Social Design Engineering Series

SDES-2020-10

Future Design as a Metacognitive Intervention for Presentism

Yoshinori Nakagawa
School of Economics and Management, Kochi University of Technology
Research Institute for Future Design, Kochi University of Technology

Yoichi Hizen
Research Institute for Humanity and Nature, Kyoto
Research Institute for Future Design, Kochi University of Technology

31st July, 2020

School of Economics and Management
Research Institute for Future Design
Kochi University of Technology
KUT-SDE working papers are preliminary research documents published by the School of Economics and Management jointly with the ResearchCenter for Social Design Engineering at Kochi University of Technology. To facilitate prompt distribution, they have not been formally reviewed
and edited. They are circulated in order to stimulate discussion and critical comment and may be revised. The views and interpretations expressedin these papers are those of the author(s). It is expected that most working papers will be published in some other form.

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Future Design as a Metacognitive Intervention

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for Presentism

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Abstract: Many important problems occur due to the incompatibilities between the interests ofthe present generation and the welfare of future generations, and thus the preset generation mywell be captured by presentism. Drawing on the theoretical framework of metacognition, thepresent study investigated how presentism is overcome by the Future Design intervention
incorporating the imaginary future generation setting. Four participants to the workshops wereinterviewed and the transcriptions were transcribed. There were two major findings. We
identified narratives of the participants suggesting that metacognition was active during theworkshops, concerning the two cognitions which were governed by the present and future
selves. Second, the narratives identified above were classified into two categories and the twocorresponding roles of the metacognition were identified: monitoring & controlling function
and harmonizing function. The former is essential for the acquisition of the identity as a future
person, and the latter is essential for making it coherent with the identity as a present person.
The present study proposes the view that Future Design is a tool of intervention withindividuals’ metacognition concerning the choice of the reference point in the time axis fromwhich to view the past, present, and future of the society, rather than a tool to naively motivate
individuals to care for future generations.

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Keywords: sustainability; Future Design; imaginary future generation; metacognition;
qualitative research; sense of coherence

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1. Introduction

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Many important problems currently threaten global sustainability, such as climatechange, environmental deterioration, and government debts. These problems mostly occur
due to the incompatibilities between the interests of the present generation and the welfareof future generations, and thus the preset generation my well be captured by presentism(i.e., the tendency to generate a bias within established laws and policies that have thepotential to negatively affect future generations [1—2]).

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To overcome presentism in the contemporary system of democracy, a number ofattempts have been made to consider how future generations’ voices can be institutionallyreflected in current decision making. A number of authors argue about the possibility that
future generations are represented in parliament [3—5]. Adachi [6] classified forms of
institutionalization into eight categories, for instance, constitutional provisions forprotection of future generations’ well‐being [7], transferring some of sovereign states’
authority to regional or global bodies [8], and creating an independent governmental
agency to review all regulations expected to impact future generations significantly and tocoordinate among existing agencies [9].

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In line with these studies, the framework of the imaginary future generation has been
proposed in the branch of a future studies discipline called Future Design [10, 11]. Under
this framework, individuals take on the role of members of a future generation (hereafter
called the imaginary future generation) and engage in designing strategies to be adopted
by the present generation. The design procedure can incorporate negotiation between theimaginary future generation and the other participants, who express the perspective of thepresent generation, to build an intergenerational consensus. Saijo, an economist, proposed
this framework out of concern that the market and democratic institutions consume future
resources without remorse, and that an alternative device is necessary to incorporate thepreferences of future generations in policymaking. Thus, while the framework of imaginary
future generation can be narrowly understood as a technique for implementing workshops
to create visions in organizations, it should be seen as a concept to be kept in mind byvarious stakeholders who make various decisions in the society governed by the market
and democracy. A growing number of municipalities are utilizing this framework to create
their visions in workshops by inviting their citizens or inside the municipalities (e.g., [12,
13])

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However, little is investigated on the subjective experience of the present generationindividuals taking on the role of members of a future generation. While earlier experimental
studies confirm that the framework of the imaginary future generation encourages
individuals to acquire sustainable policy preferences even if it is burdensome to the present
generation [14—16], an obvious question arises as to how identities as the present andfuture generations, which may well conflict with one another, can coexist in a single
individual. The present qualitative study aims to answer this question.

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Answering this question seems even more crucial considering that the issue ofpractical, real‐life institutional representation of future generations’ voices remains
unresolved. In fact, drawing on case studies of institutions representing future generations

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in six countries and regions, Jones, O’Brien, and Ryan [17, p.158] concluded, “Institutions
which are given too much power, too early in their lifespan, tend to face rejection frompoliticians.” These cases clearly show how introducing representatives of the future
generation to the contemporary political system induces intra‐generational conflicts andfail to attain its intended goals. Thus, institutional attempts to represent the future
generation must be accompanied by the attempt of each stakeholder (e.g., politicians andvoters) to overcome his own presentism. Drawing on the theoretical framework ofmetacognition, the present study indicates the direction toward this ultimate goal.

