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The Conservative Futurist: How to Create the Sci-Fi World We Were Promised
Discover the surprising case for how conservatism can help us achieve the epic sci-fi future we were promised.
America was once the world’s dream factory. We turned imagination into reality, from curing polio to landing on the Moon to creating the internet. And we were confident that more wonders lay just over the clean and infinite energy, a cure for cancer, computers and robots as humanity’s great helpers, and space colonies. (Also, of course, flying cars.) Science fiction, from The Jetsons to Star Trek , would become fact.
But as we moved into the late 20th century, we grew cautious, even cynical, about what the future held and our ability to shape it. Too many of us saw only the threats from rapid change. The year 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the start of the Great Downshift in technological progress and economic growth, followed by decades of economic stagnation, downsized dreams, and a popular culture fixated on AI that will take all our jobs if it doesn’t kill us first, nuclear war, climate chaos, plague and the zombie apocalypse. We are now at risk of another half-century of making the same mistakes and pushing a pro-progress future into the realm of impossibility.
But American Enterprise Institute (AEI) economic policy expert and long-time CNBC contributor James Pethokoukis argues that there’s still hope. We can absolutely turn things around—if we the people choose to dream and act. How dare we delay or fail to deliver for ourselves and our children.
With groundbreaking ideas and sharp analysis, Pethokoukis provides a detailed roadmap to a fantastic future filled with incredible progress and prosperity that is both optimistic and realistic. Through an exploration of culture, economics, and history, The Conservative Futurist tells the fascinating story of what went wrong in the past and what we need to do today to finally get it right. Using the latest economic research and policy analysis, as well as insights from top economists, historians, and technologists, Pethokoukis reveals that the failed futuristic visions of the past were totally possible. And they still are. If America is to fully recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, take full advantage of emerging tech from generative AI to CRISPR to reusable rockets, and launch itself into a shining tomorrow, it must again become a fully risk-taking, future-oriented society. It’s time for America to embrace the future confidently, act boldly, and take that giant leap forward.
America was once the world’s dream factory. We turned imagination into reality, from curing polio to landing on the Moon to creating the internet. And we were confident that more wonders lay just over the clean and infinite energy, a cure for cancer, computers and robots as humanity’s great helpers, and space colonies. (Also, of course, flying cars.) Science fiction, from The Jetsons to Star Trek , would become fact.
But as we moved into the late 20th century, we grew cautious, even cynical, about what the future held and our ability to shape it. Too many of us saw only the threats from rapid change. The year 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the start of the Great Downshift in technological progress and economic growth, followed by decades of economic stagnation, downsized dreams, and a popular culture fixated on AI that will take all our jobs if it doesn’t kill us first, nuclear war, climate chaos, plague and the zombie apocalypse. We are now at risk of another half-century of making the same mistakes and pushing a pro-progress future into the realm of impossibility.
But American Enterprise Institute (AEI) economic policy expert and long-time CNBC contributor James Pethokoukis argues that there’s still hope. We can absolutely turn things around—if we the people choose to dream and act. How dare we delay or fail to deliver for ourselves and our children.
With groundbreaking ideas and sharp analysis, Pethokoukis provides a detailed roadmap to a fantastic future filled with incredible progress and prosperity that is both optimistic and realistic. Through an exploration of culture, economics, and history, The Conservative Futurist tells the fascinating story of what went wrong in the past and what we need to do today to finally get it right. Using the latest economic research and policy analysis, as well as insights from top economists, historians, and technologists, Pethokoukis reveals that the failed futuristic visions of the past were totally possible. And they still are. If America is to fully recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, take full advantage of emerging tech from generative AI to CRISPR to reusable rockets, and launch itself into a shining tomorrow, it must again become a fully risk-taking, future-oriented society. It’s time for America to embrace the future confidently, act boldly, and take that giant leap forward.
262 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 3, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
February 12, 2024
The Conservative Futurist (2023) by James Pethokoukis is a curious book that brings a right wing spin to futurism. Pethokoukis is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and was a Jeopardy champion.
In the book people are divided into ‘Down Wingers’ who don’t believe in progress and ‘up-wingers’ who believe progress can be achieved and that we could improve the rate of progress. It’s implied that growth has been slower since about 1970 because people don’t believe in progress as much and have sought it less since then.
This is where the thesis of the book doesn’t seem that solid. There have always been people who either belittled progress or thought we were about to decline. Since the early 1970s growth has definitely slowed, but the alternative explanation for that is that World War Two slowed the introduction of the internal combustion engine, containerisation, plastic, turbine engines and electrification and also destroyed much of Europe and Japan. Rebuilding and introducing this range of technologies led to extraordinary growth which slowed after this remarkable set of technology was employed. We are still growing at a rate that is faster than most of human history, but it’s slower than the years after World War Two because the next changes and improvements are harder to find.
Pethokoukis puts forward that it’s regulation and down wingers that have held us back. He puts forward the example of nuclear power and how he argues it that it was throttled by over regulation and that were that not the case we’d all be much further ahead. This has some merit when considering the US. However, in France this didn’t happen and yet France is not some techno-utopia. Quite the opposite instead.
The book also suggests that less regulation and allowing more housing would help, which it probably would, but it’s unlikely that it would really make much impact into speeding technology. Indeed, the big problem with progress studies and similar ideas is that it’s really hard to actually show much that would speed technological development that much.
The book doesn’t help it’s credibility by even suggesting that Cold Fusion could well help if it were just given some more funding.
The Conservative Futurist isn’t a bad book and most readers will learn something. But it’s core thesis is not particularly strong.
In the book people are divided into ‘Down Wingers’ who don’t believe in progress and ‘up-wingers’ who believe progress can be achieved and that we could improve the rate of progress. It’s implied that growth has been slower since about 1970 because people don’t believe in progress as much and have sought it less since then.
