Future State Maximisation (FSM)

What?

Future State Maximisation (FSM) is a general framework for decision making. Broadly speaking, it argues that we should "Make decisions in the present that give you access to more states across your future". This can also be thought of as "Keep your options open". My work revolves around this principle, its applications and the interesting behaviour that emerges as a result.

Why?

Generally, the ability to change your environment (or your "state") is a good thing. This is why money is a monotonically good thing. More money gives you access to more things. As such, the pursuit of wealth is an understandable goal. Buying a car, getting a degree or healthy eating are all other common examples of FSM behaviour.

Buying a car has an intrinsic value, it allows you to physically change your location (it may even be an impressive display of resource access to attract of potential partner). If the decision was between owning or not owning a car (all other things equal), then the utility the car provides makes it an easy choice. The same can be said for a degree; the paper itself has little extrinsic value. Rather, a degree represents the refinement of a person, skill and knowledge acquisition and (more often than not) demonstration of suitable character for the workforce. Employers like graduates for these qualities, and so a degree becomes valuable because of the doors it can open, the future states that can be accessed. In fact, it is reasonable to claim that certain degrees (STEM...) allow for graduates to be employed in a variety of fields and professions, and as such are highly valued. Finally, healthy eating and lifestyle are a long-term FSM consideration. Participating in these behaviours, on average, extends life expectancy and quality. With the additional time/ mobility/ energy/ vigour, one can access more experiences.

I personally find it interesting that lots of behaviours we take as natural or normal can be viewed in the eyes of FSM. In our uncertain world, the ability to respond, change or adapt is valuable. As such, making decisions that keep our options open means we can deviate from our current path to satisfy unforeseen requirements.

On an evolutionary scale, species that can adapt to different environments have a Darwinian advantage, and potentially species that abide by the FSM framework are more likely to survive, not explicitly the species that are suited to their environment.

How?

We look at FSM through the eyes of a decision tree. At each node of the tree, we have the state of the environment, the decision that can be made and the expected resulting branches (what could happen). The FSM decision is to take the action in the present (t=0) that maximises the unique number of states that can be accessed up to a fixed depth.

For these calculation, we need to have an idea about how our environment will change over our decision tree. As such, the quality of our decision is affected by two main factors:

The other pages will discuss specific applications of this framework.