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2. Theoretical Framework

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Metacognition is a higher level cognition (i.e., a mental action or process of acquiringknowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses) about othercognitions at the object level [18]. Metacognition has attracted a great deal of scholarly
attention partly because it is essential for effective learning of school children and adults.
According to the review by Veenman et al. [19], the most common distinction inmetacognition separates metacognitive knowledge from skills. The former refers to aperson’s declarative knowledge about the interactions between person, task, and strategy
characteristics [20]), whilst the latter refers to a person’s procedural knowledge forregulating one’s problem‐solving and learning activities [21].

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The latter type of metacognition (i.e., procedural metacognition) comprises theprocesses of metacognitive monitoring (i.e., subjective assessments of ongoing cognitive
activities), and metacognitive control (i.e., the regulation of current cognitive activities) [18,22]. According to Roebers [23], monitoring is associated with questions such as “how much
effort do I have to put into learning this material?”, “did I sufficiently learn this material toremember the details later on?” and “how sure am I that this answer is correct?”, whereas
controlling includes actions such as selecting material for review while studying,differentially allocating study time to the learning material, and withdrawing answers, or
terminating memory search.

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The present study applies the concept of metacognition in understanding how
individuals experiencing the perspective of the future generation accommodates theidentities as the present and the future generations, which potentially conflict with one
another. With the earlier studies in mind, the present study’s research objective mentioned
in Introduction section is refined as follows:

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Objective 1: To confirm if the activation of metacognition is observed targeting cognitions
operated by selves as the present and future generations.

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Objective 2: To investigate the function (or role) of this metacognition.

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Considering the above mentioned previous studies on metacognition that monitor andcontrol another (i.e., lower level) cognition, it is hypothesized that one activates his
metacognition to monitor and control another cognition by considering such a question as“which perspective am I adopting (should I adopt) in thinking about the state of the societyof 2050, the present generation’s or the future generation’s?” Adoption of the present
generation’s perspective means that he is looking forward the future 30 years from now,and imagining what technologies will be available, what future people will be thinking
about, and so forth. On the other hand, adoption of the future generation’s perspectivemeans that he is absorbed in the world he is imagining, just like he is absorbed in the story
world while reading novels and assuming the realization of a specific future. He may also
be looking back on the present generation and regretting or appreciating specific actions(or inactions) of the present generation, such as coping with COVID‐19 or reduction of CO2
emission. This is just like how we as the present generation look back on the past generation(see earlier studies on retrospective assessment [24]). Thus, for Objective 1, we expect a
positive answer, and for Objective 2, we expect that monitoring and controlling are the mainfunctions of metacognition. This will be qualitatively verified.

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3. Materials and Methods

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The present study is based on interview surveys with four citizen participants to future
design workshops organized by two municipalities in Japan: Yahaba Town (Iwate
Prefecture) and Uji City (Kyoto Prefecture).

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Yahaba is a town in Iwate Prefecture with a population of about 28,000. The town is locatedconveniently about 20 to 30 minutesʹ drive away from Morioka City with nearly ten times
more population than the town, so the town has been developed as a dormitory town forthe city. Such a Town Hall decided to hold a series of workshops in an unusual way tocreate a long‐term vision for the town. The contents of the workshops were to have local
citizens to act as future persons of the town, envision the townʹs future and consider what
the town should do for realizing the visions from now on. Two participants to this series ofworkshops, Mihoko and Miho (anonyms), agreed to participate in the interview survey.
They were both females and in their forties at the time of the interviews. The interviews
were conducted six months after the series of workshops was completed. Note that theoutcomes of the workshops are reported in Hara et al. [12].

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Uji City is located in the southern part of Kyoto Prefecture, and it is famous for its
cultural properties, such as the World Heritage Byodoin Temple, and Uji Tea. Many tourists
visit this city on weekends. The population is 180,000, the city had been developed as aresidential area since 1960, and the population had increased rapidly, but after 2000, it has
been declining. In addition, the percentage of the population aged 65 and over is expected
to increase at a pace exceeding the national average. In that situation, the City Hall started
working on a workshop in an unusual way to make the citizen think about the local
communityʹs future. Two participants to this series of workshops, Mayumi and Hitoshi(anonyms), agreed to participate in interview surveys. They were female in her thirties andmale in his sixties, respectively, at the time of the interviews. The interviews were148

conducted 12 months after the series of workshops was completed.