This is where the thesis of the book doesn’t seem that solid. There have always been people who either belittled progress or thought we were about to decline. Since the early 1970s growth has definitely slowed, but the alternative explanation for that is that World War Two slowed the introduction of the internal combustion engine, containerisation, plastic, turbine engines and electrification and also destroyed much of Europe and Japan. Rebuilding and introducing this range of technologies led to extraordinary growth which slowed after this remarkable set of technology was employed. We are still growing at a rate that is faster than most of human history, but it’s slower than the years after World War Two because the next changes and improvements are harder to find.
Pethokoukis puts forward that it’s regulation and down wingers that have held us back. He puts forward the example of nuclear power and how he argues it that it was throttled by over regulation and that were that not the case we’d all be much further ahead. This has some merit when considering the US. However, in France this didn’t happen and yet France is not some techno-utopia. Quite the opposite instead.
The book also suggests that less regulation and allowing more housing would help, which it probably would, but it’s unlikely that it would really make much impact into speeding technology. Indeed, the big problem with progress studies and similar ideas is that it’s really hard to actually show much that would speed technological development that much.
The book doesn’t help it’s credibility by even suggesting that Cold Fusion could well help if it were just given some more funding.
The Conservative Futurist isn’t a bad book and most readers will learn something. But it’s core thesis is not particularly strong.
April 18, 2025
Wow this book aged like milk in a year and a half.
The author seems hung up on the Jetsons and Star Trek futurism and still bummed we have the EPA. Despite some good ideas (improving basic R&D for growth, a good proactive framework for promoting vs. stifling new technologies like AI, the potential economic benefits of abundant, cheap clean energy, getting rid of non-competes), he resorts to investment in some ludicrous ideas (billionare-class obsession with Moon and Mars colonization, cold fusion, and restarting hypersonic plane travel over cities -- sonic booms be damned) that discredit some of his more solid footing.
I find it almost incredible that this book, published in late 2023, talks about mRNA vaccines and the success of Operation Warp Speed (an incredible scientific achievement), then proceeds to not wrestle whatsoever with the fact it is conservatism's political standard bearers that have directly politicized + led the anti-vaccine mandate, leading to untold additional deaths. As we speak, the Trump administration is slashing basic research and advancement of science, gutting multiple aspects of government that will enable future investment in education and advancement, and trying to revive moribund coal.
Pethokoukis missed a golden opportunity to clearly articulate the issues with the current, deeply cynical Republican Party. The guy can't even bring himself to criticize Trump once for his about-face on Warp Speed.
A much better read on this is Ezra Klein's "Abundance." At least that book wrestles with the problems inside the author's political house. Pethokoukis pulled every punch.
The author seems hung up on the Jetsons and Star Trek futurism and still bummed we have the EPA. Despite some good ideas (improving basic R&D for growth, a good proactive framework for promoting vs. stifling new technologies like AI, the potential economic benefits of abundant, cheap clean energy, getting rid of non-competes), he resorts to investment in some ludicrous ideas (billionare-class obsession with Moon and Mars colonization, cold fusion, and restarting hypersonic plane travel over cities -- sonic booms be damned) that discredit some of his more solid footing.
I find it almost incredible that this book, published in late 2023, talks about mRNA vaccines and the success of Operation Warp Speed (an incredible scientific achievement), then proceeds to not wrestle whatsoever with the fact it is conservatism's political standard bearers that have directly politicized + led the anti-vaccine mandate, leading to untold additional deaths. As we speak, the Trump administration is slashing basic research and advancement of science, gutting multiple aspects of government that will enable future investment in education and advancement, and trying to revive moribund coal.
Pethokoukis missed a golden opportunity to clearly articulate the issues with the current, deeply cynical Republican Party. The guy can't even bring himself to criticize Trump once for his about-face on Warp Speed.
A much better read on this is Ezra Klein's "Abundance." At least that book wrestles with the problems inside the author's political house. Pethokoukis pulled every punch.
Read
January 6, 2024Reviewing for The Dispatch.
November 30, 2024
This was a good read for a variety of reasons. The most important is the fact that it aptly puts into focus the fact that current cultural output and views are overwhelmingly negative. The ability to explain that this negative outlook and pervasive sentiment is harmful is important. A negative society that does not believe in a brighter future and is driven by nihilistic views might be far less likely to dream big, innovate, and fix the problems we face. It also creates good perspective on the length of life, our place within it, the ability of compounding progress, and good focus on potential solutions to the problems we have.
It suffers in the details. It doesn’t quite focus in on why the cultural outlook is so negative. It pinpoints a few potential causes, but doesn’t quite focus on solutions either. It focuses on ways to improve productivity, solve problems, and the like in broad strokes, but misses the sort of deep cultural change we need, and this book couldn’t do that alone. Nevertheless, it has an overall beneficial perspective that I think is, especially given its author’s conservative bias, ultimately less about partisanship and more about how we should be thinking about the future. And for that alone, and the alluring pictures it paints, I think it is a decent read. I’d give it a 3.5 overall.
It suffers in the details. It doesn’t quite focus in on why the cultural outlook is so negative. It pinpoints a few potential causes, but doesn’t quite focus on solutions either. It focuses on ways to improve productivity, solve problems, and the like in broad strokes, but misses the sort of deep cultural change we need, and this book couldn’t do that alone. Nevertheless, it has an overall beneficial perspective that I think is, especially given its author’s conservative bias, ultimately less about partisanship and more about how we should be thinking about the future. And for that alone, and the alluring pictures it paints, I think it is a decent read. I’d give it a 3.5 overall.
January 24, 2025
Excellent articulation of what I’ve felt for a long time.
