Open Future Research Articles

Digital leadership in meta-organizations? Emergence of a renewed relevance of leadership in the context of digitization

In the face of uncontrollable complexity, the concept of a rational design of the organization is being replaced by the notion of an open future that is inherently unpredictable and unplanable. In rapidly changing environments, organizations and leaders are confronted with a constant stream of irritations and unexpected developments, that require ongoing attention. This prompts the question of whether the conceptualization of digital transformation as a paradigm shift also implies the need for new forms of leadership. The article analyzes the discourse on digital leadership and assesses the extent to which this concept relativizes leadership in the context of the evolution of leadership theory, which is characterized by a persistent process of modification and relativization of preceding concepts. Leadership concepts are not only responsive to general needs, but also vary according to specific contexts, such as non-profit leadership or leadership in social welfare organizations and meta-organizations. Results of a discourse analysis, which underscore the significance of adopting a complexity theory perspective on digital leadership, will therefore be contrasted with the initial findings of an empirical study on digitization in such meta-organizations. This allows for a discussion of the general findings on the revitalization of leadership, which will serve as a paradigmatic example of the previously developed context. The article concludes with implications for further theory development with the aim of making a specific contribution to organization-sensitive digitization research. The findings of the empirical study indicate the significance of employing informal structures and a heightened emphasis on subjectivity within meta-organizations, as opposed to the formal structures of organizations. The concept of digital leadership does not signify the obsolescence of traditional leadership; rather, it can be conceptualized as an advanced form of unheroic leadership within the context of external and internal complexity.

The Amazon urban weft: a methodological proposal for recognizing a territory of possibilities

In the Amazon, urbanized areas, stretching beyond the cities, constitute a complex urban network, with exchanges of economic and sociocultural capital, mediated by the management of socio-biodiversity. Despite holding the potential for an open future, this territory is generally rendered invisible by the instruments and methods used to understand and represent urbanization in the Amazon. Based on a reinterpretation and analysis of the original classes of the situations of the census tracts, combined with environmental data, this article proposes a methodological alternative that seeks to represent the complex and extensive Amazonian urban weft, considering the state of Pará as the spatial focus and three of the state’s distinct integration regions as the study area. The results have demonstrated that the proposed methodology was able to spatially delineate this weft – much larger than the municipal seats – and highlight areas where the urbanization-nature relationship is still preserved and has more chances to evolve.

An argument for open education policy

While many historically contingent barriers to individual liberty have been deconstructed, I argue that current education policy continues to maintain a discriminatory educational milieu that constitutes individuals as dis/abled. I describe this current government formulation of educational spaces as Closed Policy. Various contingent environmental barriers, dynamically intersecting with, for example, gender, class, ethnicity, physiology, and neurodiversity; inhibit individuals due to constructed notions of ability and disability. I draw upon the principles of Open Futures, Open Society, piecemeal social engineering, and prioritarianism to call for a deconstruction of Closed Policy and movement towards Open Policy. I argue that current educational policy is unjust and should be deconstructed to free individuals from coercion, prejudice, and harm. I argue for a shift towards Open Policy so that difference can be celebrated and the potential for Open Futures is maximised.

The Right to Be Forgotten and the Value of an Open Future

The Right to Be Forgotten and the Value of an Open Future

The paradox of possibility: A temporal reading of Thomas Hobbes

This article engages the role of temporality in the work of Thomas Hobbes. Rather than focusing on the political individual proposed by his later works, it politicizes the conception of subjectivity advanced in his earlier works. In these, he advances a materialist account of subjectivity that is conceptualized in entirely temporal terms. It is, he argues, the temporal categories of memory and imagination that make humans uniquely capable of selfhood and freedom. This early conception lacks the tendency towards domination described in Leviathan, in which the state of nature is presented as a war of all against all. However, this article argues that what the state of nature reveals is that the temporality of subjectivity is not objective, but rather socially produced. As such, the state of nature depicts behavior resulting from material anxiety, which prevents thinking, and therefore acting, beyond the present. Political institutions therefore emerge in his thought as a mechanism for quelling anxiety such that the future becomes actionable. By projecting a vision of a secure, open future, these institutions create a present in which meaningful, self-directed actions become possible. That is, he is the first to posit the very modern notion that political institutions fundamentally shape our sense of possibility.

