Intelligent Machines (Audio) – Podcast Summary

Episode: IM 837: Could Should Might Don't – Why Tomorrow Doesn't Feel Like Sci-Fi
Date: September 18, 2025
Host: Leo Laporte
Co-Hosts: Paris Martineau, Jeff Jarvis
Featured Guest: Nick Foster (Author: Could, Should, Might, Don't – How We Think about the Future)

Brief Overview

This episode explores why the present – marked by rapid, powerful advances in artificial intelligence – often feels less like the bold, hyper-technological sci-fi futures we anticipated. With Nick Foster, author and designer, the team breaks down the many flawed ways individuals, companies, and societies approach "the future," and discusses more productive mindsets for thinking about technology, AI, and social change.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Rethinking “The Future”: Taxonomies & Tropes

• Nick Foster’s Approach:
  Foster’s book is NOT another prediction/prescription on “what’s next,” but rather a thoughtful essay on how we think about the future.
  • Four Modes: “Could, Should, Might, Don’t” – Four ways people approach possible futures.
  • The book challenges the lazy reliance on sci-fi tropes (Star Trek, Jetsons, flying cars) as proxies for serious thought about the future.
  • Foster wants readers/teams to examine their own mindsets and biases: are you falling into only one channel and ignoring others?
    • (03:17) – "We lack the skillset to talk with rigor about the future."
    • (05:20) – "If we're obsessed by statistics ... we start to see the world through that lens and we miss all of the other stuff..."

2. The Perils of Sci-Fi-Driven Futurism

• Science Fiction as Inspiration vs. Blueprint
  • Sci-fi is overused as a direct “brief” for technology – but that’s not its purpose!
  • Many technology leaders reproduce childhood sci-fi fantasies, “using the language and behaviors as place-holders for real imagination.”
    • (06:01) Leo quoting Nick: “[Sci-fi authors] aren’t predicting possible futures, they’re trying to earn a living.”
    • (07:50) Foster: “They use [sci-fi] in a lazy way ... as a substitute for real imagination of their own.”

3. The "Mundane" Future & Presentism

• History Lessons:
  • Major inventions (triode tubes, broadcast) had unpredictable impacts – “the inventor had no idea what he had.”
  • Foster argues: focus on the embedded, mundane way change happens. Life evolves, most futures are lived in, gradual, and full of leftovers from the past.
    • (09:33) Foster: "The 'future mundane' is thinking about the future as a lived-in place... it's just an evolution of the present."
    • Technologies become normalized: the bakery is still there, older objects persist, even as AI and radical change appear.

4. "Numeric Fiction" – Limits of Quantitative Futurism

• Data ≠ Destiny:
  • Foster laments the authority corporate strategists wield with “projections” and numeric stories, which are persuasive but just as speculative as a designer’s prototype.
    • (15:22) Foster: "When that solid line turns into a dotted line, it ceases to be data and it becomes a story… I refer to it as numeric fiction."
    • (16:49) Leo: Quoting ‘Succession’: “Projection, man!”
  • Numbers are often used to justify rather than discover the future.

5. Futurism as Practice, Not Prognostication

• Futurist or Designer?
  • Foster prefers to be called a “futures designer,” aiming to empower everyone to think more critically (and less dogmatically) about future narratives.
    • (24:09) "You're not prescribing any of them?"
      Foster: "No, not at all. I want to empower people … I don’t think we're critical enough …"
  • Real insight comes from breadth – using all the “could/should/might/don't” modes, not sticking to forecasts, projections, or doomer hype.

6. The Role of Design in AI

• Speculative/Critical Design:
  • Design can be more than function or appearance – it pokes, provokes, asks awkward questions (especially in emerging tech like AI).
    • (21:01) Foster: "Design has a really good role to play … in where things like AI… fit in society… ask uncomfortable, awkward questions."
  • Rapid progress makes it hard to deeply design human-centric AI, but Foster is optimistic about where critical design will fit.

7. Avoiding Hype & Doom: A Call for More Sane Dialogue

• Media, Company, and Social Responsibilities:
  • Utopian and dystopian extremes (“superintelligence is coming” vs. “everything will collapse”) miss the lived, bell-curved, mostly-mundane experiences of history.
  • We create the future collectively every day – whether on the internet, in AI, or by the technologies we embrace or reject.
    • (25:39) Jeff: "Futurist to me is a rather hubristic job title… what you’re really saying is you’re building the future."