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In the workshops of these two municipalities, the four participants were allocatedinto groups consisting of four members or so, and were asked to collaboratively describe
the town (the city) 40 years (30 years) from the present, imagining that they had time‐
travelled to that time with their ages unchanged and they were living there. This constraint
on age is important for the following reason. Future Design is intended to resolveintergenerational problems, and thus has a concern about how conflicts of individuals at
the present with other individuals in the future can be resolved, rather than with the same
individuals aged in the future. Time‐travelling into 40 years in the future with one’s agechanged (i.e. getting old by 40 years) means that he is allowed to keep his own identity,
which we would like to avoid. (For example, an individual can be aged 42 in 2020 and aged
82 in 2060.) Time‐travelling with his aged unchanged, rather than changed, is a good (even if
not perfect) and easily implemented simulation of getting absorbed in others in the future.

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In interviews, they were requested to talk about (i) how they decided to participate in theworkshops, (ii) how they and their group members managed to take the perspective of the
future generation, and (iii) how the experience the participation influenced their lives. Theinterviews lasted for 1‐2 hours. The voices were recorded and transcribed later. The
transcription amounted to 129 pages in total. The transcription was analyzed in reference
to the theoretical framework introduced in Section 2. The narratives of the four participants
are summarized in the story form in Appendix A to D, respectively

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4. Results

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In the transcriptions of the voices of the four participants, two functions ofmetacognition were identified, and they will be detailed one by one below.

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Monitoring & controlling function

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As expected, the monitoring & controlling function of metacognition of was identified.
During the workshops, Miho carefully considered whether she was successful in taking theperspective of the future generation, rather than was keeping the perspective of the present
generation, as shown in the following except. Here she explains how she got the idea ofwhat it is like to time‐travel to future with her age unchanged, as requested by the organizerof the workshop (See the sixth paragraph of Appendix B).

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Miho: Well, I started imagining the future where I lived as a female aged 80, andthought about what future would interest me. I gradually acquired the feeling that I was
there with my age unchanged. It was probably because I felt it was a pity that such aninteresting future would be realized only after I get so old.

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This statement suggests that there is a metacognition monitoring how cognition at the object

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level (i.e., the cognition as the present self or the cognition at the future self) works, andcontrolling herself so that the cognition at the future self becomes dominant. Additionally,
it was not only herself but her group members that were monitored and controlled. In fact,
soon after the start of the discussion, one of the elderly members began to express his
opinion with an introductory remark with ʺI would die by then...ʺ, however, while he was
immersing himself in envisioning the future world specifically, he came to not use such aremark. The next excerpt of Mayumi shows that she was also monitoring her cognition at
the object level.

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Mayumi: During the workshops, I was always questioning to myself whether I was
successful in playing the role of the pure future generation or not. I felt the risk that I was
simply expressing my selfish ideas as the present generation, pretending that I was doing
so from the perspective of the future generation.

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This monitoring process guided her to arrive at the understanding of what it was like toplay the role of the future generation, as shown in the eighth paragraph of Appendix C.
This monitoring & controlling function of the metacognition was also active in Hitoshi’scase, as shown in the following excerpt.

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Interviewer: Please tell me the story after the series of workshops was over.

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Hitoshi: Yes. The series of the four workshops was over. What I thought was that at the endof the series of workshops I at last got the idea of what it was like to be a future generation,and that the ending of the workshops meant that I would sooner or later lose this sense andhad to return to what I used to be before I got familiar with the idea.

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In saying so, Hitoshi compares the cognitions by the present and the future selves, andprioritize the latter (in his monitoring process). Indeed, he decided to participate in a citizen
network as a founding member to keep regular opportunities to activate the cognition as
the future self (in his controlling process). The network consists of nearly twenty citizens
who participated in the workshops and has the aim of thinking about the future of the cityfrom the perspective of the future generation.

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Harmonizing function

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Another function of metacognition identified is on the harmonization of the object levelcognitions. If an individual belonging to the present generation successfully experience theperspective taking of the future generation and then resumes the identity as the present
generation, he perceives the coexistence of two identities that may conflict with one another.
Such conflict cannot be avoided especially when he is inclined to support actions that will
come to fruition in the immediate future. However, Mihoko’s narrative illustrate how theseidentities can be harmonized. We demonstrate that metacognition has the function ofharmonizing these two identities (and thus the cognitions associated with the perspectivesof the present and future generations). See the last paragraph of Appendix A for the context
of the excerpt.

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Interviewer: Now the series of workshops is over, and you are living your everyday life.
Do you think about things as a present generation, or recall the experience during theworkshops to think about actions to be taken by the present generation?

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Mihoko: Well, that is a difficult question to answer. After all, we succeeded in getting
absorbed in the world 40 years from now, and that is why I feel “this should be done rightnow, otherwise we will not be in time”. This feeling springs up from me as the present
generation.

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This statement suggests that there was an interplay between the cognition governed by theself as the present generation and the cognition governed by the self as the future generation.
It also suggests that Mihoko was aware that the two cognitions were consistent with one
another (i.e., the state described as the future generation and the actions to be implemented
by the present generation are connected by the means‐end relation), and thus there is ametacognition enabling the perception that the two cognitions are in harmony with one
another. This function of metacognition is also confirmed in the following excerpt of Hitoshi.
This statement also illustrates how the two cognitions are perceived to exist with harmony.