The Value of a Diamond: Understanding Global Coverage of Diamond Open Access Journals in Web of Science, Scopus, and OpenAlex to Support an Open Future

Diamond OA journals present a publishing model that is free for both authors and readers, but their lack of indexing in major bibliographic databases such as Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus presents challenges in assessing the usage of these journals. This paper provides a global picture of the coverage of diamond OA journals from the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) in three data sources. Results show their low coverage in WoS and Scopus and higher coverage in OpenAlex, as well as the generally smaller and local scope of diamond OA journals. Understanding the current landscape of diamond OA indexing can assist LIS professionals with advising researchers on avenues they can pursue to find diamond OA published work or choosing journals to publish in to ensure the visibility and accessibility of their research.

Navigating Choppy Waters: why are we always arguing about risk and uncertainty in marine multi-use environments and what can we do about it?

Arguments about risk and uncertainty are prevalent in marine decision making. Different, often invisible, starting positions of those involved – regarding world views, academic disciplines and positionality – are often responsible. Broadly agreed collective outcomes depend on uncovering these influences. In this article we prioritise navigating multiplicity and plurality rather than constraining them. An iterative cycle of reflection and an openness to make changes are central. However, such a cycle must consider how risk assessment tools open or close possible futures, how evidence is best presented to decision makers, and how mātaurangaMāori is reshaping risk perceptions and is the decisive intervention in creating improved decision-making spaces.

Todd on the open future

Todd on the open future

Defending The Open Future: Replies to MacFarlane, Green, Wasserman, and Bigg & Miller

AbstractIn this symposium piece, I reply to the diverse and wide‐ranging set of objections to my book (The Open Future: Why Future Contingents are All False) set forth by MacFarlane, Green, Wasserman, and Bigg & Miller.

Varieties of future‐contingency

AbstractI here examine some of the main contentions of Todd's “The Open Future”. I argue first that a future contingent need not contain locutions such as “will” or cognates and that once this is recognized a trilemma emerges for Todd, putting pressure on him to relinquish one of the book's main aims. Then after noting (Section II) Todd's response to a puzzle A.N. prior had raised for betting on an open‐future style view, I turn (Sections IIIa and IIIb) to his discussion of whether his approach is committed to demanding that ordinary speakers reform their talk about the future. I conclude (Section IV) that the objective of the replacement strategy that Todd recommends could be achieved with less violence to ordinary linguistic practices with the help of a view on which “will” and cognates are polysemous.

Sociodigital futures of education: reparations, sovereignty, care, and democratisation

ABSTRACT As EdTech industries grow in reach and power it is imperative to motivate conditions for ethical challenge and contestation, always remaining attentive to the kinds of education futures that dominant imaginaries of technology foreclose. In this paper, we explore how the multiple lenses of reparations, sovereignty, care and democratisation can offer resources for envisaging alternative sociodigital futures of education. We identify how these ideas can disrupt dominant EdTech modalities, exploring how they foreground different kinds of educational relationships and priorities for education/social justice. The paper explores examples of how sociodigital futures-in-the-making have begun to materialise in a range of locations and how they urge new agendas for research, redesign and regulation in relation to EdTech. Whilst the power of the EdTech industry can be overwhelming, we suggest that critiques work from a position of abundance: there are always already many ways to radically reimagine sociodigital futures of education. We argue for the importance of recognising, surfacing, and working with these potentialities in ongoing debates about EdTech precisely to keep the future of education open.

Fertility Preservation in Children and Adolescents: Where We Are and Where We Are Going.