The argument goes something like this: the goal of a country should be GDP growth, which makes everyone better off and is the Good Thing to pursue. To that end, GDP grows as a result of innovation and technology, and so government should encourage more innovation and technology and regulate wisely, if at all. The government should also encourage its citizens to dream big, take risks, and build a better future, since it’ll benefit everyone.
This books should’ve been called something that better emphasized the strictly futurist ideology presented; I hardly found it conservative, only insofar as its unabashedly pro-capitalist.
Overall, I found it an original argument, but the paragraphs were a little rambly and it was hard to follow at times.
The argument goes something like this: the goal of a country should be GDP growth, which makes everyone better off and is the Good Thing to pursue. To that end, GDP grows as a result of innovation and technology, and so government should encourage more innovation and technology and regulate wisely, if at all. The government should also encourage its citizens to dream big, take risks, and build a better future, since it’ll benefit everyone.
This books should’ve been called something that better emphasized the strictly futurist ideology presented; I hardly found it conservative, only insofar as its unabashedly pro-capitalist.
Overall, I found it an original argument, but the paragraphs were a little rambly and it was hard to follow at times.
July 29, 2025
After reading “Abundance” I wanted to see what the conservative’s version of the arguments would be. I think MAGA folks would say this is RINO stuff but I think it would be appealing to Regan/Bush/W folks. Very well researched and incredibly thorough in coverage of the issues.
December 28, 2023
Instead of nuclear fusion—or even fission—we got solar panels on the White House roof. An excellent look at the lost prosperity the USA could have had if we allowed permissionless innovation and didn’t follow the Precautionary Principle. The author frames it as Up Wing country vs. Down Wing country. The burden of proof should be on the defender of stasis. He lays out eleven pro-progress policy ideas to build a dynamic and high-productivity Up Wing economy:
1. Colonize the Moon
2. Don’t regulate AI to death
3. Double all forms of R&D in the American economy (we spend just over 3% of GDP, with a little more than 2 percent by business and about 0.75 percent by government).
4. Spend smarter on R&D
5. Say goodbye to the 1970s
6. Upgrade infrastructure
7. Make our cities denser and more affordable. And maybe more of them.
8. Open the economy further for immigration and trade.
9. Invest in Up Wing education
10. Create a labor market “imaginarium”
11. Create a safety net for new dynamic Up Wing economy
Some quibbles: I’m skeptical of government R&D, and have in my anti-library (books to read) The Economic Laws of Scientific Research, by Terence Kealey, who destroys the argument that advances come from government R&D. My other quibble is the book is too long.
That said, I’ve admired the author ever since listening to him weekly on the Larry Kudlow radio show. I love his idea: we have the Doom Clock and he thinks we should have the Genesis Clock: “an attempt to tell humanity how close or distant it might be to a period so different from modern life that it would qualify as a new beginning for our civilization, a new human epoch.” As the he writes: “Among the possible factors that would determine how close we are to dawn:
• How close are we to achieving artificial general intelligence?
• How close are we to extending the average human lifespan to 120?
• Do we have a cancer vaccine and a cure for Alzheimer’s?
• Can we deflect a larger asteroid or comet headed toward Earth?
• Is carbon in the atmosphere declining?
• Is less than 1 percent of the world’s population undernourished with a caloric intake below minimum energy requirements?
• Are we bringing back extinct species?
• Is even the poorest nation no poorer than the average economy in 2000?
• Is even the least free nation as free as the average nation in 2000?
• Is average Technologically Futuristic Productivity growth among rich nations at least 50 percent higher than its postwar average?
• Do we have sustainable off-planet human outputs that could continue with no help from Earth? Are we a true multiplanetary civilization?
A great complement book is Virginia Postrel’s The Future and Its Enemies. There’s no contradiction between being a conservative (or a libertarian like Postrel) and wanting dynamism and prosperity for posterity, including all the creative destruction that comes with it.
1. Colonize the Moon
2. Don’t regulate AI to death
3. Double all forms of R&D in the American economy (we spend just over 3% of GDP, with a little more than 2 percent by business and about 0.75 percent by government).
4. Spend smarter on R&D
5. Say goodbye to the 1970s
6. Upgrade infrastructure
7. Make our cities denser and more affordable. And maybe more of them.
8. Open the economy further for immigration and trade.
9. Invest in Up Wing education
10. Create a labor market “imaginarium”
11. Create a safety net for new dynamic Up Wing economy
Some quibbles: I’m skeptical of government R&D, and have in my anti-library (books to read) The Economic Laws of Scientific Research, by Terence Kealey, who destroys the argument that advances come from government R&D. My other quibble is the book is too long.
That said, I’ve admired the author ever since listening to him weekly on the Larry Kudlow radio show. I love his idea: we have the Doom Clock and he thinks we should have the Genesis Clock: “an attempt to tell humanity how close or distant it might be to a period so different from modern life that it would qualify as a new beginning for our civilization, a new human epoch.” As the he writes: “Among the possible factors that would determine how close we are to dawn:
• How close are we to achieving artificial general intelligence?
• How close are we to extending the average human lifespan to 120?
• Do we have a cancer vaccine and a cure for Alzheimer’s?
• Can we deflect a larger asteroid or comet headed toward Earth?
• Is carbon in the atmosphere declining?
• Is less than 1 percent of the world’s population undernourished with a caloric intake below minimum energy requirements?
• Are we bringing back extinct species?
• Is even the poorest nation no poorer than the average economy in 2000?
• Is even the least free nation as free as the average nation in 2000?
• Is average Technologically Futuristic Productivity growth among rich nations at least 50 percent higher than its postwar average?
• Do we have sustainable off-planet human outputs that could continue with no help from Earth? Are we a true multiplanetary civilization?
A great complement book is Virginia Postrel’s The Future and Its Enemies. There’s no contradiction between being a conservative (or a libertarian like Postrel) and wanting dynamism and prosperity for posterity, including all the creative destruction that comes with it.
