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Stanisław Lem

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Futures studies , futures research , futurism research, futurism, or futurology is the systematic, interdisciplinary and holistic study of social/technological advancement, and other environmental trends; often for the purpose of exploring how people will live and work in the future. Predictive techniques, such as forecasting , can be applied, but contemporary futures studies scholars emphasize the importance of systematically exploring alternatives. In general, it can be considered as a branch of the social sciences and an extension to the field of history. Futures studies (abbreviated to "'futures" by most of the field's practitioners) seeks to understand what is likely to continue and what could plausibly change. Part of the discipline thus seeks a systematic and pattern-based understanding of past and present, and to explore the possibility of future events and trends.

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122-473: Stanisław Herman Lem ( Polish: [staˈɲiswaf ˈlɛm] ; 12 September 1921 – 27 March 2006) was a Polish writer. He was the author of many novels, short stories, and essays on various subjects, including philosophy, futurology , and literary criticism . Many of his science fiction stories are of satirical and humorous character. Lem's books have been translated into more than 50 languages and have sold more than 45 million copies. Worldwide, he

244-557: A bona fide trend. Trends can also gain confirmation by the existence of other trends perceived as springing from the same branch. Some commentators claim that when 15% to 25% of a given population integrates an innovation, project, belief or action into their daily life then a trend becomes mainstream. Gartner created their Hype cycle to illustrate the phases a technology moves through as it grows from research and development to mainstream adoption. The unrealistic expectations and subsequent disillusionment that virtual reality experienced in

366-549: A forerunner of social and technological forecasting. A series of techno-optimistic newspaper articles and books were published between 1890 and 1914 in the US and Europe. After World War I the Italian Futurism movement led by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti glorified modernity . Soviet futurists, such as Vladimir Mayakovsky , David Burliuk , and Vasily Kamensky struggled against official communist cultural policy throughout

488-515: A form of invisibility from censorship. His works were widely translated abroad, appearing in over 40 languages and have sold over 45 million copies. As of 2020, about 1.5 million copies were sold in Poland after his death, with the annual numbers of 100,000 matching the new bestsellers. Franz Rottensteiner , Lem's former agent abroad, had this to say about Lem's reception on international markets: With [number of translations and copies sold], Lem

610-528: A hospital, at a maternity ward, where he assisted at a number of childbirths and a caesarean section . Lem said that the sight of blood was one of the reasons he decided to drop medicine. Lem started his literary work in 1946 with a number of publications in different genres, including poetry, as well as his first science fiction novel, The Man from Mars , serialized in Nowy Świat Przygód  [ pl ] ( New World of Adventures ). Between 1948 and 1950 Lem

732-664: A mass movement of people expelled from their homes in the process of ethnic consolidation throughout nations of Central and Eastern Europe. The new border between post-war Poland and the Soviet Union along the Curzon Line , as requested by Soviet Premier Josef Stalin at the Yalta Conference with the Western Allies, had been ratified. There was an ensuing population exchange that affected close to half

854-593: A master's degree program in 1975 at the University of Houston–Clear Lake . In 1976, the M.A. Program in Public Policy in Alternative Futures at the University of Hawaii at Manoa was established. Alvin & Heidi Toffler 's bestseller Future Shock in 1970 generated mainstream attention for futures studies on the post-industrial economy . It popularized the metaphor of waves to describe

976-558: A mechanical universe inhabited by robots (who have occasional contact with biological "slimies" and human "palefaces"). Lem also underlines the uncertainties of evolution, including that it might not progress upwards in intelligence. The Investigation and The Chain of Chance are crime novels (the latter without a murderer); Pamiętnik... is a psychological drama inspired by Kafka . A Perfect Vacuum and Imaginary Magnitude are collections of reviews of and introductions to non-existent books . Similarly, Provocations purports to review

1098-796: A million ethnic Ukrainians and about 1.1 million Poles and Polish Jews . The eastern and central areas of the Soviet republics remained unchanged, but the western regions of the Ukrainian and the Byelorussian SSR underwent dramatic expansion at the expense of the Second Polish Republic . The so-called repatriation pertained to rural populations as much as the inhabitants of provincial capitals and stripped them of their prewar economic catchment areas (Grodno, Brest, Lviv, Przemyśl). About 480,000 people from Zakerzonia , west of

1220-400: A narrower, more specified system is studied, futures studies concerns a much bigger and more complex world system. The methodology and knowledge are less proven than in natural science and social sciences like sociology and economics. There used to be a debate as to whether this discipline was an art or science, and it was sometimes described as pseudoscience ; Nevertheless, the study of

1342-478: A non-existent Holocaust -themed work. Dialogs and Summa Technologiae (1964) are Lem's two most famous philosophical texts. The Summa is notable for being a unique analysis of prospective social, cybernetic, and biological advances; in this work, Lem discusses philosophical implications of technologies that were completely in the realm of science fiction at the time, but are gaining importance today—for instance, virtual reality and nanotechnology . Throughout

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1464-530: A plausible theory of knowledge and instead turned to pluralism . At the 1967 First international Future Research Conference" in Oslo research on urban sprawl , hunger , and education was presented. In 1968 Olaf Helmer of the RAND Corporation conceded "One begins to realize that there is a wealth of possible futures and that these possibilities can be shaped in different ways". Future studies worked on

1586-605: A process together with familiarity with the fundamental attributes of most commonly used methods. Futurology is sometimes described by scientists as a pseudoscience , as it often deals with speculative scenarios and long-term predictions that can be difficult to test using traditional scientific methods. Futurists use a diverse range of forecasting and foresight methods including: Futurists use scenarios—alternative possible futures—as an important tool. To some extent, people can determine what they consider probable or desirable using qualitative and quantitative methods. By looking at

