Rethinking the Modular
Flow Hive is just one example, among myriad human inventions, of a design approach that impedes inter-connectedness between the elements, and the whole, in healthy living systems.
Society
“We’re Amateurs, but we’re Going to Grow Food!”
“This space will be somewhere where everyone will find something to do, whether developing a heating or watering system or finding innovative ways to grow fruit and vegetables.
“No Single Project is the Magic Acorn…”
We need to think more like a forest than a single tree!
Retrotopia: The Far Side of Progress
Progress as the enemy of prosperity, I thought, shaking my head. What a bizarre idea.
Lead us not into temptation: of Trump, Brexit and the wrong kind of populism
I had to recite the Lord’s Prayer at school every day for ten years, and have never spoken it since. But for my sermon today I’d like to elaborate a theme from one of its lines – “lead us not into temptation”.
Christopher Alexander’s Neglected Challenge to Permaculture
I find it curious that permaculture authors…don’t acknowledge Alexander’s critique of their core understanding of design….
Crossing the Divide
In her film The Divide, a documentary adaption of The Spirit Level, by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, Katharine Round has taken a fairly analytical book and tells a set of stories around it.
Beyond the Footprint
To be sustainable as a global village — to be able to keep all of our human and ecological systems healthy — we also need to aggressively identify and bring to market a wide range of affordable, ecologically-sound development strategies in the highly-populated, emerging nations.
Against Cultural Senility
I’ve mentioned before on this blog the need to devise new opportunities for learning, and in particular a new structure for adult education that isn’t subservient to the increasingly blatant political and financial interests of the academic industry.
City Repair: From Illegal Street Painting to City-Sanctioned Placemaking
We’re part of something so much larger than ourselves and it feels like an absolute gift to be alive in this time.
Aim for Two, Plan for Four
I began working on climate change eight years ago. As my understanding of the issue deepens and I watch national and international efforts come up short year after year, I have to wonder if our climate adaptation sights are aimed at the wrong target.
Lived Crisis vs. Systemic Crisis: Notes on a “New Narrative”
A new narrative will need to be prickly enough to resist easy incorporation, yet warm and fuzzy enough to draw people in; difficult and rigorous in its concepts to make it relatively slogan-proof, yet accessible enough to engage a distracted people.
