October 10, 2023 Applying the principles of Fatal Certainty to current affairsThe sudden, obviously long-planned attack by Hamas forces across the border of Gaza with Israel has the entire world’s attention. President Joe Biden has promised that the United States’ support for Israel is “rock-solid.” Republicans in Congress blame the attack on…
Category: War
Popular Culture
“Barbenheimer” and the Need for Rigorous Imagination
August 15, 2023 “Barbie was everything we didn’t want to be . . . everything the feminist movement was trying to escape.” – Gloria Steinem on Barbie (the doll) I’ve had a week or two to digest the two giant moviegoing experiences of the summer, and it occurs to me…
Popular Culture
“Oppenheimer” and the Real Miracle of the Nuclear Age
July 31, 2023 The Christopher Nolan film “Oppenheimer” is all over the headlines this summer (along with the film “Barbie,” directed by Greta Gerwig). Having just watched it, as a professional scenario planner and “futurist” (whatever that might mean), I have thoughts. The main thought is my amazement that we…
Fatal Certainty - Excerpts
How Will the War in Ukraine Turn Out?
No One Knows, So We’d Better Start Imagining July 26, 2023 Some 2500 years ago, a ruler of a great kingdom, Croesus of Lydia, saw a threat to his regime arising on his border. A new leader, Cyrus, had already created an empire that dwarfed Lydia, the Achaemenid Persian empire. Croesus,…