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Hitoshi: Some may argue that how future should be like should be left to the future
generation’s own choice. However, it would be too late. Without thinking about a desirable
future and starting actions right now, the desirable future will not be realized.

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It should be noted that to link the two cognitions by the means‐end relationship is
not the only way to make these cognitions in harmony with one other. Mayumi found theconsistency between the two cognitions in a unique way: not by means of identifying themeans‐end relationship, but by means of identifying essential similarity between the two
cognitions (see the eighth paragraph of Appendix C). Mayumi is well aware that thecognitions by the present and future selves may well reach different conclusions withregard to what should be (have been) done at present. According to her belief, this isbecause we as the present generation are bound by conventional thinking, which prevents
us from realizing what we really want to do. She also believes that taking the perspectiveof the future generation frees us from such conventional thinking, and thus there is nocontradiction between the cognition by the present and future selves.

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4. Discussion

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The present study conducted interview surveys with individuals who participatedin Future Design workshops and investigated the role of metacognition concerning the
cognitions at the object level governed by the selves with the present and future
generation’s perspectives. The answers to the two research questions referred to in the
research objectives are summarized as follows.

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As the answer to the first objective, we identified narratives of the participants

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suggesting that metacognition was active concerning the two cognitions at the object levelgoverned by the present and future selves. As the answer to the second objective, thenarratives identified above were classified into two categories and the two correspondingroles of the metacognition were identified: monitoring & controlling function andharmonizing function. The former is essential for the acquisition of the identity as a future
person, and the latter is essential for making it coherent with the identity as a present person.
Figures 1 and 2 are the illustrations of these two functions.
(Figures 1 & 2 inserted about here.)

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Several things should be noted on these findings. First, the narratives on themonitoring & controlling function of the metacognition were mostly on the research
participants’ experiences during the Future Design workshops. In these workshops
participants are requested to activate an unusual cognition by taking the perspective of the
future generation, and thus they monitor and control themselves to succeed in doing so.
The difficulty and importance of disengagement from the present in future studies
workshops has been recognized in the literature [25]. The contribution of the present study
on this point is that this transition is perceived by the participants to be discrete, notcontinuous, and is enabled only by intentionally paying the cost of careful monitoring andcontrolling. Since overcoming this difficulty is required, it is inevitable that someparticipants are better at taking this step than others. However, very few earlier studies
have paid attention to this individual difference. With the findings of the present study inmind, future studies should investigate whether the ability to disengage from the present
is associated with the general metacognitive competence and skills (e.g., [26—29]). Anyway,
it is of practical importance for workshop organizers to understand participants’ individual
characteristics and, where possible, place participants who have relatively low competenceof disengaging from the present in groups with people of higher competence, so that thelatter can assist the former by leading the discussions.

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Second, in spite of the potential conflicts between the present and future generations,as well as the difficulty for the present generation to get motivated to care for future
generations [30], the present study found that the perspectives of the present and future
generations can coexist due to the harmonizing function of metacognition. Furthermore, it
was found that this function can be executed in two different manners: either by defining
the means‐end relationship (i.e., between actions to be done by the present self and the stateof the society in which the future self lives in) or by finding an essential similarity in spiteof the apparent contradiction. Anyway, this metacognition serves as the bridge between thepresent and future selves. Therefore, this is expected to contribute to one’s sense ofcoherence [31—32] and thus life satisfaction.

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Third, while the monitoring & controlling function of metacognition was active
mainly during the exposure to the intervention (i.e., during the workshops whereindividuals are requested to take the perspective of the future generation), the harmonizing
function of metacognition seemed to be active for a much longer time. In fact, Mihoko andHitoshi were interviewed as long as six and 12 months after the series of workshops werecompleted, and they still felt the sense of coherence, as the excepts show. It is a crucial futuretask to quantitatively investigate how durable the Future Design intervention is. The

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answer to this question determines whether Future Design can really be a promisingframework to realize the sustainable society.

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To conclude, regardless of whether the organizers of the Future Design workshops
in Yahaba Town and Uji City had an explicit intention or not, the workshops can be viewed
as the intervention with the metacognition of the four participants concerning the choice ofthe reference point in the time axis from which to view the past, present, and future of thesociety. Taken together with the empirical evidence on the effectiveness of adopting thefuture reference point on the formation of individuals’ sustainable attitude [31, 32], it would
be beneficial for future research to consider how individuals with the metacognition of ourfour research participants are shared by as many members of the contemporary society as
possible, rather than naively questioning how as many members as possible can be
motivated to care for future generations. The former question seems to be less difficult toanswer than the latter, because adoption of this metacognition is accompanied by a senseof coherence, which is an essential component of life satisfaction.

