The Discovery of the Future

The Discovery of the Future is a 1902 philosophical lecture by H. G. Wells that argues for the knowability of the future.

Wells begins by distinguishing between "two divergent types of mind," one that judges and attaches importance principally to what has happened in the past and one that judges and attaches importance principally to what will happen in the future. Calling the former "a more modern and much less abundant type of mind."

Observing that these two minds reach incompatible consequences in the spheres of morality and public affairs, Wells analyzes the reasons for which the past-oriented mind predominates. But he argues that the inference that the future is essentially unknowable does not square with modern science.

Wells then devotes the last part of his text to speculations about "the question what is to come after man," considering it "the most persistently fascinating and the most insoluble question in the whole world."

Filosofia