1708-434: A profound basis. A fad operates in the short term, shows the vagaries of fashion, affects particular societal groups, and spreads quickly but superficially. Futurists have a decidedly mixed reputation and a patchy track record at successful prediction. Many 1950s futurists predicted commonplace space tourism by 2000, but ignored the possibilities of ubiquitous, cheap computers. On the other hand, many forecasts have portrayed

1830-637: A range of possibilities can enhance the recognition of opportunities and threats. Every successful and unsuccessful business engages in futuring to some degree—for example in research and development, innovation and market research, anticipating competitor behavior and so on. Role-playing is another way that possible futures can be collectively explored, as in the research larp Civilisation's Waiting Room . In futures research "weak signals" may be understood as advanced, noisy and socially situated indicators of change in trends and systems that constitute raw informational material for enabling anticipatory action. There

1952-481: A similar work, Imaginary Magnitude , was published. In 1976, Lem published two works: " The Mask " and The Chain of Chance . In 1980, he published another set of reviews of non-existent works, Provocation . The following year saw another Tichy novel, Observation on the Spot , and Golem XIV . Later in that decade, Lem published Peace on Earth (1984) and Fiasco (1986), his last science fiction novel. In

2074-416: A theme that usually was not favored by the censors: Lem's youth in the pre-war, then-Polish, Lviv. 1968 and 1970 saw two more non-fiction treatises, The Philosophy of Chance and Science Fiction and Futurology . Ijon Tichy returned in 1971's The Futurological Congress ; in the same year Lem released a genre-mixing experiment, A Perfect Vacuum , a collection of reviews of non-existent books . In 1973

2196-484: A trend and was about to be a topic of mainstream awareness. "Wild cards" refer to low-probability and high-impact events "that happen quickly" and "have huge sweeping consequences", and materialize too quickly for social systems to effectively respond. Elina Hiltunen notes that wild cards are not new, though they have become more prevalent. One reason for this may be the increasingly fast pace of change. Oliver Markley proposed four types of wild cards: He posits that it

2318-479: A variety of possibilities one comes closer to shaping the future, rather than predicting it. Shaping alternative futures starts by establishing a number of scenarios. Setting up scenarios takes place as a process with many stages, and can take place in an evidence-based manner. Scenarios can also study unlikely and improbable developments that would otherwise be ignored. However, for credibility, they should not be entirely utopian or dystopian. One of those stages involves

2440-616: Is already Here . Fred L. Polak published Images of the Future in 1961, it has become a classic text on imagining alternative futures. In the 1960s, human-centered methods of future studies were developed in Europe by Bertrand de Jouvenel and Johan Galtung . The positivist idea of a single future was challenged by scientists such as Thomas Kuhn , Karl Popper , and Jürgen Habermas . Future studies established itself as an academic field when social scientists began to question positivism as

2562-481: Is an interdisciplinary field that aggregates and analyzes trends, with both lay and professional methods, to compose possible futures. It includes analyzing the sources, patterns, and causes of change and stability in an attempt to develop foresight. Around the world the field is variously referred to as futures studies , futures research, strategic foresight , futuristics , futures thinking , futuring , and futurology . Futures studies and strategic foresight are

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2684-405: Is an adaptation of Stanisław Lem's 1964 novel . Lem's early works were socialist realist , possibly to satisfy state censorship, and in his later years he was critical of this aspect of them. In 1982, with the onset of the martial law in Poland , Lem moved to Berlin for studies, and the next year he moved for several years (1983–1988) to Vienna. He never showed any wish to relocate permanently in

2806-533: Is best known as the author of the 1961 novel Solaris . In 1976 Theodore Sturgeon wrote that Lem was the most widely read science fiction writer in the world. Lem was the author of the fundamental philosophical work Summa Technologiae , in which he anticipated the creation of virtual reality , artificial intelligence , and also developed the ideas of human autoevolution, the creation of artificial worlds , and many others. Lem's science fiction works explore philosophical themes through speculations on technology,

2928-529: Is highly inspired by his works, as its creators said at the start of 2021, designated the " Year of Lem ". A major character in the film Planet 51 , an alien Lem, was named by screenwriter Joe Stillman after Stanisław Lem. Since the film was intended to be a parody of American pulp science fiction shot in Eastern Europe, Stillman thought that it would be hilarious to hint at the writer whose works have nothing to do with little green men . Solaris

3050-455: Is important to track the emergence of "Type II Wild Cards" that have a high probability of occurring, but low credibility that it will happen. This focus is especially important to note because it is often difficult to persuade people to accept something they do not believe is happening, until they see the wild card. An example is climate change. This hypothesis has gone from Type I (high impact and high credibility, but low probability where science

3172-528: Is offered at the University of Turku , Finland. The University of Stellenbosch Business School in South Africa offers a PGDip in Future Studies as well as a MPhil in Future Studies degree. Population exchange between Poland and Soviet Ukraine The population exchange between Poland and Soviet Ukraine at the end of World War II was based on a treaty signed on 9 September 1944 by

3294-450: Is one of the most highly acclaimed science fiction writers, hailed by critics as equal to such classic authors as H. G. Wells and Olaf Stapledon . In 1976, Theodore Sturgeon wrote that Lem was the most widely read science fiction writer in the world. In Poland, in the 1960s and 1970s, Lem remained under the radar of mainstream critics, who dismissed him as a "mass market", low-brow, youth-oriented writer; such dismissal might have given him

3416-632: Is selected for examination. The domain is the main idea of the project, or what the outcome of the project seeks to determine. Domains can have a strategic or exploratory focus and must narrow down the scope of the research. It examines what will, and more importantly, will not be discussed in the research. Futures practitioners study trends focusing on STEEP (Social, Technological, Economic, Environments and Political) baselines. Baseline exploration examine current STEEP environments to determine normal trends, called baselines. Next, practitioners use scenarios to explore different futures outcomes. Scenarios examine how

3538-430: Is some confusion about the definition of weak signal by various researchers and consultants. Sometimes it is referred as future oriented information, sometimes more like emerging issues. The confusion has been partly clarified with the concept 'the future sign', by separating signal, issue and interpretation of the future sign. A weak signal can be an early indicator of coming change, and an example might also help clarify

