One of the great missing pieces in futures research is an adequate understanding of the human psychology of foresight. We have been talking to leaders about a rapidly moving future for around 70 years, and yet most people would agree that we haven’t quite arrived at a “foresight culture.”

The Long Now Foundation just pointed out a new article in the venerable journal Science which is finally seeking to understand The Psychology of Transcending the Here and Now.

People directly experience only themselves here and now but often consider, evaluate, and plan situations that are removed in time or space, that pertain to others’ experiences, and that are hypothetical rather than real. People thus transcend the present and mentally traverse temporal distance, spatial distance, social distance, and hypotheticality. We argue that this is made possible by the human capacity for abstract processing of information. We review research showing that there is considerable similarity in the way people mentally traverse different distances, that the process of abstraction underlies traversing different distances, and that this process guides the way people predict, evaluate, and plan near and distant situations.

From my own experience, the future is certainly abstract to people – something they consider – whereas the present is visceral – something they feel in their guts.

If I tell you the 2007 Case-Schiller price index indicates a once-in-a-lifetime bubble for housing, one that will soon pop, you file this under “interesting ideas to consider.”

When I show you a picture of the 4000 sqaure foot house that you are inexplicably allowed to purchase under lax banking regulations and unverified income, you file this under, “very awesome things.” The abstraction of the banking system is no match for the visceral awesomeness of being able to purchase a suburban castle with six bathrooms.

I think most people in a global economy will not take the time to consider the roots of confirmation bias is such depth. But I sincerely hope that every leader of business and government will.