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aristarchus [soylentnews.org] writes:

Of all publications, Wired has this Fine Article [wired.com] on Futurism.

Today, when we talk about futurism, we’re not usually talking about sculpture, painting, or poetry. Futurists today are scenario builders, people with advanced degrees in strategic foresight, science fiction writers, consultants to businesses. Futurists focus largely on technology, and the field today is inextricably linked to technologists working on everything from artificial intelligence to Crispr. And today’s Futurists almost never link their work to the existence of Marinetti, and the Italian movement that came before them. This is in part because Marinetti was an artist, and the Italian Futurists worked in paint and bronze and clay, rather than future forecasts. And there is no direct link between Marinetti's group and the strategic foresight consultants working today. But the link is also one that today's futurists would prefer to avoid in part because of another element of the artists behind the Futurist Manifesto of 1909: Marinetti and his cohort embraced and championed fascism. There are lessons to be learned for today’s technologists and futurists in Marinetti’s manifesto, and it would be foolish to ignore them.

As an American Philosopher said, "Those who do not know their history are condemned to repeat it." Aristarchus' correllary: "Those who do know their history are condemn to repeat it as well, but at least they will know what the hell is going on." And Marx says that Hegel says somewhere, that everything in history happens twice, the first time as tradegy, the second time as farce.

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