At the core of Wilson et al.´s paper stands the question of intentional change. We propose to extend this notion by introducing concepts from the domains of innovation and knowledge creation. By going beyond their ACT approach we present a comprehensive framework for a theory of change culminating in the change strategy of “learning from the future as it emerges”

Fundneider, Thomas

Peschl, Markus F.

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Evolving the future by learning from the
future (as it emerges)? Toward an
epistemology of change
Markus F. Peschl and Thomas Fundneider
2014
Online at https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/66540/
MPRA Paper No. 66540, posted 17. September 2015 19:54 UTC
[pesc14c]
Peschl, M.F. and T. Fundneider (2014):
Evolving the future by learning from the
future (as it emerges)? Toward an
epistemology of change
 Behavioral and Brain Sciences 37(4), 433-434.
URL: doi:10.1017/S0140525X13003245 ()
local file name: pesc14c Peschl Evolving the future by learning from the future.pdf
internal note:
                                                                                                                                   bibliographical data
@article{pesc14c,
 AUTHOR       = {M.F. Peschl and T. Fundneider},
 TITLE        = {Evolving the future by learning from the future (as it emerges)? Toward an epistemology
of change},
 YEAR         = {2014},
 JOURNAL      = {Behavioral and Brain Sciences},
 VOLUME       = {37},
 NUMBER       = {4},
 PAGES        = {433-434},
 URL          = {doi:10.1017/S0140525X13003245},
 KEYWORDS     = {Design | Innovation | Epistemologie | Innovation | future | epistemology | Presencing |
emergent innovation | learning | double-loop learning | }
}
10. Sep 2015
The following text is a draft version and might differ from the print version.
© M.F.Peschl & T.Fundneider  September 15 | 1 
This is a penultimate draft/manuscript. You may obtain the original from Franz-Markus.Peschl@univie.ac.at 
 
Evolving the future by learning form the future (as it emerges)?  
Subtitle: Towards an epistemology of change 
 
4-9 Author names & affiliations 
Markus F. Peschl 
Cognitive Science Research Platform and Department of Philosophy, University of Vienna 
Universitätsstrasse 7 
1010 Wien 
Austria 
+43 1 4277 46424 
Franz-Markus.Peschl@univie.ac.at 
http://www.univie.ac.at/knowledge/peschl/ 
 
Thomas Fundneider 
theLivingCore & University of Vienna 
Mariahilferstrasse 1d 
1060 Wien 
Austria 
fundneider@thelivingcore.com 
http://www.thelivingcore.com 
 
10 Abstract (max 60 words) 
At the core of Wilson et al.´s paper stands the question of intentional change. We propose to 
extend this notion by introducing concepts from the domains of innovation and knowledge 
creation. By going beyond their ACT approach we present a comprehensive framework for a 
theory of change culminating in the change strategy of “learning from the future as it 
emerges”. 
 
© M.F.Peschl & T.Fundneider  September 15 | 2 
11 Main text (max 1000 words; with paragraphs separated by full blank lines) 
 
Even though Wilson, Hayes, Biglan, & Embry (WHB&E) talk about “evolving the future” and 
the capacity for positive open-ended change and how it can be brought about in various 
domains, there is no explicit mention of the perspective of innovation and knowledge creation 
as one of the main sources for (intentional) change and bringing forth new realities (except 
for a short reference to Johnson (2010)). 
 
WHB&E pose the question why positive behavioral and cultural change is sometimes so hard 
to achieve and why something that seems to be an adaptation, occasionally turns out to be 
inadequate. Our resistance against change seems to have a dilemma that is intrinsic to 
almost all kinds of radical change or innovation as one of its deeper causes: on the one hand 
we strive for radical change, we are interested or even fascinated by it; on the other hand we 
are irritated when confronted with something radically new, because it does neither fit into 
our categories of perception nor into our mental models. The reason for the resistance 
against such changes seems to lie in this situation of loss of control, which is an unpleasant 
experience for most humans. So, the original question can be reformulated: How can one 
produce positive, in the sense of sustainable, change that is both fundamentally new and 
organically fits into existing structures, or is in continuity with the already existing categories 
of our cognition (compare Maturana & Varela´s (1980) or Luhmann´s concept of 
“anschlussfähig”)? 
 
On the individual level, WHB&E tackle this problem by proposing a three-step approach 
having the goal to increase response variability (Section 3.1): (i) Behavior therapy (BT) 
(adapting and rewiring behavioral responses), (ii) cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) 
(reconceptualizing the problem space in the symbolic realm), and (iii) “acceptance and 
commitment therapy” (ACT). ACT aims at identifying one´s most important life goals in a 
mindful manner and values and firmly following them. The question what these goals could 
be and where they come from on a more general level remains open—finding an answer to 
these questions is, however, critical for successful sustainable change. What is already a 
hard question on an individual level, becomes even more complex and challenging in the 
realm of innovation and change on a group/organizational or cultural level. It seems that the 
processes of increasing variability and selecting according to criteria (where do they come 
from?) should be complemented by another strategy hinted at by WHB&E: mindfulness, 
attentiveness, or wisdom. 
© M.F.Peschl & T.Fundneider  September 15 | 3 
 