May 19, 2024
I'm kind of a sucker for this sort of book, I guess. In the past few years, I've devoured Soonish by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith; Where Is My Flying Car? by J. Storrs Hall; The Skeptics' Guide to the Future by Dr. Steven Novella; Innovation and Its Enemies by Calestous Juma.
James Pethokoukis's book (I'll just call him JP from here on out) is disappointed with (approximately) the last half-century. It seemed, back then, that America would lead the world in bringing about innovative technological process. We'd have nuclear fusion, longer lifespans, routine space travel, and better household robots than the Roomba. I know: we got the Internet, smartphones, SpaceX, CRISPR, AI, etc. But JP says: we could have done better, and we could have done it faster.
And, above all, we'd have those flying cars. As someone who's lived through every one of those fifty years, I agree: it's difficult not to be disappointed.
JP sidesteps the left/right political spectrum, instead going with "up wing" and "down wing" attitudes. Up-wingers are optimistic about progress, economic growth, innovation; down-wingers… not so much. He makes a convincing argument that there have been too many down-wing victories over the years, stifling progress through onerous regulation, protectionism, and overall pessimism.
So what's "conservative" about JP's futurism? Good news: he's an unabashed fan of free markets and individual liberty. Exceptions: he does grant government some room to encourage R&D spending on blue-sky research, infrastructure, and space stuff; also "smart" industrial policy to (for example) ensure that we're not totally reliant on Taiwan for chip manufacture. And he's a fan of immigration, especially high-skilled workers.
But, overall, we need a cultural shift toward optimism, confidence, openness, and growth. I'm not sure how we get there, even after reading JP..
December 16, 2025
Before this book, I really wondered if there would ever be a book I would consider "bad". I was always told knowledge in any form is good, and the fact that a book can be published is indicative of the fact that it must contain something profound enough to share with the world.
This might be the first book to break that paradigm of thinking.
The book is incredibly technologically centered, as the name implies, but acts as a veil to praise billionaires as the geniuses who will make Pethokoukis' sci-fi dreams come true. Elon Musk is mentioned an inordinate amount of times in this 264 page book. Granted, he was hailed as some "Tony Stark" by many of the public before 2024 and his ties with the current administration have since dissolved the love for Musk and other billionaires. There seems to be some neurological circuitry among some people in STEM that worship these FAANG/Unicorn type companies that doesn't allow them to think straight.
Beyond that though, there's almost no consideration for the average person in this book. It's a meta analysis of a lot of advancements in human history many of which helped grow the world to be where it is today. However, the analysis of certain statistics and quotes comes off as un-empathetic and distant. People who care about the preservation of their communities and their livelihoods are othered and branded as "down wingers" who inhibit progress and do not care about the scientific betterment of society. Pethokoukis wrestles with people who are struggling to stay alive, working paycheck to paycheck, and telling them that they're on the wrong side of history! If we had made the advancements in history that we could have, your income would be threefold(!).... without the consideration for rising costs of living, and inflation. Everything is boiled down to numbers, analysis by engineers and economics, and a dream world the author so desperately wants to live.
Near the end of the book, Pethokoukis acknowledges some pessimism that surrounds the development of future technologies, but shrugs it aside and says there's already so many negative sentiments going around, he wants to go against the grain and be more optimistic... Yet optimism for him is one where he does not consider the average person. I hate to sound like Bernie Sanders, but how come in the USA, the richest nation in the world, there are millions of people who are struggling to survive, pay for rent, groceries, and healthcare? These people are not caught up in the fantasy world of Pethokoukis because they have real needs to attend to! This rising tides lifts all boats sentiment that the author goes into fails to acknowledge everyone's needs, much less their wants when it comes to developing technologies. I think we should focus on using progress in science to fix the problems we currently have before rushing to dominate other planets. How gross would it be when the uber rich are colonizing Mars in search for this fountain of youth while billions of other people remain on Earth, suffering the consequences they have left for us? Most of the technology the book gets into is only for the select few at the very top, and quite frankly, useless to almost all people. Sure it would be cool to be able to visit a colony on the moon for a day trip, but would someone be able to even afford this? Call me a "down winger", but I care more about the average person than pursuing the dreams of some billionaire oligarchs.
I think it's perfectly fine to be cautious about certain scientific discoveries. Gene editing can cure so many diseases! Flip side of that coin, there's mirror life that may wipe out the existence of all biological life on earth. The development of AGI would allow for us to have Jarvis like virtual assistants! But there's worry that AI models may value self preservation above human life (mentioned in the book about misaligned AI) and may become the end of civilization as we know it. Hell, HAL from 2001 a Spacy Odyssey was mentioned countless times in this book, but rather take it as a warning or a metric to develop these AI models, Pethokoukis thinks the world could be perfect and humans could develop an infallible conscious machine. Ridiculous.
I do appreciate the fact that this book is more optimistic than what you see daily, but the risks and consequences of developing these technologies must be understood and weighed before they are developed. There is no asking for forgiveness when the people you would have asked permission from are all deceased.
Also, the final letter to the Americans celebrating their tricentennial government is incredibly shallow, lacks self awareness, and frankly makes me cringe.
So much more could have been said, so many more novel technologies could have been introduced or even imagined in this book, but instead, Pethokoukis prefers to stay in the 1970s and live their dreams rather than create our own future.
This might be the first book to break that paradigm of thinking.
The book is incredibly technologically centered, as the name implies, but acts as a veil to praise billionaires as the geniuses who will make Pethokoukis' sci-fi dreams come true. Elon Musk is mentioned an inordinate amount of times in this 264 page book. Granted, he was hailed as some "Tony Stark" by many of the public before 2024 and his ties with the current administration have since dissolved the love for Musk and other billionaires. There seems to be some neurological circuitry among some people in STEM that worship these FAANG/Unicorn type companies that doesn't allow them to think straight.