3660-631: Is the most successful author in modern Polish fiction; nevertheless his commercial success in the world is limited, and the bulk of his large editions was due to the special publishing conditions in the Communist countries : Poland, the Soviet Union, and the German Democratic Republic . Only in West Germany was Lem really a critical and a commercial success [... and everywhere ...] in recent years interest in him has waned. Lem

3782-570: Is the only writer of European [science fiction, most of whose] books have been translated into English, and [...] kept in print in the USA. Lem's critical success in English is due mostly to the excellent translations of Michael Kandel . Will Wright 's popular city-planning game SimCity was partly inspired by Lem's short story " The Seventh Sally " in The Cyberiad . The video game Stellaris

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3904-597: The Nazi legislation that brought home to me the realization that I had Jewish blood in my veins. During that time, Lem earned a living as a car mechanic and welder, and occasionally stole munitions from storehouses (to which he had access as an employee of a German company) to pass them on to the Polish resistance . In 1945, Lwów was annexed into the Soviet Ukraine , and the family, along with many other Polish citizens,

4026-614: The Tableau Economique , so that future production could be planned. Meanwhile, Anne Robert Jacques Turgot first articulated the law of diminishing returns . In 1793 the Chinese bureaucrat Hong Liangji forecasted future population growth . The Industrial Revolution was on the verge of spreading across the European continent, when in 1798 Thomas Malthus published An essay on the principle of Population as it affects

4148-594: The Ukrainian SSR with the newly-formed Polish Committee of National Liberation (PKWN). The exchange stipulated the transfer of ethnic Ukrainians who had Polish citizenship before September 17, 1939 to the Ukrainian SSR and of ethnic Poles and Jews who had Polish citizenship before September 17, 1939 (date of the Soviet Invasion of Poland ) to post-war Poland, in accordance with the resolutions of

4270-442: The palaeolithic period to the present provides an example. Megatrends are likely to produce greater change than any previous one, because technology is causing trends to unfold at an accelerating pace. The concept was popularized by the 1982 book Megatrends by futurist John Naisbitt . Possible new trends grow from innovations, projects, beliefs or actions and activism that have the potential to grow and eventually go mainstream in

4392-461: The 17th century prompted attempts to calculate statistical and probabilistic concepts. Objectivity became linked to knowledge that could be expressed in numerical data. In 18th century Britain, investors established mathematical formulas to assess the future value of an asset . In 1758 the French economist François Quesnay proceeded to establish a quantitative model of the entire economy, known as

4514-568: The 1950s also contain various elements of socialist realism as well as of the "glorious future of communism" forced upon him by the censors and editors. Lem later criticized several of his early pieces as compromised by the ideological pressure. Lem became truly productive after 1956, when the de-Stalinization period in the Soviet Union led to the " Polish October ", when Poland experienced an increase in freedom of speech . Between 1956 and 1968, Lem authored seventeen books. His writing over

4636-575: The 1990s and early 2000s is an example of the middle phases encountered before a technology can begin to be integrated into society. Education in the field of futures studies has taken place for some time. Beginning in the United States in the 1960s, it has since developed in many different countries. Futures education encourages the use of concepts, tools and processes that allow students to think long-term, consequentially, and imaginatively. It generally helps students to: Thorough documentation of

4758-489: The 1990s large technology foresight programs were launched which informed national and regional strategies on science, technology and innovation . Prior to the 1990s foresight was rarely used to describe future studies, futurology or forecasting . Foresight prognosis relied in part on the methodologies developed by the French pioneers of prospectives research, including Bertrand de Jouvenel . Foresight practitioners attempted to gather and evaluate evidence based insights for

4880-504: The 1990s, Lem forswore science fiction and returned to futurological prognostications, most notably those expressed in Okamgnienie  [ pl ] [ Blink of an Eye ]. He had a deep appreciation for the works of Polish writer Czesław Miłosz and respected Józef Piłsudski as a national leader. Lem said that since the success of the trade union Solidarity , and the collapse of the Soviet empire , he felt his wild dreams about

5002-454: The 20th century. In Japan, futurists gained traction after World War I by denouncing the Meiji era and glorifying speed and technological progress. With the end of World War I interest in statistical forecasting intensified. In statistics, a forecast is a calculation of a future event's magnitude or probability . Forecasting calculates the future, while an estimate attempts to establish

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5124-621: The Background of the Universal Gravitation ), a memoir which contains numerous personal details about Lem. The book jacket says Tomasz works as a translator and has a daughter, Anna. As of 1984, Lem's writing pattern was to get up a short time before five in the morning and start writing soon after, for 5 or 6 hours before taking a break. Lem was an aggressive driver. He loved sweets (especially halva and chocolate-covered marzipan ), and did not give them up even when, toward

5246-624: The Curzon Line, were moved eastward to the territory, which became part of Soviet Ukraine and Belarus. With the signing of the agreement in September 1944, people who were required to register for resettlement were identified only by ethnicity, not by the country of birth. Ukrainians residing west of the border were required to register with the Polish authorities, and the Poles living east of

5368-506: The End of the Universe (1963) (which didn't credit Lem as writer of the original book The Magellanic Cloud ) and Przekładaniec (1968) (which was based upon his short story "Do You Exist, Mr Jones?"). A list of works by Stanisław Lem and their subsequent adaptations in other media: A list of books and monographs about Stanisław Lem: Futurology Unlike the physical sciences where

5490-577: The Future Improvement of Society . Malthus questioned optimistic utopias and theories of progress . Malthus' fear about the survival of the human race is regarded as an early European dystopia . Starting in the 1830s, Auguste Comte developed theories of social evolution and claimed that metapatterns could be discerned in social change. In the 1870s Herbert Spencer blended Compte's theories with Charles Darwin 's biological evolution theory . Social Darwinism became popular in Europe and

