What We Know Will Happen

2022 predictions are not hard, but they are not what we want

Photo by Jen Theodore on Unsplash

by Mike Meyer ~ Honolulu ~ January 2, 2022

Early January is crystal ball time. Even if they deny it as a waste of time, everyone wants to take a peek at what the future will bring. Most things will be the same but the differences are what we want to understand. Change is the issue, whether driven by hope or fear.

The business world is both the primary source and primary consumer of fortune-telling. These predictions are carefully identified as trend analysis by faceless experts or visions if done by noted individuals. Only in the medicine show world of late capitalist markets are the secret to coming fortunes revealed.

All of this is little different from the efforts of the ancient Shang Chinese analysts. They answered essential questions about the future written on tortoise shells after burning them and interpreting the resulting cracks.

21st-century analysts dispense with tortoise shells, tea leaves, or chicken entrails as those no longer add validity as channels for supernatural forces to communicate on important issues. In our world, people who have made lots of money must know something, at least about making money.

Otherwise, the predictions are left to scientists and technical experts and are restricted to their fields of expertise. This activity is not about predictions but the simple logic of asking an expert on issues within their area of expertise.

Anyone can get into the prediction game in January as we have planetwide social networking with an infinite array of special interest groups. The experts in these social networks are identified as influencers which says much about their area of expertise. These are fashion or popularity trends shading into relations and political cults—the 21st-century version of roasting tortoise shells on questions of love and power.

The deluge of predictions in January is beginning to gain value from the vast amount of data in specialized areas. But, unfortunately, this is very hard to find. Nevertheless, people are making an effort. Marshall Kirkpatrick has put together a hefty summary of trend reports that may be valuable. This is from Exponential View’s 2022…