ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Narrative Design & World-Building: USC Media Lab • Alex McDowell
What if innovation isn't about inventing better products – but about designing entirely new worlds?
In this episode of UnNatural Selection, Nic Encina sits down with legendary production designer and futurist Alex McDowell, whose groundbreaking work on Minority Report helped pioneer modern world building and accurately anticipated technologies that would shape our future.
From Michael Jackson and Queen to Steven Spielberg and USC, Alex's career has been built around one question:
How do we imagine futures that don't yet exist?
Together they explore:
- Why storytelling is humanity's oldest innovation engine
- How world building became a methodology for corporate strategy
- Why multidisciplinary teams consistently outperform isolated experts
- How AI changes creative work without replacing human imagination
- Lessons from Hollywood that every executive, entrepreneur, scientist, and educator should know
- Why the organizations that survive disruption don't predict the future – they build it
If you've ever wondered how companies should innovate in an era of exponential change, this conversation offers a fundamentally different way to think about competition, creativity, and the future.
