Futures Menagerie

Tools & MethodsFutures & Foresight
Written By Rachelle Bugeaud

The menagerie of postnormal potentialities are three animals that represent events that could radically redirect the future… for better or worse.

Originally conceived by Ziauddin Sardar and John A. Sweeney in their paper The Three Tomorrows (2015), the menagerie of postnormal potentialities consists of the original three: Black Elephant, Black Swan, and Black Jellyfish. The fourth animal (Grey Rhino) is not officially part of the menagerie of postnormal potentialities but is sometimes included to broaden the spectrum. Its inclusion is roughly based on the Johari window framework, a 1955 tool meant to help individuals better understand themselves.

The animals are situated in a quadrant formed from axes that range from known to unknown. Using these animals helps us to explore a range of futures, especially futures we never dared imagine.

 
 
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Black Elephant
(Known Known)

  • REPRESENTS THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM: THAT WHICH IS WELL KNOWN BUT NO ONE WANTS TO ADDRESS

  • IS AN EVENT THAT’S HIGHLY LIKELY TO UNFOLD. THAT CARRIES WITH IT BIG IMPACT, BUT THAT THE GENERAL PUBLIC DEEMS UNLIKELY (CONTRARY TO EXPERT OPINION)

  • EX: COLLAPSING OCEAN ECOSYSTEMS, PANDEMIC FLU


A black elephant is a term popularized in 2014 by New York Times columnist Thomas L Friedman. It is an event that’s very likely to happen but is usually dismissed or ignored by society. Think of “the elephant in the room” that no one wants to deal with or mention. These types of events tend to exist where fear-based drivers outweigh the desire for progress. They are threats we recognize but choose to ignore, perhaps because they seem too big to influence.

Rhinowhite.png

Grey Rhino
(Known Unknown)

  • THE EVENTS WE KNOW ARE COMING BUT WE DON’T KNOW HOW THEY’RE GOING TO MANIFEST

  • SIMILAR TO BLACK ELEPHANTS IN THAT THEY ARE CHARACTERIZED BY INACTION THOUGH ONE (ELEPHANT) IS BY CHOICE AND THE OTHER IS DUE TO LACK OF IDENTIFICATION OR KNOWLEDGE (RHINO)

  • EX: FINANCIAL CRISIS, SPACE TRAVEL CATASTROPHE

The term Grey Rhino was popularized in 2012 by Michele Wucker in her article The Gray Rhino: How to Recognise and Act on the Obvious Dangers We Ignore. In it, Michele explains that black rhinos aren’t actually black, and white rhinos aren’t actually white. They’re all grey, but no one calls them grey rhinos!

As such, this category of events is all about seeing what’s plainly in front of you but is often not discussed. It’s about threats that may have been identified by others but to which you remain blind. With Grey Rhinos it’s not a question of IF they will happen but of WHEN they will hit.

 
 
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Black Jellyfish
(Unknown Known)

  • EVENTS THAT ARE KNOWN TO OCCUR BUT THAT CARRY UNFORESEEN RISKS WHEN EVENS ARE EXPONENTIALLY SCALED

  • EVENTS THAT WE DO NOT CONSIDER TO BE THREATS OR RISKS BUT PROVE MORE COMPLEX WHEN SCALED

  • EX: ESCALATING CYBERTHREATS, GMO

This represents events that have the potential for instantaneous scaling of impact. That means that although they are likely small events, very many of them could occur all at once leading to unforeseeable change. The term is inspired by jellyfish blooms that happen in the ocean and can cripple coastal power plants and undermine naval military fleets. Something as soft and small as a jellyfish can have tremendous impact when there are millions of them. These are events we think we know, but we really don’t understand their complexity or potential at all.

Swanwhite.png

Black Swans
(Unknown Unknown)

  • UNLIKELY AND UNEXPECTED, LOW PROBABILITY OF OCCURRING

  • HOWEVER, CARRY LARGE UNKNOWN RAMIFICATIONS SHOULD THEY OCCUR

  • EX: CREATION OF THE INTERNET, 9/11 ATTACKS


This is probably the most talked about animal of the menagerie thanks no doubt to Nasim Nicolas Taleb’s book The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. Black swans represent events that lie beyond the limits of our experience. For example, because we tend to only see white swans, we do not think that such a thing as a black swan might exist (surprise! they do: in Australia).

Now it’s important to note that a black swan event does not have to be a negative thing. It could bring about incredible forward momentum as well. Essentially it’s something that cannot be predicted or forecasted by even the best experts. They’re kind of like wild cards except wild cards tend to be imaginable whereas black swans lie beyond our imagination.

 
Rachelle Bugeaud
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