‘Inventing the Future’ International Symposium concludes in Moscow

Over the course of two days, experts from various countries discussed the fundamental changes the world may face in the foreseeable future

The 2nd International Symposium “Inventing the Future” has concluded at the National Centre RUSSIA.

“This year, experts from 86 countries came: from North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa... We gathered representatives of many creative professions — scientists, architects, artists,” said Natalia Virtuozova, General Director of the National Centre RUSSIA.

As part of the symposium, 50 different events were held, divided into three themes: Society, Technology, and Global Cooperation. Participants discussed demographic issues, urbanization, biotechnology, artificial intelligence, as well as the shared future of Russia and the Global South in mega-projects.

This year, the symposium also introduced an Open Lecture Hall, freely accessible to the public. Thanks to it, anyone could come, listen to expert discussions, and participate in them.

The second hackathon of the First Neurocontent Cup also took place during the event, after which its winners were announced. In addition, the symposium hosted the All-Russian Literary Prize in the field of science fiction, established by the National Centre together with the Writers’ Union.

“The main conclusion: not only is science fiction becoming more interesting, but overall appreciation of the printed book is increasing as well. That’s why we began collecting essays for the Open Dialogue. And now we are waiting for bold and daring ideas from all corners of the world,” added Natalia Virtuozova.

A landmark event of the symposium was the decision to make it part of the global ecosystem of the Open Dialogue initiative. This was announced by Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration Maxim Oreshkin.

“We are actively developing a new important initiative. It is called ‘Open Dialogue.’ I know there are participants here from the event we held in April this year… Essentially, many like-minded people who think about the future and development came together. A comfortable space has been created for such open discussion,” Oreshkin noted.

According to him, the authors of the initiatives voiced during the Open Dialogue inspire each other and are finding more and more supporters in different countries around the world. As a result, some of the ideas they proposed are already beginning to be implemented in practice, added Oreshkin.