5612-594: The Graduate Institute of Futures Studies is an MA Program. Only ten students are accepted annually in the program. Associated with the program is the Journal of Futures Studies . The longest running Future Studies program in North America was established in 1975 at the University of Houston–Clear Lake . It moved to the University of Houston in 2007 and renamed the degree to Foresight. The program

5734-577: The Interfuture group at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Club of Rome . The Club of Rome challenged the political status quo in 1972 with the report The Limits to Growth by putting computer simulations of economic growth alongside projections of population growth . The 1972 report The Limits to Growth established environmental degradation firmly on

5856-606: The SFWA members as a rebuke for his stance, and it seems that Lem interpreted it as such. Lem was invited to stay on with the organization with a regular membership, but he declined. After many members (including Ursula K. Le Guin , who quit her membership and then refused the Nebula Award for Best Novelette for The Diary of the Rose ) protested against Lem's treatment by the SFWA, a member offered to pay his dues. Lem never accepted

5978-587: The STEEP categories of Social, Technological, Economic, Environmental and Political. Third, futures studies challenges and unpacks the assumptions behind dominant and contending views of the future. The future thus is not empty but fraught with hidden assumptions. For example, many people expect the collapse of the Earth's ecosystem in the near future, while others believe the current ecosystem will survive indefinitely. A foresight approach would seek to analyze and highlight

6100-636: The Stars , was translated into English by Katarzyna Gucio and published by Routledge . It discussed aspects of Lem's life, such as being forced to wear the yellow badge and being struck for not removing his hat in the presence of Germans, as required of Jews at the time. Lem loved movies and greatly enjoyed artistic cinema (especially the movies of Luis Buñuel ). He also liked King Kong , James Bond , Star Wars , and Star Trek movies but he remained mostly displeased by movies which were based upon his own stories. The only notable exceptions are Voyage to

6222-475: The USA. By the late 19th century, the belief in human progress and the triumph of scientific invention prevailed and science fiction became a popular future narrative. In 1888 William Morris published News from Nowhere , in which he theorized about how working time could be reduced. The British H. G. Wells established the genre of "true science fiction" at the turn of the century. Well's works were supposedly based on sound scientific knowledge. Wells became

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6344-655: The Ukrainians were not permitted to leave Soviet Ukraine. In August 1945, the campaign to resettle entered a new phase. To achieve the political objective of relocating the Ukrainian ethnic population from Poland, the Polish government abandoned the relatively-benign character of the policy toward a more aggressive approach. There was significant resistance, as most Ukrainians did not want to abandon their ancestral lands and resettle to Soviet Ukraine. In that regard, Polish and Soviet security forces were deployed ( KBW and MVD , respectively) to force people to relocate. With time,

6466-544: The West. By the standards of the Eastern Bloc , Lem was financially well off for most of his life. Lem was a critic of capitalism , totalitarianism , and of both Stalinist and Western ideologies. Lem believed there were no absolutes. He said: "I should wish, as do most men, that immutable truths existed, that not all would be eroded by the impact of historical time, that there were some essential propositions, be it only in

6588-719: The Yalta and Tehran conferences and the plans about the new Poland–Ukraine border . Similar agreements were signed with the Byelorussian SSR (see Population exchange between Poland and Soviet Belarus ) and the Lithuanian SSR (see Population exchange between Poland and Soviet Lithuania ); the three documents are commonly known as the Republican Agreements  [ pl ] . The population transfer, which took place in 1944 to 1946, became part of

6710-514: The academic field's most commonly used terms in the English-speaking world. Foresight was the original term and was first used in this sense by H. G. Wells in 1932. "Futurology" is a term common in encyclopedias, though it is used almost exclusively by nonpractitioners today, at least in the English-speaking world. "Futurology" is defined as the "study of the future". The term was coined by German professor Ossip K. Flechtheim in

6832-416: The assumptions underpinning such views. As a field, futures studies expands on the research component, by emphasizing the communication of a strategy and the actionable steps needed to implement the plan or plans leading to the preferable future. It is in this regard, that futures studies evolves from an academic exercise to a more traditional business-like practice, looking to better prepare organizations for

6954-457: The basis that a multitude of possible futures could be estimated, forecast, and manipulated. Futures studies was developed as an empirical research field. Inspired by Herman Kahn 's publications, future studies employed techniques such as scenario planning , game theory , and computer simulations . Historians, political scientists and sociologists who engaged in critical futures studies, such as Ossip K. Flechtheim , and Johan Galtung , laid

7076-497: The border of philosophy and sociology of science and futurology, Summa Technologiae , as well as a novel, The Invincible . 1965 saw the publication of The Cyberiad and of a short story collection, The Hunt ( Polowanie  [ pl ] ). 1966 was the year of Highcastle , followed in 1968 by His Master's Voice and Tales of Pirx the Pilot . Highcastle was another of Lem's autobiographical works, and touched upon

7198-532: The border registered with the Soviet NKVD . To guarantee efficiency and prevent the haulage of empty wagons, the resettled people were loaded onto the same returning trains on both sides of the new border. According to statistical data, rural inhabitants (453,766 people) represented 58% of all relocated Poles, while urban residents (328,908 people) accounted for the remaining percentage. The number of Ukrainians registered between October 1944 and September 1946

7320-517: The confusion. On May 27, 2012, hundreds of people gathered for a "Take the Flour Back" demonstration at Rothamsted Research in Harpenden, UK, to oppose a publicly funded trial of genetically modified wheat. This was a weak signal for a broader shift in consumer sentiment against genetically modified foods. When Whole Foods mandated the labeling of GMOs in 2013, this non-GMO idea had already become