This review will describe current pediatric and adolescent fertility preservation methodologies and the ethical concerns surrounding these procedures, as well as highlight recent research that may pave the way for the development of new fertility preservation options. Research is ongoing to allow prepubertal patients, particularly those with testes, to be able to have biologic children in the future. Studies on sperm in vitro maturation highlight the importance of supporting the spermatogonial stem cell niche for the development of mature sperm. The live birth of a rhesus macaque from in vitro fertilization using prepubertal testicular tissue and in vivo matured sperm gives hope to future human births. For patients with ovaries, prior work has led to successful fertility but further research is underway to refine these techniques and optimize outcomes. Organoid scaffolds have shown promise when being used for in vitro oocyte maturation. For children and adolescents undergoing gonadotoxic treatment, such as chemotherapy, or hormonal treatment, such as gender-affirming hormone therapy, future fertility potential may be negatively impacted. It is recommended that fertility preservation (FP) be offered to these patients and families prior to undergoing treatment. Fertility preservation for postpubertal patients mimics that in adults. For prepubertal children, however, the options are limited and in some cases still experimental. It is essential that this work continues so that we may offer children and adolescents the right to an open future and preserve their fertility potential.

Ambivalent presents, open futures: Affective constructions of the future among highly qualified Turkish migrants in Germany

Turkish migrant professionals in Germany are valued as highly skilled individuals. They describe their lives in Germany mostly in positive terms. Their social, cultural and mobility capital enables them to imagine the future as including favourable circumstances for them such as exciting job opportunities. At the same time, heightened anti-migrant discourses and uncertainties about the future create potential risks. By bringing together the sociological literatures on ambivalence and the future, I analyse how highly skilled Turkish migrants make projections about their future in Germany under this ambivalent atmosphere. Based on interviews conducted with 29 highly qualified Turkish migrants in Germany in 2022, the article identifies openness as an affective mechanism, which can be deployed both to embrace opportunities and navigate instabilities that might emerge in the future.

The moving open future, temporal phenomenology, and temporal passage

Empirical evidence suggests that people naïvely represent time as dynamical (i.e. as containing robust temporal passage). Yet many contemporary B-theorists deny that it seems to us, in perceptual experience, as though time robustly passes. The question then arises as to why we represent time as dynamical if we do not have perceptual experiences which represent time as dynamical. We consider two hypotheses about why this might be: the temporally aperspectival replacement hypothesis and the moving open future hypothesis. We then empirically test the moving open future hypothesis. According to that hypothesis, we represent the past as objectively fixed and the future open. And we represent that this objective openness moves as events that were open become fixed, such that in doing so, we represent a privileged moving present. We found no evidence for the moving open future hypothesis, which suggests that further investigation of the temporally aperspectival replacement hypothesis is called for. Our results also shed further light on our understanding of the respects in which we represent the future to be open, which, in turn, has implications for our theorising about the open future.

Smart Painting Exhibitions: Utilizing Internet of Things Technology Creating Interactive Art Spaces

INTRODUCTION: With the rapid development of science and technology, intelligent painting exhibitions have gradually attracted people's attention with their unique forms. This study aims to create an interactive art space using Internet of Things (IoT) technology to provide audiences with a more prosperous and deeper art experience. OBJECTIVES: The primary purpose of this study is to explore how to use IoT technology to transform a painting exhibition into a digital space that can interact with the audience. By fusing art and technology, the researchers aim to promote innovation in traditional art presentations and stimulate the audience's freshness and interest in art.METHODS: In the Smart Painting exhibition, the researchers used advanced Internet of Things (IoT) technology to incorporate the audience's movements, emotions, and feedback into the artworks through sensors, wearable devices, and cloud computing. The digital devices in the exhibition space could sense the audience's presence and generate and adjust the art content in real-time according to their movements or emotional state, creating a unique display that interacted with the audience. RESULTS: After implementing the Smart Painting exhibition, the audience's sense of participation and immersion in the art display was significantly increased. Through IoT technology, viewers can interact with the artwork in real-time and feel a more personalized art experience. The digitized exhibition space provided the audience a new level of perception, deepening their understanding and appreciation of the artworks. CONCLUSION: This study demonstrates the feasibility of using IoT technology to create interactive art spaces and shows that this innovation can inject new vitality into traditional painting exhibitions. Through digitalization, the interactivity of the art space is enhanced, providing the audience with a more profound art experience. This approach provides artists with new possibilities for creativity and opens up a fresh vision of participatory art for the audience. The Smart Painting Exhibition is expected to become a new model for integrating art and technology, pushing the art world towards a more innovative and open future.