Beyond that though, there's almost no consideration for the average person in this book. It's a meta analysis of a lot of advancements in human history many of which helped grow the world to be where it is today. However, the analysis of certain statistics and quotes comes off as un-empathetic and distant. People who care about the preservation of their communities and their livelihoods are othered and branded as "down wingers" who inhibit progress and do not care about the scientific betterment of society. Pethokoukis wrestles with people who are struggling to stay alive, working paycheck to paycheck, and telling them that they're on the wrong side of history! If we had made the advancements in history that we could have, your income would be threefold(!).... without the consideration for rising costs of living, and inflation. Everything is boiled down to numbers, analysis by engineers and economics, and a dream world the author so desperately wants to live.
Near the end of the book, Pethokoukis acknowledges some pessimism that surrounds the development of future technologies, but shrugs it aside and says there's already so many negative sentiments going around, he wants to go against the grain and be more optimistic... Yet optimism for him is one where he does not consider the average person. I hate to sound like Bernie Sanders, but how come in the USA, the richest nation in the world, there are millions of people who are struggling to survive, pay for rent, groceries, and healthcare? These people are not caught up in the fantasy world of Pethokoukis because they have real needs to attend to! This rising tides lifts all boats sentiment that the author goes into fails to acknowledge everyone's needs, much less their wants when it comes to developing technologies. I think we should focus on using progress in science to fix the problems we currently have before rushing to dominate other planets. How gross would it be when the uber rich are colonizing Mars in search for this fountain of youth while billions of other people remain on Earth, suffering the consequences they have left for us? Most of the technology the book gets into is only for the select few at the very top, and quite frankly, useless to almost all people. Sure it would be cool to be able to visit a colony on the moon for a day trip, but would someone be able to even afford this? Call me a "down winger", but I care more about the average person than pursuing the dreams of some billionaire oligarchs.
I think it's perfectly fine to be cautious about certain scientific discoveries. Gene editing can cure so many diseases! Flip side of that coin, there's mirror life that may wipe out the existence of all biological life on earth. The development of AGI would allow for us to have Jarvis like virtual assistants! But there's worry that AI models may value self preservation above human life (mentioned in the book about misaligned AI) and may become the end of civilization as we know it. Hell, HAL from 2001 a Spacy Odyssey was mentioned countless times in this book, but rather take it as a warning or a metric to develop these AI models, Pethokoukis thinks the world could be perfect and humans could develop an infallible conscious machine. Ridiculous.
I do appreciate the fact that this book is more optimistic than what you see daily, but the risks and consequences of developing these technologies must be understood and weighed before they are developed. There is no asking for forgiveness when the people you would have asked permission from are all deceased.
Also, the final letter to the Americans celebrating their tricentennial government is incredibly shallow, lacks self awareness, and frankly makes me cringe.
So much more could have been said, so many more novel technologies could have been introduced or even imagined in this book, but instead, Pethokoukis prefers to stay in the 1970s and live their dreams rather than create our own future.
October 13, 2025
"This I believe: American again can enjoy the material and societal benefits of fast technological progress and rapid, innovation-driven growth. For that to happen, however, America must again become what I call an Up Wing country."
This is another book that I read for a book club. I found the synopsis very interesting, though felt a bit more critical of the title and how it would work for Pethokoukis' argument. There were a couple entertaining chapters, but overall I still feel a bit unconvinced by Pethokoukis' points, especially given how dated many of them have become.
Pethokoukis stresses the need for an "Up Wing" America where both the left and the right work together towards innovation. His argument's crux is that the main problem of America is not the ideological divide between liberals and conservatives, but a division between an America that welcomes growth and an America that doesn't.
Pethokoukis fails to address, however, how polarized America truly has become and cooperation between the left and the right isn't so simple anymore. With how much inspiration his arguments take from sci-fi, he does very little to criticize conservatives and how anti-science their agenda has devolved into. The book was released in 2023 so I imagine it was riding off some post-pandemic optimism, but it's amazing how poorly it's already aged to the point of being cringeworthy sometimes. He fantasizes about the potential of AI in one chapter (though admittedly he also stresses the need for some government regulation to happen if it goes out of control), and the book concludes with a vision of Mars where some inhabitants live in a city named after Elon Musk.
I'll admit that it was a creative read nonetheless. It had me thinking more about the type of science fiction I consume. My favorite part of the book was its identification of a hieroglyph theory where good sci-fi supplies an image that pushes society toward action, whereas bad sci-fi is simply based one mere fantasy and speculation. While many of Pethokoukis' arguments may have aged very poorly, I do appreciate his creative attempts at connecting science fiction with reality. It's hard for me to decide whether to give this three stars or two stars because, in spite of its weaknesses, it's still an experimental and creative book that I might suggest to other readers.
I also wonder where his views lie now. I imagine he's reformed a lot of his views since. I would be interested in hearing a follow-up on how practical he thinks that these views truly are within the context of Trump's America.
This is another book that I read for a book club. I found the synopsis very interesting, though felt a bit more critical of the title and how it would work for Pethokoukis' argument. There were a couple entertaining chapters, but overall I still feel a bit unconvinced by Pethokoukis' points, especially given how dated many of them have become.
Pethokoukis stresses the need for an "Up Wing" America where both the left and the right work together towards innovation. His argument's crux is that the main problem of America is not the ideological divide between liberals and conservatives, but a division between an America that welcomes growth and an America that doesn't.