7442-786: The course of the next year. Evidently, some of these predictions may come true as the year unfolds, though many fail. When predicted events fail to take place, the authors of the predictions may state that misinterpretation of the "signs" and portents may explain the failure of the prediction. Marketers have increasingly started to embrace futures studies, in an effort to benefit from an increasingly competitive marketplace with fast production cycles, using such techniques as trendspotting as popularized by Faith Popcorn . Trends come in different sizes. A megatrend extends over many generations, and in cases of climate, megatrends can cover periods prior to human existence. They describe complex interactions between many factors. The increase in population from

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7564-439: The economic and social changes the United States was experiencing. The authors identified the first wave as agricultural society , the second wave as industrial society and the nascent third wave as information society . In the 1970s, future studies focused less on Cold War scenarios and instead grappled on the impact of accelerated globalization . Pioneers of global future studies include Pierre Wack of Royal Dutch Shell ,

7686-664: The end of his life, he fell ill with diabetes . In the mid-80s due to health problems he stopped smoking. Coffee often featured in Lem's writing and interviews. Stanisław Lem died from a heart failure in the hospital of the Jagiellonian University Medical College , Kraków on 27 March 2006 at the age of 84. He was buried at Salwator Cemetery , Sector W, Row 4, grave 17 ( Polish : cmentarz Salwatorski, sektor W, rząd 4, grób 17 ). In November 2021, Agnieszka Gajewska 's biography of Lem, Holocaust and

7808-639: The entirety of his life, Stanisław Lem remained deeply attached to his original hometown of Lwów (then in Poland, now Lviv in Ukraine) and missed it greatly. Although he never called for Poland to retake the city, he expressed sorrow and felt a sense of injustice at Poland losing the city to the USSR after the Second World War. His criticism of most science fiction surfaced in literary and philosophical essays Science Fiction and Futurology and interviews. In

7930-433: The failure of first contact . Another key recurring theme is the shortcomings of humans. In His Master's Voice , Lem describes the failure of humanity's intelligence to decipher and truly comprehend an apparent message from space. Two overlapping arcs of short stories, Fables for Robots and The Cyberiad provide a commentary on humanity in the form of a series of grotesque, humorous, fairytale -like short stories about

8052-499: The field of human values, the basic values, etc. In brief, I long for the absolute. But at the same time I am firmly convinced that there are no absolutes, that everything is historical, and that you cannot get away from history." Lem was concerned that if the human race attained prosperity and comfort, this would lead it to passiveness and degeneration. Lem was a polyglot : he knew Polish, Latin (from medical school), German, French, English, Russian and Ukrainian. Lem claimed that his IQ

8174-399: The field. Learning about medium and long-term developments may at times be observed from their early signs. As a rule, futures studies is generally concerned with changes of transformative impact, rather than those of an incremental or narrow scope. The futures field also excludes those who make future predictions through professed supernatural means. To complete a futures study, a domain

8296-544: The foundations of peace and conflict studies as an academic discipline. The international academic dialogue on futures studies became institutionalized in the form of the World Futures Studies Federation (WFSF), founded in 1967. The first doctoral program on the Study of the Future, was founded in 1969 at the University of Massachusetts by Christopher Dede and Billy Rojas. Dede also founded

8418-683: The future as an academic discipline gradually gained ground, and parallel to this development, corporations and governments began employing people trained in this field. This resulted in, for example, the Association of Professional Futurists being formed in 2002, developing a Foresight Competency Model in 2017, and it is now possible to study it academically, for example at the FU Berlin in their master's course. To encourage inclusive and cross-disciplinary discussions about futures studies, UNESCO declared December 2 as World Futures Day. Futurology

8540-405: The future can be different. 1. Collapse Scenarios seek to answer: What happens if the STEEP baselines fall into ruin and no longer exist? How will that impact STEEP categories? 2. Transformation Scenarios: explore futures with the baseline of society transiting to a "new" state. How are the STEEP categories effected if society has a whole new structure? 3. New Equilibrium: examines an entire change to

8662-497: The future could no longer compare with reality. He became increasingly critical of modern technology in his later life, criticising inventions such as the Internet, which he said "makes it easier to hurt our neighbors." He was a proponent of nuclear power , which he saw as a potential means for Poland to secure its sovereignty via reducing dependency on fossil fuels from Russia. In his 2004-2006 columns for Tygodnik Powszechny , Lem

8784-527: The future with some degree of accuracy. Sample predicted futures range from predicted ecological catastrophes , through a utopian future where the poorest human being lives in what present-day observers would regard as wealth and comfort, through the transformation of humanity into a posthuman life-form, to the destruction of all life on Earth in, say, a nanotechnological disaster . For reasons of convenience, futurists have often extrapolated present technical and societal trends and assumed they will develop at

8906-450: The future". There is no single set of methods that are appropriate for all futures research. Different futures researchers intentionally or unintentionally promote use of favored techniques over a more structured approach. Selection of methods for use on futures research projects has so far been dominated by the intuition and insight of practitioners; but can better identify a balanced selection of techniques via acknowledgement of foresight as

9028-462: The future. Futures studies does not generally focus on short term predictions such as interest rates over the next business cycle , or of managers or investors with short-term time horizons. Most strategic planning, which develops goals and objectives with time horizons of one to three years, is also not considered futures. Plans and strategies with longer time horizons that specifically attempt to anticipate possible future events are definitely part of

9150-709: The future. Very often, trends relate to one another the same way as a tree-trunk relates to branches and twigs. For example, a well-documented movement toward equality between men and women might represent a branch trend. The trend toward reducing differences in the salaries of men and women in the Western world could form a twig on that branch. Understanding the technology adoption cycle helps futurists monitor trend development. Trends start as weak signals by small mentions in fringe media outlets, discussion conversations or blog posts, often by innovators. As these ideas, projects, beliefs or technologies gain acceptance, they move into

9272-748: The future. Foresight research output focused on identifying challenges and opportunities, which was presented as intelligence at a strategic level. Practitioners tended to focus on particular companies or economic regions, while making no attempt to plan for specific problems. In the 1990s several future studies practitioners attempted to synthesize a coherent framework for the futures studies research field, including Wendell Bell 's two-volume work, The Foundations of Futures Studies , and Ziauddin Sardar 's Rescuing all of our Futures . Futures techniques or methodologies may be viewed as "frameworks for making sense of data generated by structured processes to think about

