Ancient Delphi as the Oikumene’s Centre of Futures Studies

14th London Ancient Science Conference 2020, UCL, London

The Delphic Oracle had been the site of paramount importance on Pan-Hellenic:: level and even beyond. “…scholars have pointed to Delphi as a developing ‘information centre’… priests who were plugged in to the information hub at Delphi and this able to give better-informed guesses…” (Michael Scott).
Ancient Greek and Hellenic culture:: had special relation with the concept of time as futures- focused society: chresmologoi (oracle-tellers) and manties (seers) function of indicating possible moment of kairos as personal and collective hiatus is comparable to contemporary methodologies of foresight in politics and economics. The Delphic Pythia had been receiving multiple choice questions from the inquirers and responded in coded verse that needed to be methodologically interpreted further.
Euripides referred to idea of quality in future-telling and futures-making techne saying “the best seer is the one who guesses right”. In my paper, I will look references to the oracle and the institutions around it (such as temples and rites) as the elements of future-making techniques and the attempts on scientific approach to futures studies, which re-emerged in the Western academia as discipline in the second half of 20 century.