Purpose-The paper aims to review all the techniques for developing scenarios that have appeared in the literature, along with comments on their utility, strengths and weaknesses. Design/methodology/approach-The study was carried out through an electronic search using internet search engines and online databases and indexes. Findings-The paper finds eight categories of techniques that include a total of 23 variations used to develop scenarios. There are descriptions and evaluations for each. Practical implications-Futurists can use this list to broaden their repertoire of scenario techniques. Originality/value-Scenario development is the stock-in-trade of futures studies, but no catalog of the techniques used has yet been published. This list is the start at developing a consensus list of techniques that can be refined as the field matures. Keywords Futures markets, Research methods, Management techniques Paper type Literature review B It is vitally important that we think deeply and creatively about the future, or else we run the risk of being surprised and unprepared. B At the same time, the future is uncertain so we must prepare for multiple plausible futures, not just the one we expect to happen. Scenarios contain the stories of these multiple futures, from the expected to the wildcard, in forms that are analytically coherent and imaginatively engaging. A good scenario grabs us by the collar and says, ''Take a good look at this future. This could be your future. Are you going to be ready?'' As consultants and organizations have come to recognize the value of scenarios, they have also latched onto one scenario technique-a very good one in fact-as the default for all their scenario work. That technique is the Royal Dutch Shell/Global Business Network (GBN) matrix approach, created by Pierre Wack in the 1970s and popularized by Schwartz (1991) in the Art of the Long View and Van der Heijden (1996) in Scenarios: The Art of Strategic Conversations. In fact, Millett (2003, p. 18) calls it the ''gold standard of corporate scenario generation.'' While the GBN technique is an excellent one, it is regrettable that it has so swept the field that most practitioners do not even know that it is only one of more than two dozen techniques for developing scenarios. There are so many approaches and techniques that go by the term scenario that Millett (2003, p. 16) says that ''resolving the confusion over the definitions and

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The present study grew out of an investigation into the projection of the visual fields on the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) in the cat. The new methods we have developed for studying this projection using single-unit recording and the precision we have found in the projection itself directed our attention to many of the basic problems inherent in the idea of topographical localization in the visual system. The present paper is concerned with an examination of these problems particularly as they pertain to the eye. The nature of the projection of the visual fields on the LGN will be described in the following paper (Bishop, Kozak, Levick & Vakkur, 1962).In order to describe a direction in the visual field a suitable system of co-ordinates is required, the direction being defined in terms of angles from a reference axis and plane. Under experimental conditions the visual field will consist of a tangent screen or perimeter. In addition, the reference axis and plane of the visual field co-ordinate system must be defined in relation to the projection of retinal landmarks into the visual field. Unless this is the case the nature of the projection of the visual fields on to the brain centres will vary with the position of the eyes. Thus the orientation of the eyeballs should be known and for this purpose an axis and plane of reference for the eye must be defined in relation to appropriate retinal landmarks.Even before the development of vision the direction of gravity provided the vertical co-ordinate as the basic reference for the orientation of the organism in its environment. The development of vision, particularly binocular vision, has added a second fundamental reference, namely the horizontal co-ordinate determined visually from the horizon. The direction of gravity and the plane of the horizon are the axis and plane of reference used by the animal in its interpretation of the visual world. If our system

Of binocularly-activated striate neurons only a proportion have their two receptive fields in exactly corresponding positions in the eontralateral hemifield. Those which are not corresponding are said to show receptive field disparity. Because the eyes diverge in the anaesthetized and paralyzed preparation, the binocular receptive fields are horizontally separate. With increasing retinal eccentricity there is a gradual decrease in this horizontal separation as well as progressive changes in the local receptive field disparities. With increasing horizontal retinal eccentricity there is a progressive increase in horizontal receptive field disparities together with a smaller decrease in vertical disparities. Receptive field disparities are relatively unaffected by increasing vertical retinal eccentricity.A neurophysiological theory for binocular single vision and depth discrimination is put forward as a theoretical framework for the construction of the horopter for the cat as well as a region analogous to Panum's fusional area in man.Observations have been made on the responses, particularly to moving slit stimuli, of units with peripherally-located receptive fields. For several binocular units it was possible to study the full range of the binocular interaction when the two receptive fields were moved from exact correspondence to positions of increasing non-alignment.

SUMMARY1. The excitatory and inhibitory components in the receptive fields of unimodal simple cells in the striate cortex of the cat anaesthetized with nitrous oxide have been described using slits of light and single light-dark edges as stimuli.2. There is a small excitatory region (excitatory complex) centrally located in the receptive field that is made up of various combinations and spatial arrangements of subliminal excitatory and discharge subregions or centres.3. The subliminal excitatory centres were revealed by a binocular facilitation technique. The excitability of the cell was raised by repeated stimulation via one eye while the neurone was tested with single edges via the other eye.4. The subliminal excitatory and discharge centres are each specifically activated by only one type of edge, light-dark or dark-light, and then only in one direction of motion. All the subregions in the excitatory complex have the same optimal stimulus orientation.5. Inhibitory components in the receptive field were identified by stimulating the cell with bars of light and single edges against an artificial background discharge produced by repeated stimulation separately applied either to the same eye (monocular conditioning) or to the other eye (binocular conditioning). There are powerful inhibitory sidebands to either side of the excitatory complex and these inhibitory regions merge to include the excitatory complex when stimulus orientation is angled away from the optimal.6. Excitation is highly stimulus specific whereas inhibition is nonspecific.7. The organization ofthe two receptive fields ofa binocularly discharged cell can be closely similar.

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