Speculation Conceiving of and hypothesizing the future, usually derived from conditions of the present. Speculation is used in two major ways: in fiction, as an imaginative exercise; and in finance, as a method of betting on and guaranteeing the future. As an imaginative activity, speculation hinges largely on one’s assessment of the present. Trends, tendencies and current potentialities are extrapolated from current conditions. Speculation in this sense results in hypothetical scenarios that accentuate, exaggerate or emphasize specific elements of the present in new and novel ways. Advertising presents a type of highly produced and technical speculation, involving the promotion of commodities and the imagination of futures where desires are fulfilled in and through the purchase of commodities. As fiction, however, speculation creates interesting feedback loops: Henri Lefebvre argues that such activity nurtures reality. Elsewhere, Paul Ricoeur proposes that fiction “because it has no previous referent, it may refer in a productive way to reality, and even increase reality:” speculation in this sense allows for the reconsideration of the present in light of the speculative future.
Speculative Fieldnote
By Blair Bainbridge
"I don’t want to go to the moon. I want to stay with the earth. The worked earth. With the manmade craters, the dark monuments to negative futures always already here."
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Mine Flows
By Max Symuleski
"Perception as a deprivation of action and reaction brings to the mind the desolate, but exquisite, surface structures of the empty 'box' or 'lattice'"
Exit, Moon
By Maya Indira Ganesh
"Some people had the option of leaving. Those people who don’t have to take care of anyone else, or anything else. Who feel like they can sever their connections and move on to the next thing. Some times this is survival. Some times it is escape, it is exit."
The Water Chronicles
By Tricia Toso
"Is it cynical or naive, or perhaps ironic (?) to discuss the impending apocalypse of climate change, while hydrating from bottled water?"
You and Us Silent Beings
By Ségolène Guinard
"They told me about the time before the great fires. Before everything became ashes..."