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Figure 1: Illustration of the monitoring & controlling function of metacognition.

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Figure 2: Illustration of the harmonizing function of metacognition.

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Appendix A: The Story of Mihoko in Yahaba Town

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Mihoko is a cheerful and outspoken woman in her 40s. She was born and grew up in Iwate
Prefecture. After graduating from a local high school, she went on to a university in a big
city outside of the prefecture. Then, after graduating from the university, she once thoughtof working in the big city without going back to Iwate Prefecture. However, she decided toreturn her home prefecture and work in Morioka city by some kind of fate. After a while,
she decided to get married. At first, she and her husband thought of living in Morioka citywhere they were working, but they decided to build a house in Yahaba Town where hadno connection with both of them. The reason was the reasonable house building cost in thetown, even though the town was located only about 20 to 30 minutesʹ drive away from
Morioka City.

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Ten years have passed since Mihoko came to live in Yahaba Town. She has little complaint
about living in the town. Actually, there are not so much play equipment in a park near herhouse, but it is sufficient for children to play. The elementary school where her children
attend is also close to her home. And above all, the townʹs tap water tastes better than the
Morioka Cityʹs. The only unfortunate thing is that many young people, who were born andraised in the town, go on to universities outside of the prefecture and get jobs there. There
are some households near her house whose sons and daughters moved to the outside of theprefecture. Such a woman, Mihoko happened to participate in the unusual workshops.

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On the first day of the workshop, each local citizen participant in a group of six was
invited into a room. There were various people in the room where Mihoko was invited,
including a young woman around the age of 20 or an elderly man. The persons whoplanned those workshops was Mr. Yoshioka, Yahaba Town Hall personnel. Mihoko could
not understand what this planner’s instructions meant at the beginning of the workshop.
The instructions were as follows: ʺImagine if you could time travel 40 years into the future
to Yahaba Town with the present your ages and live there. And then, envision the townʹsfuture as a group with representing the interests of the future generations 40 years later,
and provide ideas for policy measures which we should implement now.ʺ Contrary to the
instructions, Mihoko tried to imagine the future 40 years from now and being herself at 80‐
year‐old elderly woman because she thought it was difficult to time travel 40 years into the
future with her present age. Even so, she had only thought that ʺIf I were an elderly woman
in the future, I would be fine if the town would remain unchanged as it is now, wouldnʹt
I?ʺ As she has no particular complaints about living in Yahaba, it is natural that she should
think so.

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At first, the group started a discussion: which vision should they choose for their
town 40 years from now, just as it is now or the different. During the discussion, one of themember of the group, an about 20‐year‐old young woman expressed, ʺ40 years later fromnow, I would like to hope that our town would be easier to live than it is now.ʺ Her opinion
itself was not so surprising. However, the young womanʹs remarks, which expressed clearly
her hope that she would choose the different vision of the town after 40 years, moved
Mihoko deeply, and she thought ʺWell, yes, she is right.ʺ The young woman was born andgrew up in Yahaba Town, and now commutes to a university in Morioka City while livingin the town.

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Mihoko started to think strongly that she also wanted to choose the different visionfrom now, triggered by the young womanʹs remark. She wants the town after 40 years,
which population would be aging, to be a place where young people, who would support
the elderly, can think ʺWe donʹt want to move outside of the town.ʺ The town surely should
be like such. In fact, the town would be inundated with so many applicants who hope tomove there from all parts of the country, and it couldnʹt help rejecting most of them. In thisway, Mihoko and the group members expand their imaginations. A playground forchildren and an exercise and health management facility for senior citizens would beestablished in the same place, so children and the elderly could come together. The facility
also would serve as a workplace for the elderly to cook lunch boxes and delicatessens, andthe young generation would buy those meals and communicate with the elderly. Thus, thegroup reached the concept of ʺYahaba, a Healthy Town.ʺ This concept connects each groupidea, such as enticing a university hospital to establish which has realized already,reforming a closed junior high school ground into a sport stadium.

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On the other day of the workshop, a debate between the participants of future
generations (Mihokoʹs group who envisioned the Yahabaʹs future as the future generations)and the participants of the present generations (the group who ordinarily lived in thepresent town as the present generations) was held. They discussed the townʹs policy
measures which the town should implement from now. The present generations insisted
that important things were to achieve free medical care and education for children. When
Mihoko heard their opinions, she found a certain thing. The present generations were justobsessing about solving immediate issues. She appealed to such present generations. ʺWe
are living in the future on the assumption that you took an action to look into the future 40
years from now. Therefore, we will be at a loss if you fail to take such proper action.ʺ