Pethokoukis fails to address, however, how polarized America truly has become and cooperation between the left and the right isn't so simple anymore. With how much inspiration his arguments take from sci-fi, he does very little to criticize conservatives and how anti-science their agenda has devolved into. The book was released in 2023 so I imagine it was riding off some post-pandemic optimism, but it's amazing how poorly it's already aged to the point of being cringeworthy sometimes. He fantasizes about the potential of AI in one chapter (though admittedly he also stresses the need for some government regulation to happen if it goes out of control), and the book concludes with a vision of Mars where some inhabitants live in a city named after Elon Musk.
I'll admit that it was a creative read nonetheless. It had me thinking more about the type of science fiction I consume. My favorite part of the book was its identification of a hieroglyph theory where good sci-fi supplies an image that pushes society toward action, whereas bad sci-fi is simply based one mere fantasy and speculation. While many of Pethokoukis' arguments may have aged very poorly, I do appreciate his creative attempts at connecting science fiction with reality. It's hard for me to decide whether to give this three stars or two stars because, in spite of its weaknesses, it's still an experimental and creative book that I might suggest to other readers.
I also wonder where his views lie now. I imagine he's reformed a lot of his views since. I would be interested in hearing a follow-up on how practical he thinks that these views truly are within the context of Trump's America.
March 26, 2024
*.5
Best for fans of Elon Musk, Ayn Rand, Ronald Reagan, and trickle-down neoliberal capitalism who despise Greta Thunberg, environmental regulation, and socialism.
The author adopts the "upwing vs downwing" terminology of FM-2030 in lieue of the standard political "leftwing vs rightwing" framing. Basically, he espouses a techno-utopia, funded by government investment in research but left entirely unregulated. AI, nuclear power, bioengineering and nanotechnology should all be paid for by everyone, and allowed to proliferate without any restrictions, under the assumptions that the positive effects will ultimately outweigh the dangers of environmental, social, economic, and political devastation.
Although he mentions China a couple of times and promotes free trade and globalization, the book is entirely American-centric. He bemoans what he calls "The Great Downshift" starting in 1973, blaming the new environmental regulations and the ending of the Apollo program for the next 50 years of technological stagnation. In this worldview, only government restrictions and bureaucratic red tape explain why the best we've managed to achieve since then is Twitter and not flying cars. If only the SEC, FAA, EPA, OSHA, ADA, NRC, and NPS were abolished, billionaire owned megacorps would be able to freely mine the national parks with slave labor for natural resources they could use to construct thousands of unlicensed and uninspected nuclear reactors across the country, powering super-intelligent AIs that will develop next gen nanobots and GMOs. What could possibly go wrong?
He does make some valid points, such as the need for more investment in basic research, especially for nuclear fusion, which has received a fraction of what's been needed over the past several decades. But then he turns around and ruins it by advocating dumb shit like allowing supersonic airplanes over population centers, sonic booms be damned.
Best for fans of Elon Musk, Ayn Rand, Ronald Reagan, and trickle-down neoliberal capitalism who despise Greta Thunberg, environmental regulation, and socialism.
The author adopts the "upwing vs downwing" terminology of FM-2030 in lieue of the standard political "leftwing vs rightwing" framing. Basically, he espouses a techno-utopia, funded by government investment in research but left entirely unregulated. AI, nuclear power, bioengineering and nanotechnology should all be paid for by everyone, and allowed to proliferate without any restrictions, under the assumptions that the positive effects will ultimately outweigh the dangers of environmental, social, economic, and political devastation.
Although he mentions China a couple of times and promotes free trade and globalization, the book is entirely American-centric. He bemoans what he calls "The Great Downshift" starting in 1973, blaming the new environmental regulations and the ending of the Apollo program for the next 50 years of technological stagnation. In this worldview, only government restrictions and bureaucratic red tape explain why the best we've managed to achieve since then is Twitter and not flying cars. If only the SEC, FAA, EPA, OSHA, ADA, NRC, and NPS were abolished, billionaire owned megacorps would be able to freely mine the national parks with slave labor for natural resources they could use to construct thousands of unlicensed and uninspected nuclear reactors across the country, powering super-intelligent AIs that will develop next gen nanobots and GMOs. What could possibly go wrong?
He does make some valid points, such as the need for more investment in basic research, especially for nuclear fusion, which has received a fraction of what's been needed over the past several decades. But then he turns around and ruins it by advocating dumb shit like allowing supersonic airplanes over population centers, sonic booms be damned.
January 2, 2024
I have read the author's newsletter for a while and am familiar with many of his theses. This book is basically an expansion of the newsletter into a single work, but in this different form fails to make as large an impact.
This book outlines the author's views on techno-optimism and why he enjoys it but tends to fall back on many of the same arguments and few of these feel concrete. Sure, we can do some policies to double GDP or triple household income, but he rarely tries to pull it back to some kind of concrete impact. Why does tripling my household income matter? I could use my imagination, but why exactly should that be something I want? What kind of future would that get us? He then makes up ideas like flying cars or space elevators, which are speculative. There is not a direct line from "triple income" to "flying cars". Perhaps the former will be necessary before we get the latter, but promising this doesn't seem convincing.
He does a lot of research. The book is generally split into past/present/future. I found the future section to be the most concrete and yet the most speculative. He seems correct that our modern problems are due in part to a general pessimism, but that does seem to make it more important that we can deliver on our promises.
The title contains the world 'conservative' which he does intentionally as a core of his political philosophy but then defines that in the text as a way that seems entirely divorced from a contemporary understanding of conservatism. In fact his views really seem far more liberal in contemporary discussion.
I read this book because I like reading his regular newsletter, so I'm not coming at this as a partisan. However, this book doesn't really seem like the best distillation of his views or why it matters.