9394-476: The genre of science fiction, and his general pessimism regarding technical progress. He viewed the human body as unsuitable for space travel, held that information technology drowns people in a glut of low-quality information , and considered truly intelligent robots as both undesirable and impossible to construct. Lem's prose shows a mastery of numerous genres and themes. One of Lem's major recurring themes, beginning from his very first novel, The Man from Mars ,

9516-665: The history of futures education exists, for example in the work of Richard A. Slaughter (2004), David Hicks, Ivana Milojević to name a few. While futures studies remains a relatively new academic tradition, numerous tertiary institutions around the world teach it. These vary from small programs, or universities with just one or two classes, to programs that offer certificates and incorporate futures studies into other degrees, (for example in planning , business, environmental studies, economics, development studies, science and technology studies). Various formal Masters-level programs exist on six continents. Finally, doctoral dissertations around

9638-584: The late 1970s and early 1980s, Lem cautiously supported the Polish dissident movement , and started publishing essays in the Paris-based magazine Kultura . In 1982, with martial law in Poland declared, Lem moved to West Berlin , where he became a fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study, Berlin ( Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin ). After that, he settled in Vienna . He returned to Poland in 1988. From

9760-465: The late 1980s onwards, Lem tended to concentrate on philosophical texts and essays, published in Polish magazines including Tygodnik Powszechny , Odra , and Przegląd . These were later collected in a number of anthologies. In early 1980s literary critic and historian Stanisław Bereś conducted a lengthy interview with Lem, which was published in book format in 1987 as Rozmowy ze Stanisławem Lemem ( Conversations with Stanisław Lem) . That edition

9882-469: The mid-1940s, who proposed it as a new branch of knowledge that would include a new science of probability . This term has fallen from favor in recent decades because modern practitioners stress the importance of alternative, plausible, preferable and plural futures, rather than one monolithic future, and the limitations of prediction and probability, versus the creation of possible and preferable futures. Three factors usually distinguish futures studies from

10004-472: The most often cited examples of a wild card event in recent history is 9/11. Nothing had happened in the past that could point to such a possibility and yet it had a huge impact on everyday life in the United States, from simple tasks like how to travel via airplane to deeper cultural values. Wild card events might also be natural disasters, such as Hurricane Katrina , which can force the relocation of huge populations and wipe out entire crops or completely disrupt

10126-516: The nature of intelligence , the impossibility of communication with and understanding of alien intelligence , despair about human limitations, and humanity's place in the universe. His essays and philosophical books cover these and many other topics. Translating his works is difficult due to Lem's elaborate neologisms and idiomatic wordplay. The Sejm (the lower house of the Polish Parliament ) declared 2021 Stanisław Lem Year . Lem

10248-415: The next three decades or so was split between science fiction and essays about science and culture. In 1957, he published his first non-fiction, philosophical book, Dialogs , as well as a science fiction anthology, The Star Diaries , collecting short stories about one of his most popular characters, Ijon Tichy . 1959 saw the publication of three books: the novels Eden and The Investigation , and

10370-432: The offer. Lem singled out only one American science fiction writer for praise, Philip K. Dick , in a 1984 English-language anthology of his critical essays, Microworlds: Writings on Science Fiction and Fantasy . Lem had initially held a low opinion of Philip K. Dick (as he did for the bulk of American science fiction) and would later say that this was due to a limited familiarity with Dick's work, since Western literature

10492-510: The phase of early adopters. In the beginning of a trend's development, it is difficult to tell if it will become a significant trend that creates changes or merely a trendy fad that fades into forgotten history. Trends will emerge as initially unconnected dots but eventually coalesce into persistent change. Some trends emerge when enough confirmation occurs in the various media, surveys or questionnaires to show that it has an increasingly accepted value, behavior or technology, it becomes accepted as

10614-464: The political agenda. The environmental movement demanded of industry and policymakers to consider long-term implications when planning and investing in power plants and infrastructure. The 1990s saw a surge in futures studies in preparation for the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals , which were adopted in 2000 as international development goals for the year 2015. Throughout

10736-415: The pretence of "voluntary resettlement" was dropped. Groups and entire villages were forced out of their homes and directed to embark on transports bound for the Soviet Union. Within the course of a single year, July 1945-July 1946, close to 500,000 Ukrainians and Rusyns had been uprooted and deported in that manner. The resettlement operation concluded in September 1946. The campaign to resettle Ukrainians

10858-400: The publication of another science fiction novel, The Magellanic Cloud . During the era of Stalinism in Poland , which had begun in the late 1940s, all published works had to be directly approved by the state. Thus The Astronauts was not, in fact, the first novel Lem finished, just the first that made it past the state censors. Going by the date of the finished manuscript, Lem's first book

10980-471: The publisher, he held Lem personally responsible (see Microworlds ). Also it was suggested that Dick was under the influence of strong medications, including opioids, and may have experienced a "slight disconnect from reality" some time before writing the letter. A "defensive patriotism" of Dick against Lem's attacks on American science fiction may have played some role as well. Lem would later mention Dick in his monograph Science Fiction and Futurology . Lem

11102-402: The qualifying English-language publications. Lem never had a high opinion of American science fiction , describing it as ill-thought-out, poorly written, and interested more in making money than in ideas or new literary forms. After his eventual American publication, when he became eligible for regular membership, his honorary membership was rescinded. This formal action was interpreted by some of

11224-434: The research conducted by other disciplines (although all of these disciplines overlap, to differing degrees). First, futures studies often examines trends to compose possible, probable, and preferable futures along with the role "wild cards" can play on future scenarios. Second, futures studies typically attempts to gain a holistic or systemic view based on insights from a range of different disciplines, generally focusing on