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Even so, Mihoko didnʹt have the slightest intention of criticizing the present
generations. If she was the position of the present generations, she must have focused on
immediate issues they were facing now and solving the issues in timely manner as needed,
and must have seen the world 40 years later would be on the extension of such short‐sighted
behavior. Therefore, in the debate, she must have insisted that we should solve immediate
issues facing now. Moreover, she had even thought, 40 years later, ʺIf I were an elderly
woman in the future, I would be fine if the town would remain unchanged as it is now,
wouldnʹt I?ʺ before she heard the idea of the woman university student at the firstworkshop. For that reason, she understood sufficiently that the present generations would
criticize the future generationsʹ ideas and say ʺConsider realistically more immediate
issues!ʺ

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Now, a few months has passed since Mihoko participated in the workshops and she
thinks back to her experience of the workshop participation. And now she feels that she
could learn to have her own thoughts what we need now or not as the citizens of the town.
In fact, when she walks around the town and sees the scenery, sometimes she remembers
the days of the workshop when she acquired the future generationsʹ view. Then she thinksthat ʺWe cannot make it in time unless we move to action immediately.ʺ Mihoko as the
future person certainly still lives on in her mind. She is full of gratitude for Yahaba Town
that gave her such a valuable experience.

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Appendix B: The Story of Miho in Yahaba Town

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Miho lives in Yahaba town with her husband and two children. One child is in the first yearof junior high school, and the other is in the fourth year of elementary school. Six years ago
from now, invited by her friend, she started her activity as a member of the civil panel tostudy and give opinions on the town waterworks. At that time, she had been overwhelmedwith childcare and household chores even more than now and had been frantic to live
through each and every day. That is why this activity made her forget temporarily childcare
and gave her a fresh experience to make her eyes turn to the other things. Without thisactivity, she could never have had a chance to know the system of waterworks such as
production of tap water and home water supply, which enable us to get clean water just by
turning on a faucet routinely. Such a woman, Miho happened to participate in the unusual
workshops.

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On the first day of the workshop, each local citizen participant in a group of six was invited
into a room. There were men and women of all ages in the room where Miho was invited.
The persons who planned those workshops were Mr. Yoshioka, Yahaba Town Hall
personnel, and Prof. Hara for Osaka University. At the beginning of the workshop, Mihoand the other participants received the following instructions by those planners. ʺImagine
if you could time travel 40 years into the future to Yahaba Town with the present your ages
and live there. And then, envision the townʹs future as a group with representing theinterests of the future generations 40 years later, and provide ideas for policy measures
which we should implement now.ʺ However, since Miho who lives in the present could notimage at all that she would be a future person, she could not help but participate in thediscussion with hesitation. Contrary to the plannersʹ instructions, she tried to imagine
herself to be an 80‐year‐old elderly woman after 40 years from now, but the result was the
same.

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When the discussion had been going on for a while, the group were discussing how highwas the priority for the government to tackle childcare supports such as free medical careand ensuring day‐care centers. This subject was exactly what Miho had been worrying
about as an urgent issue because she had been overwhelmed with childcare. Contrary to
her thoughts, Mr. Omura, one of a member of the group and about a 70‐year‐old man,
expressed his opinion. ʺSince we are future persons, we may think that such issues could
be solved in a few years and it would already have been solved 40 years from now.ʺ

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Miho was taken aback by his casual comments. ʺI had been thinking of issues that I wanted
to be solved in the near future since I had been bound myself by childcare too much. That
is why I could not be a future person well. The issues like childcare, which I have beenworrying about could be solved in a few years, and it would surely have been solved in theworld 40 years from now. Iʹll forget temporarily daily childcare. Iʹll forget temporarily
issues which could be solved in a few years. And then Iʹll imagine Yahaba town 40 years
from now!ʺ

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After that, Miho thought what kind of town would be interesting when she would be at 80

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years old and came to lead the workshop discussion. In that way, one of the ideas the groupreached was to create a public transportation network to connect schools, the Town Halland tourist spots in the motif of ʺNight on the Galactic Railroadʺ, a childrenʹs story by Kenji
Miyazawa. Future vehicles might connect those places. Giovanni, the main character of thisstory, get on the Galactic Train from a small hill with his one friend and finding what a true
happiness is, while traveling through various constellations. Giovanni wakes up when heloses sight of the friend and finds out that all the events happened were in his dream world.
And in the real world, he was noticed that the friend fell into the river and went missing tosave his acquaintance. Mt. Nansho in Yahaba is said to be the model of the hill where thetrain starts in this beautiful story.