8. The AI News Roundtable

• Emerging Trends and Debates:
  • Ongoing media concern with copyright/IP and generative AI, but industry stats show AI-generated links often boost media more than traditional search.
  • Critique of present-day AI’s limitations – hallucinations, reinforcement learning costs, hardware scaling vs. alternative models (see: Yann LeCun’s advice [55:05]).
  • ChatGPT age prediction system and moderation – discussion about privacy, protection for teens, and how AI platforms guess your age.
  • Real-world uses of AI (according to new studies): majority is search/advice, practical guidance, not creative writing or code.
    • (81:44) "By July 2025, 18 billion messages sent weekly by 700 million users – 10% of the global adult population."
  • Survey results: Most people use AI in practical help roles, not for therapy or self-expression; public mixed on its impact.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Nick Foster – On Sci-Fi as Futurism:

  “What I’ve found is that people lean on science fiction … in a lazy way, as a substitution or placeholder for real imagination and real ideas of their own.” (07:50)

• On Numeric Fiction & Data:

  “No matter how good your data is, when that solid line turns into a dotted line, it ceases to be data and becomes a story. … I refer to it as numeric fiction.” (15:22)

• Design’s Role in Technology:

  “Design can poke and provoke people to think slightly differently … ask uncomfortable questions.” (21:01)

• On the Mundane Future:

  “Most people that have taken a Waymo two or three times, it sort of normalizes quite quickly, right?” (13:26) “My left knee still hurts every time I stand up.” (09:29)

• Futurists vs. Futures Designers:

  “The work of futurists is typically subpar… I refer to myself as a futures designer, which sounds equally pretentious, but at least it gets design in there…” (24:09)

• Collective Responsibility:

  “We’re living in time capsules… planted by people who didn’t think enough about the future. … We have an opportunity to change that.” (35:33)

• On Preparation:

  “Most of decent futures work is just doing the thinking – not necessarily getting to the answer.” (31:23)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Intro & Guest Background: 00:00–03:00
• Four Modes of Futurism: 03:00–05:30
• Sci-Fi's Harmful Influence: 06:01–08:00
• History, Mundane Futures, Lessons: 08:09–11:06
• Numeric Fiction & Data Projections: 15:06–17:46
• Book Covers, Design as an Ethic: 18:11–22:36
• The Ring (humorous aside): 22:36–23:55
• Gemütlichkeit, Futures Designer: 24:09–26:23
• Doom vs Hype, “Future Mundane” Applied: 26:25–29:54
• Practical Advice ("How Should We Prepare"): 31:23–33:56
• Critique of Current AI Expert Discourse: 54:04–58:17
• Public Sentiment & AI Study: 129:23–133:41
• ChatGPT User Study Stats: 81:44–86:18
• The Role of OnlyFans Chatbots and the global AI labor ecosystem: 125:46–127:33
• Picks of the Week (fun/cultural close): 139:08–147:12

Additional Memorable Moments

• Humor:

  • The recurring “ring” gag (22:48) and offbeat discussion of Italian “brain rot memes” (98:35–101:48)
  • Playful teasing over book covers and British/US design differences (19:56–20:31)
  • "Numeric fiction," quoting Succession: “Projection, man!” (16:49)

• Practical Wisdom:

  • “If we look at our big tech companies, we see them falling into [future-thinking] pockets. … What I would love to see is a leader doing all four of those behaviors at once.” (11:33)
  • On futility of perfect prediction: “The future is a verb, not a noun.” (33:49; borrowed from Bruce Sterling)

Takeaways

• Thinking about the future is not about making confident predictions or mimicking stories from sci-fi.
• Being "future literate" means recognizing the limitations and biases built into any approach—statistical, fictional, managerial, or design-based.
• Big changes become normal fast; “the future” is usually a subtle, incremental extension of the present.
• Quality critical thinking—and intentionally using multiple frameworks—is essential if we want technology, and especially AI, to evolve in human-beneficial directions.
• Collective, continual reflection is more important than any single forecast.

Next Episode Preview

Next week: Steven Levy (Wired magazine) on AI, copyright, and who really profits as generative models reshape tech and media.

Summary by Intelligent Machines podcast AI, with a heavy dose of human judgment. For further reading, check out Nick Foster’s Could, Should, Might, Don’t —and steer clear of lazy thinking about tomorrow!