The proposition of this commentary is to extend the above approach to intentional change by 
introducing concepts from the domains of innovation and knowledge creation. They have 
their roots in cognitive science, epistemology, innovation studies and organization science 
(Fagerberg, Mowery, & Nelson, 2006; Fagerberg & Verspagen, 2009), and second order 
cybernetics (of semantics) (Krippendorff, 2006). We propose the following conceptual and 
epistemological framework differentiating various strategies of change (see also Figure 1): 
 
a. Downloading and reacting: Existing and successful behavioral patterns from the past 
are downloaded and applied (⇒ no change occurs). 
b. Single-loop strategy of change/learning (adapting and restructuring): this circular 
process is closely related to the evolutionary dynamics by adapting to the 
environment through generating variation and testing it by behavioral expression. 
Such a strategy leads to optimizing existing structures; oftentimes it is referred to as 
incremental innovation (Ettlie, Bridges, & O’Keefe, 1984) and can be compared to the 
BT-approach. 
c. Double-loop strategy of change/learning (redesigning & reframing) (Argyris & Schön, 
1996): humans are not only capable of simply adapting to the environment, but also 
to reframe their symbolic/symbotype system by reflecting on their assumptions or 
values and changing them (e.g., a change in premises in our cognitive framework, 
paradigmatic shift in the realm of science (Kuhn, 1970), radical innovation (Corso, 
Martini, & Pellegrini, 2009; Ettlie et al., 1984)). That creates a new space of 
knowledge opening up an unexplored scope of potential behaviors (compare to CBT-
approach). Both the single- and double-loop strategies understand change as 
adaptation and as “learning from the past”. 
d. “Learning from the future as it emerges” (regenerating): Going one step further, our 
cognition and symbolic capabilities enable us to intellectually deeply penetrate the 
environment in order to achieve a profound understanding of the potentials that are 
not yet realized in a particular part of the (internal or external) environment—
potentials that are hidden, that need to be discovered, developed, and cultivated in 
order to emerge in the future. This is a rather different strategy which we refer to as 
Emergent Innovation (Peschl & Fundneider, 2008, 2013; Peschl, Raffl, Fundneider, & 
Blachfellner, 2010). It is partially based on Scharmer´s (2007) Theory-U and does not 
primarily follow the classical strategy of trial-and-error, variation, selection, and 
adaptation in order to bring forth change and innovation, but uses deep knowledge 
about the core of the object of innovation (OOI) and its potentials in order to “learn 
© M.F.Peschl & T.Fundneider  September 15 | 4 
from the future as it emerges”. In other words, these potentials offer a pointer towards 
the future possibilities that might emerge. This leads to changes that fit into the 
environment (because they have their basis in the core of the OOI) and are at the 
same time fundamentally new (because they tap yet unrealized potentials of the core 
of the OOI). 
 
 
 
Figure 1: Strategies and levels for dealing with (open-ended) change (they do not exclude 
each other). 
 
Although the above framework stresses an epistemological perspective, one can clearly see 
the similarities to WHB&E (Section 3.1f) on a conceptual level. Taking their ACT approach 
one step further, reveals that our fourth change-strategy of “Learning from the future as it 
emerges” follows a slightly different procedure, in which the concepts of identifying and 
cultivating potentials as well as enabling intentional change play a central role. 
 
Besides having to employ a whole new set of cognitive and epistemological skills, as well as 
attitudes complementing the classical variation-and-selection processes (e.g., openness, 
patience, letting-go, coping with loss of control, deep understanding (of the core potentials), 
© M.F.Peschl & T.Fundneider  September 15 | 5 
etc.), such an approach has far-reaching implications on innovation and creating new 
knowledge. 
 
12 References (APA Style) 
 
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. A. (1996). Organizational learning II. Theory, method, and practice. 
Redwood City, CA: Addison-Wesley. 
Corso, M., Martini, A., & Pellegrini, L. (2009). Innovation at the intersection between 
exploration, exploitation and discontinuity. Int. J. Learning and Intellectual Capital, 6(4), 324–
340. 
Ettlie, J. E., Bridges, W. P., & O’Keefe, R. D. (1984). Organisational strategic and structural 
differences for radical vs. incremental innovation. Management Science, 30. 
Fagerberg, J., Mowery, D. C., & Nelson, R. R. (Eds.). (2006). The Oxford handbook of 
innovation. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 
Fagerberg, J., & Verspagen, B. (2009). Innovation studies. The emerging structure of a new 
scientific field. Research Policy, 38(2), 218–233. 
Johnson, S. (2010). Where good ideas come from. The natural history of innovation. New 
York: Riverhead Books. 
Krippendorff, K. (2006). The semantic turn. A new foundation for design. Boca Raton, FL: 
Taylor and Francis CRC Press. 
Kuhn, T. S. (1970). The structure of scientific revolutions (second.). Chicago: The University 
of Chicago Press. 
Maturana, H. R., & Varela, F. J. (Eds.). (1980). Autopoiesis and cognition: the realization of 
the living. Dordrecht, Boston: Reidel Pub. 
Peschl, M. F., & Fundneider, T. (2008). Emergent Innovation and Sustainable Knowledge 
Co-creation. A Socio-Epistemological Approach to "Innovation from within". In M. D. Lytras, 
J. M. Carroll, E. Damiani, & others (Eds.), The Open Knowledge Society: A Computer 
Science and Information Systems Manifesto (Vol. CCIS (Communications in Computer and 
Information Science) 19, pp. 101–108). New York, Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer (CCIS 19). 
Peschl, M. F., & Fundneider, T. (2013). Designing (and) enabling interfaces for collaborative 
knowledge creation and innovation. Computers and Human Behavior, 2013, in press. 
Peschl, M. F., Raffl, C., Fundneider, T., & Blachfellner, S. (2010). Creating sustainable 
futures by innovation from within. Radical change is in demand of radical innovation. In R. 
© M.F.Peschl & T.Fundneider  September 15 | 6 
Trappl (Ed.), Cybernetics and Systems 2010 (pp. 354–359). Wien. 
Scharmer, C. O. (2007). Theory U. Leading from the future as it emerges. The social 
technology of presencing. Cambridge, MA: Society for Organizational Learning. 
 
 


Evolving the future by learning from the future (as it emerges)? Toward an epistemology of change

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