This book outlines the author's views on techno-optimism and why he enjoys it but tends to fall back on many of the same arguments and few of these feel concrete. Sure, we can do some policies to double GDP or triple household income, but he rarely tries to pull it back to some kind of concrete impact. Why does tripling my household income matter? I could use my imagination, but why exactly should that be something I want? What kind of future would that get us? He then makes up ideas like flying cars or space elevators, which are speculative. There is not a direct line from "triple income" to "flying cars". Perhaps the former will be necessary before we get the latter, but promising this doesn't seem convincing.
He does a lot of research. The book is generally split into past/present/future. I found the future section to be the most concrete and yet the most speculative. He seems correct that our modern problems are due in part to a general pessimism, but that does seem to make it more important that we can deliver on our promises.
The title contains the world 'conservative' which he does intentionally as a core of his political philosophy but then defines that in the text as a way that seems entirely divorced from a contemporary understanding of conservatism. In fact his views really seem far more liberal in contemporary discussion.
I read this book because I like reading his regular newsletter, so I'm not coming at this as a partisan. However, this book doesn't really seem like the best distillation of his views or why it matters.
January 8, 2025
The Conservative Futurist by James Pethokoukis raises some fascinating points about technology and the future. We tend to look at politics as the left wing versus the right wing. Pethokoukis posits a third possibility which he calls "up wing". He explores project Apollo and how after men landed on the moon the program was cancelled, and the space program took a nosedive. Unfortunately, the 1970's saw innovation come to a halt. The 70s were a time of pessimism and Hollywood reflected the view with science fiction dystopias such as Soyant Green where the world was overpopulated, and food and water were scarce. Fast forward to the 2020s and technological innovation is on the march in artificial intelligence, biotechnology, clean energy, robotics and space. The country needs to do three things, roll back regulations so companies can innovate, encourage students to major in science, technology, engineering and math. Finally, congress needs to aggressively fund R & D to achieve breakthroughs in technology. However, all is not well in paradise, another conservative writer named Glen Beck wrote a book called Dark Future about the emerging technologies that might be disruptors such as AI, transhumanism and digital currency. Beck believes that these technologies will lead a surveillance society where people will be less free. I hope that Glen Beck is wrong and James Pethokoukis is right - only time will tell
June 4, 2025
Read this immediately after Abundance which was a cool, if not highly redundant, experience.
This book is a more aimless and repetitive “Abundance” that never really gets into the nitty gritty. I honestly couldn’t tell you what Conservative Futurism even is.
In a sentence, I could explain Abundance philosophy. I could not do this same for Conservative Futurism as it feels like a redundant yet unspecified copy of Abundance with more affection for nuclear energy.
So much of the book is surface level I was shocked when I was 2/3 of the way through and realized that I still had no idea what the author was getting at.
Chapter 11 was better though as he finally started to get a little more in the weeds, but even there, it just felt like a worse copy of Klein and Thompson’s book.
Now I’m not saying it’s a bad book, it’s fine. It just feels like one long chapter 1 that never gets to something more. Again, I don’t even know what his claim or thesis was in this.
But to end on a positive, the biggest positive I have is how fun it was to read this as a companion piece to “Abundance”. The history in both books lines up almost exactly which makes it fun to see the dueling ideas for the future. The fun ends though when only Klein and Thompson provide a robust breakdown of their view while this book simply doesn’t.
This book is a more aimless and repetitive “Abundance” that never really gets into the nitty gritty. I honestly couldn’t tell you what Conservative Futurism even is.
In a sentence, I could explain Abundance philosophy. I could not do this same for Conservative Futurism as it feels like a redundant yet unspecified copy of Abundance with more affection for nuclear energy.
So much of the book is surface level I was shocked when I was 2/3 of the way through and realized that I still had no idea what the author was getting at.
Chapter 11 was better though as he finally started to get a little more in the weeds, but even there, it just felt like a worse copy of Klein and Thompson’s book.
Now I’m not saying it’s a bad book, it’s fine. It just feels like one long chapter 1 that never gets to something more. Again, I don’t even know what his claim or thesis was in this.
But to end on a positive, the biggest positive I have is how fun it was to read this as a companion piece to “Abundance”. The history in both books lines up almost exactly which makes it fun to see the dueling ideas for the future. The fun ends though when only Klein and Thompson provide a robust breakdown of their view while this book simply doesn’t.
December 29, 2025
In The Conservative Futurist, an American Enterprise Institute fellow presents a carefully argued case that the abandonment of neoliberal economic principles beginning around 1970 has contributed to slower growth and lost opportunity. He supports his thesis with extensive data and an engaging retrospective of the technological and economic optimism expressed by mid-20th-century visionaries such as Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov. By tracing post-World War II trends and comparing them with today’s economic realities, the author ultimately offers eleven recommendations for restoring long-term prosperity.
The book’s economic argument will resonate with many American conservatives, though it is not without weaknesses. The extraordinary strength of the postwar U.S. economy was due in no small part to America’s unique position as the only major industrial power left physically intact after the war. Likewise, the slowdown of the 1970s was accelerated by constrained capital investment resulting from the high-tax policies necessary to service wartime debt.
My chief criticism, however, is the book’s length. While its arguments are sound, they are repeated so often that the presentation becomes unnecessarily bloated. What the author stretches across 250 pages could have been delivered far more effectively as a tightly written 100-page policy paper.
The book’s economic argument will resonate with many American conservatives, though it is not without weaknesses. The extraordinary strength of the postwar U.S. economy was due in no small part to America’s unique position as the only major industrial power left physically intact after the war. Likewise, the slowdown of the 1970s was accelerated by constrained capital investment resulting from the high-tax policies necessary to service wartime debt.
My chief criticism, however, is the book’s length. While its arguments are sound, they are repeated so often that the presentation becomes unnecessarily bloated. What the author stretches across 250 pages could have been delivered far more effectively as a tightly written 100-page policy paper.
