CONCEPT
Seventh-Generation Thinking
The Haudenosaunee governance principle — decisions should be evaluated by their effects on the seventh generation, approximately two hundred years forward — adopted by Macy as the temporal dam the AI moment most lacks.
Seventh-generation thinking is the Haudenosaunee constitutional principle that chiefs were required to consider the effects of their decisions on the seventh generation — approximately two hundred years forward. The principle functioned as a temporal dam, slowing the river of immediate self-interest long enough for distant consequences to become visible. Macy adopted and generalized the principle across her later work, arguing that civilizations facing existential choices require exactly this kind of temporal discipline — the capacity to evaluate present decisions by their effects on people whose faces the deciders will never see. Applied to the AI moment, seventh-generation thinking reveals the catastrophic mismatch between the temporal frames on which AI decisions are currently being made (quarters, product cycles, legislative sessions) and the temporal frame over which those decisions will have their effects.
In The You On AI Field Guide
The principle has deep roots in Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) constitutional tradition, where it served as binding governance practice rather than aspirational counsel.