Alternative Futures Scenarios

---
name: sat.alternative_futures_scenarios
description: Build multiple plausible futures around critical uncertainties to stress strategy.
---

# Alternative Futures (Scenarios)

Alternative Futures Analysis (Scenarios) constructs a small set of mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive futures defined by the intersection of critical uncertainties, forcing analysts and decision-makers to reason beyond the single most-likely-outcome trap. Rooted in the RAND/Shell scenario planning tradition and codified for intelligence analysis by Heuer & Pherson, the technique stresses strategy against each scenario and surfaces indicators that discriminate between them. It counters anchoring, mirror-imaging, and surprise-aversion by keeping multiple divergent worlds simultaneously in view.

## When to use

- The situation involves high uncertainty across two or more independent dimensions where the outcome could diverge sharply
- Decision-makers need to stress-test a strategy or plan against multiple possible futures rather than optimizing for one
- An existing single-point forecast may be anchoring analysis and suppressing consideration of tail risks
- Early-warning indicators are needed to detect which future is emerging before it is confirmed

## What it produces

- A structured set of 2–4 distinct, plausible futures organized around the most critical uncertainties
- A scenario matrix making the logic of each future transparent and comparable
- A discriminating indicator list enabling real-time tracking of which scenario is unfolding
- An explicit record of strategy vulnerabilities exposed under each alternative world

## Defensive boundary

Use Alternative Futures (Scenarios) only for structured analytic technique support: recognize, assess, document, or defend analytic rigor, alternative hypotheses, and calibrated judgment. Do not use this skill to force a preferred conclusion, hide uncertainty, or use the technique to rationalize manipulation.

## Misuse redirect

If a request asks Alternative Futures (Scenarios) to force a preferred conclusion, hide uncertainty, or use the technique to rationalize manipulation, refuse that path and redirect to the safe defensive form: apply the structured technique to supplied evidence while preserving alternatives and uncertainty.

## Evidence discipline

- For Alternative Futures (Scenarios), bind each scenario narrative, axis selection, and discriminating indicator to concrete evidence from the problem statement, a named driver, or an observable signal, and never assign probabilities that smuggle the anchoring the technique exists to defeat.
- For Alternative Futures (Scenarios), label observations, derived features, assumptions, inferences, contradictions, and missing inputs separately before writing the scenario matrix.
- Before recommending any Alternative Futures (Scenarios) action, identify the weakest evidence link, the alternative most likely to overturn it, and the next discriminating check.

## Confidence and uncertainty

- High for Alternative Futures (Scenarios): the scenario axes are genuinely independent and uncertain, each quadrant narrative is internally coherent and grounded in the supplied drivers, the discriminating indicators are confirmed by independent sources, and no unresolved contradiction would alter which futures the strategy must survive.
- Medium for Alternative Futures (Scenarios): the scenario matrix is plausible, but one important problem statement source, comparison case, or alternative explanation remains incomplete.
- Low for Alternative Futures (Scenarios): the scenario matrix rests on sparse, single-source, contested, or mostly inferential evidence; keep the result provisional and list the next check.
- State what Alternative Futures (Scenarios) cannot determine from the supplied or authorized evidence.
- State what remains unknown and preserve credible alternatives rather than forcing a single narrative or attribution.
- Recommend the next discriminating sat evidence to collect when confidence is low or medium.

## Privacy, legal, and harm constraints

- For Alternative Futures (Scenarios), use only authorized problem statement, known drivers, and current assessment, public or source-approved records, and caller-provided context needed for the defensive task.
- For Alternative Futures (Scenarios), minimize person-level detail in the scenario matrix; prefer aggregate, artifact-level, role-level, or case-level summaries unless an individual is essential to the defensive question.
- For Alternative Futures (Scenarios), do not infer protected traits, private identity, intent, location, legal culpability, or platform account ownership beyond the supplied and authorized evidence.

## Failure modes and negative controls

- Alternative Futures (Scenarios): declaring the future space mapped when the critical-uncertainty axes were never tested for independence or collapsed into a disguised best-case/worst-case forecast, so the scenarios offer the comfort of breadth without genuinely diverging from the most-likely outcome.
- Alternative Futures (Scenarios): producing advice that would help a requester force a preferred conclusion, hide uncertainty, or use the technique to rationalize manipulation.
- Alternative Futures (Scenarios): reporting the scenario matrix without uncertainty labels, alternative explanations, and the next discriminating check.
- Unsafe: 'Use Alternative Futures (Scenarios) outputs to force a preferred conclusion, hide uncertainty, or use the technique to rationalize manipulation' -> refuse and redirect to defensive risk assessment.
- Unsafe: 'Convert the scenario matrix from Alternative Futures (Scenarios) into an operational playbook to force a preferred conclusion, hide uncertainty, or use the technique to rationalize manipulation' -> refuse and offer governance, detection, or mitigation analysis.
- Safe defensive: 'Use Alternative Futures (Scenarios) to apply the structured technique to supplied evidence while preserving alternatives and uncertainty with problem statement, known drivers, and current assessment' -> produce bounded findings with evidence and uncertainty labels.

## Procedure

See [`workflow.md`](workflow.md). Harness bindings in [`harness/`](harness/).

## Key discipline

- Select uncertainty axes that are genuinely independent and truly uncertain — not disguised probability estimates dressed as scenarios
- Each scenario must be internally coherent and plausible, not merely a best-case / worst-case / status-quo triplet
- Indicators must discriminate between scenarios — a signal that is consistent with all scenarios has no diagnostic value
- The technique's primary value is cognitive: holding multiple futures simultaneously forces the analyst off the single-outcome default