EU Scream – Ep.110: Philosophy and Future Generations
Podcast Date: September 4, 2024
Host: James Kanter (with interview segments)
Guest: Roman Krznaric, social philosopher, author of The Good Ancestor

Episode Overview

This episode explores the philosophy and politics of caring for future generations, focusing on why societies should look many decades, or even centuries, ahead when making decisions—especially in the context of the climate crisis. Host James Kanter interviews Roman Krznaric, whose work has helped inspire momentum for “future generations” policies and institutions in governments across Europe and beyond. They discuss humanity's cognitive and cultural biases toward short-termism, alternative models from indigenous and contemporary societies, how politics and economics “discount” the value of future people, and the differences between Krznaric’s ideas and those of the “longtermism” and “effective altruism” movements.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Human Nature and Long-Term Thinking

• Eudaimonia vs. Hedonia
  • Krznaric introduces eudaimonia as “seeking a life of meaning or flourishing” contrasted with hedonia, which is about pleasure ([02:21]).
• Marshmallow Brain vs. Acorn Brain
  • Krznaric explains that while humans are wired for both short- and long-term thinking, modern culture amplifies the urge for immediate gratification (“marshmallow brain”) at the expense of our capacity for planning (“acorn brain”) ([04:30]; [06:44]).
  • Notable quote:

    “We live in an age of the tyranny of the now, where our politicians can barely see beyond the next election or the latest tweet, businesses can't see beyond the quarterly report.”
    — Roman Krznaric [08:48]

• Origins of Short-Termism
  • Beyond technology and social media, Krznaric traces “short-term culture” to the invention of mechanical clocks and the structuring of time into smaller and smaller units since the 14th century ([09:12]).

Memorable Analogy

“If alien scientists wanted to destroy our species...they would invent something like global warming, which would slip under the radar of the human brain because we simply aren't very good at acting on long term threats.”
— Krznaric reading from his book The Good Ancestor [04:02]

2. Institutions and Policy: Expanding the Time Horizon

• Current Limits
  • “The public future ‘goes dark’ after about three decades… beyond 2050 is a policy horizon few governments plan for.” ([11:27])
• Historical Examples
  • The Victorian-era construction of London’s sewers, built double-size to serve future populations, as a precedent for bold long-term infrastructure ([12:12]).
• Policy Innovations
  • Wales’s Well-Being of Future Generations Act (2015) and Commissioner serve as a model for integrating long-term thinking into governance, influencing the Netherlands and attracting attention from the EU ([14:13]).
  • Krznaric recommends coupling such roles with citizens’ assemblies for greater legitimacy ([15:35]).
• Intergenerational Fairness in Budgets
  • Canada’s federal budget now reports on the distribution of benefits by generation, an approach Krznaric sees as adaptable across countries ([16:51]).

Notable quote

“We treat the future like a distant colonial outpost where we can freely dump ecological degradation and technological risk as if there was nobody there. Yet there are the millions, the billions of citizens of the future, and they don’t have a voice in the existing political system.”
— Krznaric [18:01]

3. Timeframes and Ethical Reasoning

• How Far Ahead Should We Plan?

  • Krznaric sets 100 years as a benchmark for long-term thinking, aligning roughly with a human lifespan; pragmatically, he advocates for at least 30 years to move beyond current political cycles ([19:38]; [20:23]).
  • Seventh generation thinking, inspired by Indigenous North American ideas, is about considering the impact of decisions on descendants far in the future ([21:51]).
  • Practical example: Japanese “Future Design” workshops where citizens plan for their town as if they lived decades in the future ([21:51]).

• Equality With Future Generations

  • Krznaric calls not just for recognizing the interests of future people, but for a robust case for real equality in moral and political terms ([23:14]).
  • Notable quote:

    “Not do unto others as you would have them do unto you, but do unto future generations how you would wish past generations had done unto us.”
    — Krznaric [23:49]

4. Discount Rates: Valuing the Unborn

• Economic “Discounting”
  • Present-day public policy often assigns less value to future lives or benefits via “discount rates,” lowering the priority of long-term investment like clean energy—even when the moral stakes are high ([28:01]).
  • Practical impact: At high discount rates, benefits 30+ years out are “basically close to zero and they're not included in the calculus” ([29:06]).
  • Discounting likened to historical injustices:

    “…the status [we give] future generations is equivalent to that of slaves under current discounting thought…and with how an African American slave… had 3/5 of the value of a free white person…” ([34:51])

  • Krznaric calls for either zero or much-reduced discount rates, at least on irreversible issues like climate, and for making these decisions through broad public discussion ([40:08]).