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In this way, while Miho was envisioning Yahabaʹs future 40 years from now and imagining
herself at 80 years old, she came to be under the sensation as if she had actually lived in the
future world with her present age. She noticed that other members of the group also shared
the same sensation. In fact, soon after the start of the discussion, one of the elderly members
began to express his opinion with an introductory remark with ʺI would die by then...ʺ,
however, while he was immersing himself in envisioning the future world specifically, hecame to not use such a remark. In this way, the members of the group gradually andnaturally came to follow the instructions by Mr. Yoshioka, ʺImagine if you could time travel
into the future with the present your ages.ʺ

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On the other day of the workshop, a debate between the participants of future generations(Mihoʹs group) and the participants of the present generations (the group who ordinarily
lived in the present town as the present generations) was held. They discussed the townʹspolicy measures which the town should implement from now. As expected, the present
generations insisted that the town should implement the immediate measures such as
childcare supports. At that time, Miho thought as follows: ʺThey are still talking about such
issues (laughing). Such issues already have been solved in our future world (laughing).ʺ
However, that thought is slightly different from looking down on the present generations.
Miho herself also had been persisting in solving the immediate issues before she would be
the future generations. If she and other future generation members still had been thepresent generations, they should have thought that the transportation network vision in the
motif of ʺGalactic Railroadʺ would be only an empty dream. Miho as the future generation
might have felt how she got matured after experiencing the future generation’s perspective.

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Now that the series of workshop is over, Miho thinks back to the moment when she could
be a future person, triggered by the remark of Mr. Omura, a 70‐year‐old man. And she feltthat she could response to his remark since she had attachment and reliability to her country,
Japan. There are difficult situations for working mothers such as chronic shortages of day‐care centers and menʹs still‐low involvement in childcare in Japan now. However, theJapanese must not be so foolish as to leave such issues unsolved in 40 years. The Japanesesurely could solve such issues in the near future. That is why Miho charged the present
generations with finding solutions for such issues, and forgot temporarily such issues andcould boldly time travel 40 years into the future world. Acting as a future person was suchan experience for her.

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Appendix C: The Story of Mayumi in Uji City

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Mayumi is a woman in her 30s and serving on a PTA Board at her first‐born 10‐year‐olddaughterʹs elementary school. When her daughter reached the age to enter an elementary
school, a problem came up. Her daughter started saying, ʺI never want to go to theelementary school.ʺ After all, she has been repeatedly attending and missing school while
enrolled the school, and now she is in the fourth grade. Some odd things often occur; when
her daughter is absent from school, she goes to her daughterʹs school for PTA activities.

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When her daughter became unable to go to school, she noticed a thing. That was there were
only mothers with their little children and the elderly strolling around the streets in theweekday daytime. Mayumi and her elementary school daughter were easy to notice in sucha situation, so sometimes elderly strangers at a park spoke to her like ʺChildren should go
to school properly,ʺ and she was ashamed a little. She fully understood the meaning of theiradvice. However, she doesnʹt want to force her daughter to go to school without regard to
her daughterʹs feelings at hand. She wants her daughter to go to school with feelings of her
own will such as ʺI want to go to schoolʺ or ʺwant to studyʺ, and wants her to absorb manythings.

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Mayumi knows that most people cannot accept such opinions about school. When she wascarrying such her thoughts to one by one carefully, she often felt her heart would break. In
that situation, the existence of several mothers whose children in the same situation was a
precious support for her to share the same feelings. Each mom friend lives in a different
area, but they send text messages by mobile phones to encourage each other. Mayumi, insuch a situation, happened to see a leaflet to recruit participants for the unusual workshop.

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ʺTry to be future persons and consider the shape of the local community in Uji City 30 years
later,ʺ the idea was very interesting. On the day of the workshop, there were many elderly
people like the elderly who had spoken to her at a park before, so she felt uneasy a little,
but her anxiety was gradually eased as the discussion proceeded with a group of four. The
instructions for the participants by the City Hall personnel were as follows: ʺImagine if you
could time travel 30 years into the future to Uji City with the present your ages and live
there. And then, tell us what the cityʹs local community would look like.ʺ

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At first, she felt ashamed to express her opinion by acting as a future person. If she carelessly
says, ʺThe other day, I watched such a program on TVʺ, the facilitator corrects it like ʺTherewas such a TV program 30 years ago, wasnʹt there?ʺ However, thanks to such corrections,she felt to be able to envision the future freely without being restricted by the present
peopleʹs view. In such an atmosphere, when she envisioned and expressed the future,
which children could freely learn across school districts and grades boundaries, wasrealized, no one in the group turned down her opinion. It was also a moment that she wassurprised and pleased with the groupʹs warm‐heart and affinity across the generation gap
between the elderly and herself.

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What surprised her was not only that experience. The elderly participants in the otherfuture personsʹ groups also imagined new visions of schools one after another. One groupenvisioned the future that children could study special fields without school divisions such

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as elementary, junior high and senior high schools. Another group envisioned the futurethat children could study and take credits at home, and each student could develop theirability on their own ground. In Japan, a present person Mayumi lives, when children turnsix years old, they should enter elementary school at the same time, then go to junior highand senior high in order. Such standardized school system has been continued as a matterof course. However, many future personsʹ groups abandoned such conventional thinking
with no difficulty.