11346-399: The resettlement campaign, all eligible individuals were required to register with local Polish district commissions set up in the key cities of Jarosław , Gorlice , Krasnystaw , Chełm, Lublin , Biłgoraj , Jasło , Zamość and Nowy Sącz . The function of the commissions, which were staffed with both Polish communists and Soviet personnel, was not only to register, coordinate and facilitate

11468-568: The resettlement of the Ukrainians remaining in southeastern Poland into the Recovered Territories . Orest Subtelny , a Canadian historian of Ukrainian descent, concluded "that the separation of the two people was a necessary precondition for the development of a mutually beneficial relationship between them. Apparently, the old adage that 'good fences make for good neighbors' has been proven once more," he wrote. [REDACTED] Media related to Expulsion of Ukrainians from Poland to

11590-715: The same rate into the future; but technical progress and social upheavals, in reality, take place in fits and starts and in different areas at different rates. Therefore, to some degree, the field has aimed to move away from prediction. Current futurists often present multiple scenarios that help their audience envision what "may" occur instead of "predicting the future". They claim that understanding potential scenarios helps individuals and organizations prepare with flexibility. Many corporations use futurists as part of their risk management strategy, for horizon scanning and emerging issues analysis, and to identify wild cards —low probability, potentially high-impact risks. Understanding

11712-522: The screen adaptations, with the sole exception of Przekładaniec in 1968 by Andrzej Wajda . In 2013, the Israeli–Polish co-production The Congress was released, inspired by Lem's novel The Futurological Congress . György Pálfi directed a film adaptation of His Master's Voice with the same title, which was released in 2018. In 2023, 11 Bit Studios published The Invincible , an adventure video game developed by Starward Industries. The game

11834-642: The seven meters estimated rise. This concept may be embedded in standard foresight projects and introduced into anticipatory decision-making activity in order to increase the ability of social groups adapt to surprises arising in turbulent business environments. Such sudden and unique incidents might constitute turning points in the evolution of a certain trend or system. Wild cards may or may not be announced by weak signals, which are incomplete and fragmented data from which relevant foresight information might be inferred. Sometimes, mistakenly, wild cards and weak signals are considered as synonyms, which they are not. One of

11956-409: The short story anthology An Invasion from Aldebaran ( Inwazja z Aldebarana ). 1961 saw the novels Memoirs Found in a Bathtub , Solaris , and Return from the Stars , with Solaris being among his top works. This was followed by a collection of his essays and non-fiction prose, Wejście na orbitę (1962), and a short story anthology Noc księżycowa (1963). In 1964, Lem published a large work on

12078-446: The structure of the domain. What happens if the baseline changes to a "new" baseline within the same structure of society? Johan Galtung and Sohail Inayatullah argue that the search for grand patterns goes all the way back to Sima Qian (145–90 BC) and Ibn Khaldun (1332–1406). Early western examples include Sir Thomas More 's Utopia (1516) in which a future society has overcome poverty and misery. Advances in mathematics in

12200-434: The study of emerging issues, such as megatrends , trends and weak signals . Megatrends illustrate major, long-term phenomena that change slowly, are often interlinked and cannot be transformed in an instant. Trends express an increase or a decrease in a phenomenon, and there are many ways to spot trends. Some argue that a trend persists long-term and long-range; affects many societal groups; grows slowly; and appears to have

12322-578: The supply chain of many businesses. Although wild card events cannot be predicted, after they occur it is often easy to reflect back and convincingly explain why they happened. A long-running tradition in various cultures, and especially in the media, involves various spokespersons making predictions for the upcoming year at the beginning of the year. These predictions are thought-provokers, which sometimes base themselves on current trends in culture (music, movies, fashion, politics); sometimes they make hopeful guesses as to what major events might take place over

12444-463: The transportation of individuals, but also to conduct propaganda work among the target population. Because of the propaganda, which falsely promised Ukrainians better living conditions in Soviet Ukraine, there was some initial success. However, the number of applications for resettlement tapered off by mid-1945, as word spread concerning the true conditions of the agreement, and by the fact that

12566-451: The value of an existing quantity . In the United States, President Hoover established a Research Committee on Social Trends in 1929 headed by William F. Ogburn . Past statistics were used to chart trends and project those trends into the future. Planning became part of the political decision-making process after World War II as capitalist and communist governments across the globe produced predictive forecasts. The RAND Corporation

12688-454: The world appears to me to be put together in such a painful way that I prefer to believe that it was not created ... intentionally". In later years he would call himself both an agnostic and an atheist. After the 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland's former eastern territory (now part of Ukraine and Belarus), he was not allowed to study at Lwów Polytechnic as he wished because of his " bourgeois origin", and only due to his father's connections he

12810-429: The world have incorporated futures studies (see e.g. Rohrbeck, 2010; von der Gracht, 2008; Hines, 2012 ). A recent survey documented approximately 50 cases of futures studies at the tertiary level. A Futures Studies program is offered at Tamkang University , Taiwan. Futures Studies is a required course at the undergraduate level, with between three and five thousand students taking classes on an annual basis. Housed in

12932-503: The world were delivering one or more courses in futures studies. The World Futures Studies Federation has a comprehensive survey of global futures programs and courses. The Acceleration Studies Foundation maintains an annotated list of primary and secondary graduate futures studies programs. A MA Program in Futures Studies has been offered at Free University of Berlin since 2010. A MSocSc and PhD program in Futures Studies

13054-634: Was 492,682. Of the total, 482,880 individuals were eventually relocated to Soviet Ukraine, settling primarily in the Ternopil , Ivano-Frankivsk , and Lviv Oblasts (provinces), in the southern and south-western oblasts of Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk , and to a lesser extent the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. The largest resettlement of Ukrainians from Poland took place in the border counties of Hrubieszów , Przemyśl and Sanok , followed by Lubaczów , Tomaszów , Lesko , Jarosław and Chełm . During

