Editing Thought experiment (section)

===Backcasting===
[[File:Backcasting.jpg|thumb|right|Temporal representation of backcasting<ref>{{Cite thesis |last=Yeates |first=Lindsay Bertram |title=Thought Experimentation: A Cognitive Approach |date=2004 |url=http://archive.org/details/TECA2004 |page=147}}</ref>]]
The activity of ''[[backcasting]]'' – the term ''backcasting'' was coined by John Robinson in 1982<ref>See Robinson, J.B., "Energy Backcasting: A Proposed Method of Policy Analysis", ''Energy Policy'', Vol.10, No.4 (December 1982), pp. 337–345; Robinson, J.B., "Unlearning and Backcasting: Rethinking Some of the Questions We Ask About the Future", ''Technological Forecasting and Social Change'', Vol.33, No.4, (July 1988), pp. 325–338; Robinson, J., "Future Subjunctive: Backcasting as Social Learning", ''Futures'', Vol.35, No.8, (October 2003), pp. 839–856.</ref> – involves establishing the description of a very definite and very specific future situation. It then involves an imaginary moving backward in time, step-by-step, in as many stages as are considered necessary, from the future to the present to reveal the mechanism through which that particular specified future could be attained from the present.<ref>See Yeates, Lindsay Bertram (2004). ''Thought Experimentation: A Cognitive Approach'' (Thesis). pp.&nbsp;[https://archive.org/details/TECA2004/page/n147/mode/2up 139–140], [https://archive.org/details/TECA2004/page/n149/mode/2up 141–142], [https://archive.org/details/TECA2004/page/n154/mode/1up 146]–[https://archive.org/details/TECA2004/page/n155/mode/1up 147].</ref><ref>Also, see Garbey, Joerger & Furr (2023), pp.&nbsp;112, 127–128.</ref><ref>Robinson's backcasting approach is very similar to the ''anticipatory scenarios'' of Ducot and Lubben (Ducot, C. & Lubben, G.J., "A Typology for Scenarios", ''Futures'', Vol.11, No.1, (February 1980), pp. 51–57), and Bunn and Salo (Bunn, D.W. & Salo, A.A., "Forecasting with scenarios", European Journal of Operational Research, Vol.68, No.3, (13 August 1993), pp. 291–303).</ref>

Backcasting is not concerned with predicting the future:

{{blockquote|The major distinguishing characteristic of backcasting analyses is the concern, not with likely energy futures, but with how desirable futures can be attained. It is thus explicitly [[normative]], involving 'working backward' from a particular future end-point to the present to determine what policy measures would be required to reach that future.<ref>p. 814, Dreborg, K.H., "Essence of Backcasting", ''Futures'', Vol.28, No.9, (November 1996), pp. 813–828.</ref>}}

According to Jansen (1994, p.&nbsp;503:<ref>Jansen, L., "Towards a Sustainable Future, en route with Technology", pp. 496–525 in Dutch Committee for Long-Term Environmental Policy (ed.), ''The Environment: Towards a Sustainable Future (Environment & Policy, Volume 1)'', Kluwer Academic Publishers, (Dortrecht), 1994.</ref>

{{blockquote|Within the framework of technological development, "forecasting" concerns the extrapolation of developments towards the future and the exploration of achievements that can be realized through technology in the long term. Conversely, the reasoning behind "backcasting" is: on the basis of an interconnecting picture of demands technology must meet in the future – "sustainability criteria" – to direct and determine the process that technology development must take and possibly also the pace at which this development process must take effect.

Backcasting [is] both an important aid in determining the direction technology development must take and in specifying the targets to be set for this purpose. As such, backcasting is an ideal search toward determining the nature and scope of the technological challenge posed by sustainable development, and it can thus serve to direct the search process toward new – sustainable – technology.}}