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She felt a great hope when she saw many participants envisioned free styles of learning by
being future persons. As soon as the workshop was over, she sent messages to her mom
friends who she always exchanged emails on mobile phones. ʺNow the workshop was over.
Contrary to our expectations, all the elderly might have the same hope as we have!ʺ

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We have a lot of issues to start acting for the next generation. In the process of starting anaction, we may meet persons whose opinions would be different with us. However,Mayumi thinks it is too one‐sided that we only to tell the person, like ʺYou should change
your opinion.ʺ Having said that, we could realize and share ʺthings that we want to cherishʺ
that we put in the back of our mind with being restricted by social relationships andconventional thinking in the daily life. For her, the experience of being a future person wasabandoning conventional thinking temporarily, which restricted her usual life, andenvisioning freely the world that she would really want to live.

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In the spring, a few months after she experienced being a future person, her daughter
became the fourth grade in the elementary school. While Mayumi has the child who doesnʹtlike the school, but she decided to be a PTA Board member. The reason was that she wanted
to contribute to making the school better for all children, even just a little, like they can think
the school ʺIncredibly enjoyable.ʺ She wants parents and guardians, and local people toknow how good to think about things from a viewpoint of a future person. The hope isexpressed clearly on a newsletter message which she wrote as a PTA board member.

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Appendix D: The Story of Hitoshi in Uji City

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There is a tea house on the front approach to Byodoin Temple. The tea house is on the firstfloor of a Japanese modern building which is built with bare concrete and wooden materials,
and it curiously harmonizes with its surrounding buildings while showing its presence. A
person, who is serving tea to customers while talking cheerfully at the tea counter, is Hitoshi,
a main character of this story. When sometimes customers are attracted to the building andenter the tea house, he is in a good mood. The reason is because he designed the building
and has an attachment to it.

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Actually, Hitoshi is not an owner of the tea house. He runs an architectural design
office on the second floor of this building. When the tea house is crowded with customers,
he comes down the stairs to help. He designed the building when he was 38 years old andran a design office outside Uji City. He wanted to build a building with distinctive presence
and to make the whole front approach to the temple even more attractive due to the651

building while harmonizing with the other shops. That was his wish.

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When Hitoshi was 50 years old, he had a chance to move his design office to thesecond floor of the building. After that, he became the chairman of the association of thefront approach consisting of about 60 members including shops and neighbors on theapproach. The members cannot always reach agreements on various issues, including how
to regulate vehicles during tourist peak hours or how to receive newcomers.

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In such a situation, Hitoshi happened to get a leaflet to recruit participants for a seriesof citizen workshops. He was attracted by the theme of the workshops, Future Design,
which has positive meaning such as designing and creating the future. After theparticipants were divided into a group of four at the workshop, they were instructed by theCity Hall personnel as follows: ʺImagine if you could time travel 30 years into the future to
Uji City with the present your ages and live there. And then, envision what the cityʹs local
community would look like.ʺ

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However, the members of the Hitoshiʹs group thought it was more difficult than they
expected to place all of them in 30 years later and envision the Uji in the future. The reason
was that they tended to discuss solutions for complaints as present persons such as how to
use parks in the city. One of the other groups imagined that people were flying with Take‐
copters (Hopters). When he saw the group, he thought ʺThey have become future persons
well,ʺ and was envious of them.

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He thought that envisioning the future as a future person would be imaging boldly
a situation that an issue facing present persons would not have even occurred. This is theanswer he got. For example, current Uji City has a problem that youth are reluctant to joinneighborhood and community associations. Not resolving it with a stopgap measure, but
it should be better to think an exciting system which naturally brings youth and the elderly
together.

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One of the other groups envisioned the future that the local elderly would set up asmall private school at home to provide a learning place for children. By realizing suchplaces, a bond between people would be built naturally. Consequently, many issues, which
are caused by low percentage of membership in neighborhood and community associations,would also be resolved by themselves. This idea taught Hitoshi that we could envision an
exciting future if we just adapt new ways of thinking without imaging a dreamlike
technology such as Take‐copters.

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Now the series of workshops were over, Hitoshi is still doing his best as the chairmanof the association of the approach. He realizes that the participation of the workshops madehis thoughts stronger. The present front approach to the temple has many issues includingreconciling vehicles and pedestrians, and how to receive newcomers. However, just aiming
to resolve the issues with stopgap measures are not enough. It is necessary that everyone
shares the future visions such as ʺWe want to make the approach like that.ʺ By doing so, thepresent issues would have been resolved naturally.

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Then what is ʺthe approach like that we in the association wants?ʺ The exact answer

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is not known yet, but the approach would be like that at least ʺpeople could think the wholeof Uji City is attractive due to the presence of the approach.ʺ When Hitoshi was 38 years
old, he thought, ʺI wish to make the whole front approach to the temple more attractive byconstructing one building.ʺ He is now 62 years old and what he is looking forward is the
future of whole Uji City.
© 2019 by the authors. Submitted for possible open access publication under
the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

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