CFOs on safari to the future

On 24 February, finance and HR professionals gathered online for the Fearless Future Summit, hosted by CFO South Africa, during which they explored how accurate science writer Arthur C Clarke’s predictions from the 70s were, and then had the opportunity to live one of his predictions themselves.

Professor Ian Glenn, research associate in communications sciences at the University of the Free State and emeritus professor of media studies at the University of Cape Town, kicked off the virtual Fearless Future Summit by sharing some of science writer Arthur C Clarke’s predictions of the future that he made in the 70s.

The future, today

Clarke worked on the famous film in 1968 called “2001: A Space Odyssey”. “In this movie we are introduced to a computer called HAL, which takes over a spaceship and attacks the humans on board. So the notion of our uneasy relationship with artificial intelligence is also there,” Ian said.

In 1976 Clarke gave a talk in which he looked at what the future held and said, “the basic ingredients of the ideal communications device are therefore already in common use, even today. The standard computer console with keyboard and visual display, plus hifi sound and TV camera, will do very nicely. Through such an instrument one can have face-to-face interaction with anyone, anywhere on Earth, and send or receive any type of information.” Ian said that, after rereading Clarke’s book “The view from Serendip” during lockdown, one of the predictions jumped out at him. Clarke had said, “We are already approaching the point where it will be feasible, not necessarily desirable, for those engaged in white-collar jobs to do perhaps 95 percent of their work without leaving home… Apart from the saving in travel time, there will be astronomical economies in power and raw materials.” Clarke foresaw some of the psychological problems that came with these advances. He said, “The trouble is, that [the easy and constant accessibility to information] is going to turn some of us into ‘infomaniacs’.” Arthur even predicted virtual safaris, something attendees of the evening had a chance to experience during the last hour of the event. “How nice to be able to make a trip to the Amazon with a few dozen unknown friends scattered all over the world, with perfect sound and vision, being able to ask your guide questions, suggest detours, request closeups of interesting plants and animals. In fact, sharing everything except the mosquitos and the heat,” he wrote.

The future is already possible

Once the audience had made their predictions, they returned to the main “room”, in which TomorrowToday Global founder and futurist Graeme Codrington outlined possible technology of the future. “Any useful idea of the future must appear ridiculous at first,” Graeme said. “The reason it has to appear ridiculous at first, is that if we just take what we are already

doing and stretch it just a little bit, it doesn’t push our thinking forward and invite innovation.” He referred to Elon Musk, who brought a group of engineers together and said that he wanted to design a hybrid vehicle that could go 500km per litre of petrol. The engineers said that it was impossible and that they could only do 30 or 40km per litre. But Elon wanted more and ended up building one of the world’s greatest, electrical battery driven sports cars that can go from 0 to 100km in six seconds. “You can only build that if you tell everyone to get rid of the rules in their head and the boundaries that they have,” Graeme said. He then discussed some of the trends his company has been observing that lead the way to the future, like driverless cars and sustainable energy. “We are currently busy building a nuclear fusion plant in the South of France that, once it is operational, will turn seawater into energy for free,” he said. He also referred to graphene, which was discovered over 10 years ago. It’s a compound that is based on carbon that is 200 times stronger than steel and 20 times more conductive than copper, but lighter than air. Graphene can be used to enhance the human body. There are also technologies that exist, that can extend the life of cells and enable humans to live for more than 100 years. Everyone concluded that the world today is changing rapidly and even though things might seem impossible, they’re probably already real. Attendees were then taken on a live, private virtual safari through the Greater Kruger National Park, guided by bushveld expert Brent Leo-Smith from Painted Dog TV. The attendees’ first sighting was an elephant taking a mud bath. Brent explained that he and his crew had been tracking the elephant as she was going from one muddy pit to another. The hosts then asked attendees which animals they wanted to see and, after much debate, Brent went looking for the requested leopard and hyena. Instead, he came across some Matabele ants marching across the road, and found fresh leopard spoor, but the leopards themselves remained well hidden in the verdant foliage of the park. As Brent drove on and neared the end of the hour-long game drive, the guests saw a rhino, grazing in the field. The rhino had been dehorned by the Kruger National Park rangers to reduce the risk of poaching. One of the guests asked how long its horn would have been if it hadn’t been cut. Brent said that it differed for each rhino and that it was difficult to guess. Finally, guests were given a view of the red-gold sun as it set behind the lowveld trees of the Kruger National Park, bringing the first-ever SA executive virtual safari and summit to an end. l