5. Balancing Present and Future Needs

• Tradeoffs & Moral Dilemmas
  • Krznaric acknowledges that politics inevitably involves balancing urgent needs of today (hunger, refugees, migrants) with investments for future generations ([41:45]).
  • Key is to not ignore or silence the interests of the future:

    "Let’s not push [future people] out of our minds just because they are not here." ([42:26])

• Sacrifice & Rationing
  • Some rationing—whether of carbon or food—may become politically unavoidable, but it should be structured to be fair “so that [future generations] can enjoy what we enjoy…” ([43:47])

6. Critique of Longtermism and Effective Altruism

• Definition & Critique
  • Krznaric distances his ideas from effective altruism/longtermism, associated with tech elites and Oxford, which he sees as overly focused on abstract, vastly distant risks (AI apocalypses) and insufficiently attentive to the present or near-term ecological crisis ([46:03]; [47:05]).
  • Effective altruists often “systematically de-emphasize the impacts of ecological risks” while prioritizing speculative technological threats ([49:52]).
  • Notable quotes:

    “I think that effective altruism is quite ineffective. It’s got these biases built in like all political ideologies do…”
    — Krznaric [53:22] “The whole discussion about AI apocalypse is a kind of a ghost story that functions to distract us from the very real impacts of everyday AI today.”
    — Krznaric [55:07]

  • Criticizes tech visionaries like Elon Musk for promoting space colonization rather than stewardship of “base camp Earth” ([56:24]; [56:43])

7. Democracy and Political Change

• Is Democracy up to the Task?
  • Analysis of 122 countries found that high-performing long-term policy is correlated with democracy, not authoritarianism—dispelling the myth that benevolent dictatorships would do better ([58:30]).
• Religion as a Resource
  • Christianity and the Catholic Pope Francis’s call for “intergenerational solidarity” can help expand the moral conversation around the protection of future people ([62:17]).
• Social Movements and Disruptive Change
  • History shows that direct action, often by radical movements (sometimes violent, sometimes not), accelerates transformative change. Krznaric supports nonviolent direct action groups like Extinction Rebellion and emphasizes the difference between violence to people and property ([65:40]; [68:51]).
  • Notable quote:

    “The health of a democracy partly emerges from the challenging of its rules. It’s too late to leave the problems of our time to simmer on the low flame of gradualism.”
    — Krznaric [69:17]

Timestamps for Major Segments

| Segment | Time | |------------------------------------------------------------------|------------| | Eudaimonia and Human Flourishing | 02:14–03:20| | Marshmallow vs Acorn Brain, origins of short-termism | 04:30–09:12| | The limits of public policy timeframes | 11:27–13:20| | Future Generations Commissioner and citizens' assemblies | 14:13–16:51| | Indigenous/Seventh Generation thinking & “Future Design” | 21:31–23:14| | Discount rates, economics, and slavery/colonial analogies | 28:01–36:38| | Dilemmas—balancing present and future, rationing | 41:45–44:48| | Critique of effective altruism/longtermism/tech elites | 46:03–56:24| | Democratic vs authoritarian approaches to long-term planning | 58:01–60:37| | Religion's role—Pope Francis & intergenerational solidarity | 61:20–63:33| | Direct action and radical flanks in social movements | 65:40–69:17|

Notable Quotes

• “We live in an age of the tyranny of the now…” — Krznaric [08:48]
• “We treat the future like a distant colonial outpost…” — Krznaric [18:01]
• “It's not good enough to simply state that the needs of future generations matter as much as the needs of those living in the present…” — Interviewer quoting book [23:14]
• “Let’s not push them out of our minds just because they are not here.” — Krznaric [42:26]
• “The whole discussion about AI apocalypse is a kind of a ghost story that functions to distract us…” — Krznaric [55:07]
• “The health of a democracy partly emerges from the challenging of its rules. It’s too late to leave the problems of our time to simmer on the low flame of gradualism.” — Krznaric [69:17]

Takeaways

• Long-term thinking is both a cognitive skill and a cultural practice that can (and must) be deliberately nurtured in politics and society.
• Current policy and economic frameworks have systematic blind spots (“discounting,” presentism), which institutional innovations like future generations commissioners and citizens assemblies can help address.
• While “effective altruism” and “longtermism” have brought useful attention to future generations, their frameworks miss social, ecological, and political complexity, often relying on narrow utilitarian or techno-centric logics.
• Transformative change has often required disruptive social movements—including direct action.
• Religious traditions and narratives, as well as democratic deepening, can all contribute to a more robust ethics of intergenerational justice.

This episode will be valuable for anyone interested in the ethics, politics, and cultural shifts necessary for addressing climate and existential risks—not just for ourselves, but for the billions yet to be born.