Puberty Suppression for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria and the Child’s Right to an Open Future

In this essay, we consider the clinical and ethical implications of puberty blockers for pediatric gender dysphoria through the lens of “the child’s right to an open future,” which refers to rights that children do not have the capacity to exercise as minors, but that must be protected, so they can exercise them in the future as autonomous adults. We contrast the open future principle with the beliefs underpinning the gender affirming care model and discuss implications for consent. We evaluate claims that puberty blockers are reversible, discuss the scientific uncertainty about long-term benefits and harms, summarize international developments, and examine how suicide has been used to frame puberty suppression as a medically necessary, lifesaving treatment. In discussing these issues, we include relevant empirical evidence and raise questions for clinicians and researchers. We conclude that treatment pathways that delay decisions about medical transition until the child has had the chance to grow and mature into an autonomous adulthood would be most consistent with the open future principle.

“My Books are My Relation to Society”

This article contextualises the transition to an open access publishing future and sets it against the background of the current state of decline in arts and humanities research funding in the US and UK. It outlines the problems which have stymied and slowed the move towards open research and it highlights those issues which particularly pertain to the field of arts and humanities. It considers the demands of research assesement and to quantify value and the opportunities that open access publishing might afford to those who research in the arts and humanities.

Why future contingents are not all false*

AbstractPatrick Todd argues for a modified Peircean view on which all future contingents are false. According to Todd, this is the only view that makes sense if we fully embrace an open future, rejecting the idea of actual future history. I argue that supervaluational accounts, on which future contingents are neither true nor false, are fully consistent with the metaphysics of an open future. I suggest that it is Todd's failure to distinguish semantic and postsemantic levels that leads him to suppose otherwise. I also show how one can resist Todd's argument (with Brian Rabern) that the conceptual possibility of omniscience requires us to reject Retro‐closure ().

Trajectories of Post-Sustainability

AbstractFaced with climate change and other ecological crises, sustainability has become an inescapable normative framework for organizations and societies worldwide. However, it conceals very different practices and imaginaries of a sustainable future. Firstly, this article introduces the three imaginaries of modernization, transformation, and control and explores what chances of implementation these trajectories have. Modernization is the dominant path driven by governments and corporations, transformation efforts by civil society actors are marginalized, and control is currently becoming more influential as a trajectory in the wake of a renaissance of strong nation-states. Secondly, this article works out the idea that sustainability, in the sense of an open future, is no longer achievable. Too many ecological burdens already exist, or can no longer be averted, so much so that one should be speaking instead about the politics of post-sustainability. It is highly probable that catastrophes and social collapses can no longer be prevented, and a rapid decarbonization of economies and societies in the coming years is so unlikely that the question thus arises as to how positive visions of the future for living together can still be derived from this. Finally, using the example of the rights of nature, it is discussed how there can, nevertheless, be forms of conviviality that could (albeit slowly) grow out of the multiple social and ecological crises and which are based on an amalgam of modernization, transformation, and control.

Distribution, Evolution, and Origin of the Lunar Energetic Particles

Various kinds of energetic particles can directly and continuously interact with the lunar surface since there is no atmosphere and no global magnetic field on the Moon. How energetic particles distribute on the Moon and what are their roles in the space weathering caused by the interactions between energetic particles and the lunar surface are the essential problems that need to be solved urgently in lunar science. In this paper, the research status and related scientific problems of the origin, distribution, and evolution of lunar energetic particles are summarized. The lunar exploration programs proposed by different countries and organizations are listed, and directions for future development are also discussed in this paper. Finally, based on the open questions and future focuses, we put forward several suggestions about China’s future lunar exploration programs and technical specifications of scientific payloads.