13176-485: Was a partly autobiographical novel Hospital of the Transfiguration , finished in 1948. It would be published seven years later, in 1955, as a part of the trilogy Czas nieutracony ( Time Not Lost ). The experience of trying to push Czas nieutracony through the censors was one of the major reasons Lem decided to focus on the less-censored genre of science fiction. Nonetheless, most of Lem's works published in

13298-459: Was accepted and thought unlikely to happen) to Type II (high probability, high impact, but low credibility as policy makers and lobbyists push back against the science), to Type III (high probability, high impact, disputed credibility) — at least for most people: There are still some who probably will not accept the science until the Greenland ice sheet has completely melted and sea-level has risen

13420-606: Was accepted to study medicine at Lwów University in 1940. During the subsequent Nazi occupation (1941–1944), Lem's Jewish family avoided placement in the Nazi Lwów Ghetto , surviving with false papers. He would later recall: During that period, I learned in a very personal, practical way that I was no " Aryan ". I knew that my ancestors were Jews, but I knew nothing of the Mosaic faith and, regrettably, nothing at all of Jewish culture . So it was, strictly speaking, only

13542-771: Was born in 1921 in Lwów, interwar Poland (now Lviv , Ukraine). According to his own account, he was actually born on 13 September, but the date was changed to the 12th on his birth certificate because of superstition . He was the son of Sabina née Woller (1892–1979) and Samuel Lem (1879–1954), a wealthy laryngologist and former physician in the Austro-Hungarian Army , and first cousin to Polish poet Marian Hemar (Lem's father's sister's son). In later years Lem sometimes claimed to have been raised Roman Catholic , but he went to Jewish religious lessons during his school years. He later became an atheist "for moral reasons ...

13664-437: Was established on the belief that if history is studied and taught in an academic setting, then so should the future. Its mission is to prepare professional futurists. The curriculum incorporates a blend of the essential theory, a framework and methods for doing the work, and a focus on application for clients in business, government, nonprofits, and society in general. As of 2003, over 40 tertiary education establishments around

13786-464: Was founded in 1945 to assist the US military with post-war planning. The long-term planning of military and industrial Cold War efforts peaked in the 1960s when peace research emerged as a counter-movement and the positivist idea of "the one predictable future" was called into question. In 1954 Robert Jungk published a critique of the US and the supposed colonization of the future in Tomorrow

13908-613: Was hard to come by in the Polish People's Republic . Dick alleged that Stanisław Lem was probably a false name used by a composite committee operating on orders of the Communist party to gain control over public opinion, and wrote a letter to the FBI to that effect. There were several attempts to explain Dick's act. Lem was responsible for the Polish translation of Dick's work Ubik in 1972, and when Dick felt monetarily short-changed by

14030-629: Was highly critical of Vladimir Putin , George W. Bush , Andrzej Lepper , Samoobrona , the League of Polish Families , and the All-Polish Youth . Lem was awarded an honorary membership in the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) in 1973. SFWA honorary membership is given to people who do not meet the publishing criteria for joining the regular membership, but who would be welcomed as members had their work appeared in

14152-592: Was in large part intended to remove any base for the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which had conducted the massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia since 1943. The UPA was somewhat successful in disrupting the 1944-1946 transfers. Difficulties in suppressing the UPA insurgency, however, prompted the Polish and Soviet communist governments to pursue Operation Vistula in 1947, which entailed

14274-743: Was made into a film in 1968 by Russian director Boris Nirenburg, a film in 1972 by Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky —which won a Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1972—and an American film in 2002 by Steven Soderbergh . Film critics have noted the influence of Tarkovsky's adaptation on later science fiction films such as Event Horizon (1997) and Christopher Nolan 's Inception (2010). A number of other dramatic and musical adaptations of his work exist, such as adaptations of The Astronauts ( First Spaceship on Venus , 1960) and The Magellanic Cloud ( Ikarie XB-1 , 1963). Lem himself was, however, critical of most of

14396-483: Was resettled to Kraków , where Lem, at his father's insistence, took up medical studies at the Jagiellonian University . He did not take his final examinations on purpose, to avoid the career of military doctor, which he suspected could have become lifelong. After receiving absolutorium (Latin term for the evidence of completion of the studies without diploma), he did an obligatory monthly work at

14518-661: Was subject to censorship. A revised, complete edition was published in 2002 as Tako rzecze… Lem ( Thus spoke... Lem ). In the early 1990s, Lem met with the literary critic and scholar Peter Swirski for a series of extensive interviews, published together with other critical materials and translations as A Stanislaw Lem Reader (1997). In these interviews Lem speaks about a range of issues he rarely discussed previously. The book also includes Swirski's translation of Lem's retrospective essay "Thirty Years Later", devoted to Lem's nonfictional treatise Summa Technologiae . During later interviews in 2005, Lem expressed his disappointment with

14640-497: Was tested at high school as 180. In 1953, Lem met radiology student Barbara Leśniak, whom he married in a civil ceremony the same year. The couple's church marriage ceremony was performed in February 1954. Barbara died on 27 April 2016. Their only child, Tomasz  [ pl ] (born 1968), who graduated with a degree in physics from Princeton University , has written Awantury na tle powszechnego ciążenia ( Tantrums on

14762-580: Was the impossibility of communication between profoundly alien beings , which may have no common ground with human intelligence, and humans. The best known example is the living planetary ocean in Solaris . Other examples include the intelligent swarms of mechanical insect-like micromachines in The Invincible , and strangely ordered societies of more human-like beings in Fiasco and Eden , describing

14884-415: Was working as a scientific research assistant at the Jagiellonian University , and published a number of short stories, poems, reviews, etc., particularly in the magazine Tygodnik Powszechny . In 1951, he published his first book, The Astronauts . In 1954, he published a short story collection, Sezam i inne opowiadania  [ pl ] [ Sesame and Other Stories ] . The following year, 1955, saw

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