Scenario-based planning postulates that one should predict symptoms emblematic of a given scenario and then robotically assume you are in said scenario once a sufficient number of these symptoms come to pass. I am unsure whether there is wisdom in this approach, but I find it a discomfiting line of thought.
Interesting, I don’t know much about scenario-based planning but this seems like maybe a literature I should read up on? How strong is the evidence for this claim?
I don’t know too much about it. But I do know it was used extensively by Shell; they credited it with allowing them to respond to the Oil Shock much quicker than their competitors. They had analyzed the symptoms of a similar scenario (which was considered extremely outlandish at the time of scenario’s creation) and begin to notice eerie similarities between those symptoms and their present reality.
I see it as a sort of social technology that tries to assist an organization (and perhaps an individual) in resisting becoming the proverbial slowly-boiling frog.
As to evidence of its efficacy, I am only aware of anecdotal evidence. There appears to be an extensive Wikipedia page on the topic but I have not read it—my knowledge comes mostly from hearing Vernor Vinge speak about the technique, as he assisted in scenario-creation for several companies.
Ever since I heard Vinge speak about this, I have occasionally tried to think about the present as if it were a scenario I developed in the past: what sort of scenario would it be, how surprised would my past self be, and so on. Seeing how much The Pile improved GPT-J’s performance on this task trigged such thoughts.
Interesting, I don’t know much about scenario-based planning but this seems like maybe a literature I should read up on? How strong is the evidence for this claim?
I don’t know too much about it. But I do know it was used extensively by Shell; they credited it with allowing them to respond to the Oil Shock much quicker than their competitors. They had analyzed the symptoms of a similar scenario (which was considered extremely outlandish at the time of scenario’s creation) and begin to notice eerie similarities between those symptoms and their present reality.
I see it as a sort of social technology that tries to assist an organization (and perhaps an individual) in resisting becoming the proverbial slowly-boiling frog.
As to evidence of its efficacy, I am only aware of anecdotal evidence. There appears to be an extensive Wikipedia page on the topic but I have not read it—my knowledge comes mostly from hearing Vernor Vinge speak about the technique, as he assisted in scenario-creation for several companies.
Ever since I heard Vinge speak about this, I have occasionally tried to think about the present as if it were a scenario I developed in the past: what sort of scenario would it be, how surprised would my past self be, and so on. Seeing how much The Pile improved GPT-J’s performance on this task trigged such thoughts.