October 14, 2023
Waiting to find a way to pirate this, so I can avoid financially supporting it for my hateread, but this is a placeholder, for I did listen to an interview about the book w/ the author on *The Realignment*, & it was horrible. I can't take someone seriously who actually thinks Elon Musk has accomplished anything or that we're going to have a bright future when we as a species, & especially the US, cannot maturely deal w/ the existential risks we're currently courting from climate change & nuclear war. Also, he thinks the US is a materially successful & functional democracy to which I can only chortle & jeer.
If you want interesting, thoughtful conservative futurism that's not just an argument for slashing corporate tax rates & health & safety regulations, I'd recommend Ross Douthat's *Decadent Society* or Pat Deneen's *Regime Change*.
If you want interesting, thoughtful conservative futurism that's not just an argument for slashing corporate tax rates & health & safety regulations, I'd recommend Ross Douthat's *Decadent Society* or Pat Deneen's *Regime Change*.
November 6, 2023
Not as good as it could or should have been, but I'll give it three stars because I appreciated the optimism coupled with the willingness to think outside the box. I'm not sure how you could call Pethokoukis' vision "conservative." Nearly all of his suggestions circled back to things Uncle Sam should be doing. I'm sorry, but that's not the answer. But he does stress again and again the underrated importance of economic growth (4% vs. 2% makes a humongous difference once you get a few years down the road). And he understands what a huge portion of past growth has been caused by gains in productivity (yay robots).
An integral part of going big is dreaming (when there's no will, there's no way), and Pethokoukis has done us a great service here. Read his book and get inspired. But then, rather than writing your congressman, go start a business!
An integral part of going big is dreaming (when there's no will, there's no way), and Pethokoukis has done us a great service here. Read his book and get inspired. But then, rather than writing your congressman, go start a business!
September 19, 2025
I read this after reading Abundance to understand the conservative approach to the topic of future growth. Both books had similar themes but very different approaches, and not just because their authors' ideologies differed. 'The Conservative Futurist' leaned heavily on how our culture and media reflect our optimism or lack thereof for the future. The author also does combine this with some ideas for areas of interest and strategies to catalyze growth. On the whole though, I found this book to be slightly less nuanced and the cultural references started to get repetitive (the author is clearly a fan of Star Trek). Overall I thought this was a well researched book but it's tough to comp with Abundance which I thought was so well written.
December 1, 2023
This falls into one of my favorite genres of books, optimistic futurism. This fascinating book lays out the progress that we have seen over the past few hundred years and argues for why we have grown stagnant in the innovation arena. If you haven't read anything along these lines, its an encouraging read and shows just how close we are for things long promised, like faster travel, better healthcare, cheaper energy, and much more. The author gives several guidelines for how to speed up innovation as well and reach these goals faster. In a world of constant bad news, books like this are a refreshing balance to the evil and negativity. Recommended.
December 7, 2023
While I agree with most ideas' vibes and directionality, I didn't take that much from the book, partly because I already agree with the vision and partly because the book made lots of general broad points and didn't explore root-cause-effects that deeply. I also wish there were more concrete ideas for turning ideals into reality. Many of the ideas, like colonizing the moon, are politically infeasible at the moment. Nonetheless, if you're a de-growth/"tech is bad" person then this is worth reading to challenge those basic presuppositions.
May 19, 2025
An upwing future could be the defining coalition of the next 10 years. Right wing technofutuists + left wing abundane = upwing. This is a syntehsis of science fiction more than anything and there are some strong ideas here. The solutions are creative and bold.
What's missing is how the republican party goes from its current deformed state to a clear scifi visionary incubator.
Nevertheless - worthwhile read especially for conservatives and maybe we have more common ground afterall.
What's missing is how the republican party goes from its current deformed state to a clear scifi visionary incubator.
Nevertheless - worthwhile read especially for conservatives and maybe we have more common ground afterall.
November 8, 2024
There were moments of brilliance here, but they were few and far between. The narrative was engaging at times but often lost focus. Some chapters were a joy to read, while others felt like a chore. It’s not a bad read, but it’s not something I’d revisit. Worth a try, but temper your expectations.
November 9, 2024
The prose here is truly breathtaking, every sentence crafted with such care. The characters were complex, and I found myself completely immersed in their world. The emotional highs and lows felt so real. I couldn't put it down once I started. This is one that will stay with me for a long time. Absolutely worth the read!
December 2, 2024
James pethokoukis did a phenomenal job highlighting some much-needed positive thinking about our future (and the present we were seemingly robbed of) around topics such as: climate change, AI, economic growth, our cities, and a future amongst the stars. A great blueprint if you're looking for some hope amongst a seemingly, perennially negative world.
October 31, 2023
Great book! There were some repetitive sections being familiar with the genre. But if you’re looking for well argued, data driven, optimistic yet realistic points on why we need and can have a better future, this is your read!
December 19, 2023
A fun, quick, exhilarating antidote to all the pessimism about the future that has infected our government and culture. We can have a better future, if only we would cut the red tape and dream a little bigger.
November 9, 2024
It’s a good read if you have patience. The storyline had its moments, but it took a while to get to the point. Some chapters were really engaging, while others dragged on unnecessarily. The characters were interesting, but not enough to make it a page-turner. It’s a mixed bag.
April 12, 2025
A good analysis a why progress has slowed. And good suggestions of how to speed it again.
3.5 stars
I listened to the audiobook. It was very well read. That is not always easy with a nonfiction book.
3.5 stars
I listened to the audiobook. It was very well read. That is not always easy with a nonfiction book.
November 2, 2023
Good compilation of discussion about how US society thinks about the future and should think about the future. Comprehensive, but almost entirely ideas and details that I already knew.
July 7, 2025
This book is a wonderful jumping off point for ways to think about scientific progress which do not necessarily dovetail with left-wing ideas.
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