What do we mean when we say forever? Natural and cultural heritage management policies
concern themselves with conserving and preserving things ‘for future generations’. But the future
as a great unknown sits uneasily with the management practices that underpin those policies. The
futures that are created are primarily concerned with security. In this way they are analogous with
the futures created through nuclear waste management. But are these futures worth caring about?
Futures that ‘our children and grandchildren’ will flourish in? If intergenerational justice is to be
meaningful then the futures it works for need to be more than a risk assessment. If we consider
the futures created by creating and transmitting messages to deep space, messages that may not
be received during the lifetime of humanity, a more adventurous future concept emerges. This
paper will consider this triangulation and whether it can re-enchant the deep future with equal
wonder to the deep past
