequences are thought through. Great reading. And it’s where I got one of anecdotes for my lecture: In order to commemorate the 1964 New York Worlds Fair, Isaac Asimov wrote an essay where he tried to imagine what 2014 be like. As you can imagine, it just shows the “Pitfalls of Prediction.”
