"If we are going to act like gods, we might as well get good at it."
And Biomimicry is one key, and in a sense, one of the legacy's of the Whole Earth movement. Like Buckminster Fuller's comprehensive antipatory design science, Biomimicry is (1) the exploration and understanding of nature, i.e., the environment, as the technology and economy of an exquisitely evolved and designed regenerative life support system (living machine) that has been tested and developed over 3.8 billion years of evolution (see-the time line of evolution) and then (2) applying those battle-hardened principles to all aspects of human activity--designing, creating, and managing of society, from industrial products, to urban and regional systems, to public policy, business, the economy, etc., i.e., Sustainability 2030 and the leading edge of the sustainability response.
Key Questions
Sustainability 2030's (S2030) research/practice program addresses the following key questions:
1. How can you/we become effective, powerful, even transformational forces for sustainability?
2. What is the program required for ultimate sustainability success--the end game?
3. Who has part of the answer now (current sustainability champions), how far do they take us, and how can we harness the state-of-the-art leading edge sustainability to an innovative research/practice program that gets us to ultimate success in the limited time remaining? (more)
Advance, accelerate, and amplify an accurate understanding of the sustainability challenge and how to harness the power and potential of sustainability for an effective response before time runs out. The StrategicSustainability2030 Institute (S2030I) is a web-based think/do tank (more).
"to make the world work for 100% of humanity, in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone."
Caption: "Sadly, the only proven way to achieve global GHG reductions so far has been economic recession." Comment: Fortunately, shifting to 100% renewables would catalyze the global transition to durable prosperity and community well-being in a way that would eliminate GHG production AND grow the economy <<continued>>. (See also: strategic sustainability, natural capitalism, its four strategies, and RMI's Reinventing Fire [energy] Program.)
Stephen Cohen's Weekly Column in the New York Observer
SUSTAINABILITY 2030 CLIPS
Quick access to key sustainability resourcesfrom an emerging whole systems and critical-path perspective: pioneers, leaders, powerful ideas, path-breaking initiatives, beyond best practices, important events. Comment. Search. Go to the Sust-Clips Index of categories. See also:the State of Sustainability (SOS)TM Journal for commentary.
Earth Policy Institute, PLAN B: MOBILIZING TO SAVE CIVILIZATION-THE FILM. PBS stations across the United States are airing the program between now and May 16, 2012. Check your local listings to see where and when it is airing in your area. Based on Lester Brown's Plan B book series, this 90-minute film-Plan B: Mobilizing to Save Civilization (see listings for time and additional dates in your area), follows Lester as he speaks in Beijing, Seoul, Tokyo, New Delhi, Rome, Istanbul, Ankara, and Washington, DC, and visits with world leaders to discuss ways to respond to the challenges of climate change. Journey to Planet Earth.
Do we want to be the generation that lost the future for humanity or won it?
Thatis the sustainability challenge we face. It is our choice; one we can and need to make in the affirmative.
This is the thesis underlying the work of Lester Brown, his Earth Policy Institute, and his most recent book, World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse (see links below), as he describes it in a letter to readers (see link). His key points are as follows:
Watch Thom Hartman's 15-minute video clip interview with Lester Brown (if you subscribe to Linked-In's Natural Step group, go here to participate in the discussion. (also, see part 1 below; there is a 12 minute part 2 also).
Yes, global civilizations is failing, emphatically, unequivocally. However, the question is not whether global civilization is failing, but whether we can chart a new course in time amidst the increasing constraints of climate detribalization and the acceleratingcological-economic-social stresses.
Lester Brown is one of many who have done a great job of connecting the dots of the evolving systemic global sustainability challenge over the past 50+ years and illuminating the false positive-prosperity future in which most people believe patriotically, that is Plan A, Business as Usual (BAU).
But he, and others, have done more. They have also illuminated Plan B, the path of hopeful possibility. In that path, humanity changes course from BAU by using the accumulated fruits of BAU to date (intelligence, capital, and institutional and political capacity) to invent the path to a new future of ecologically empowered durable economic prosperity and security.
The only real question left is whether we will do Plan B or continue to "muddle through" into the increasingly harsh and brutal world of BAU and our civilization's ultimate collapse, likely in this century, likely sooner rather than later.
The jury is out. It is not promising, but there is a chance for success. As Donella Meadows used to say on this point, "there is just enough time if we start now!" So we need to educate ourselves with a powerful understanding of the sustainability challenge and get to work in our respective domains of activity and influence.
Of course, the above formulation of Lester Brown et. al., is nothing new to those trained in The Natural Step strategic sustainability planning methodology and framework, where it is succinctly presented in the metaphor of the funnel (challenge) and the ABCD sustainability game (hope and method for charting the Plan B new course).
The Hartman video clip is an accessible and adequately presentation of the challenge and the hope. There is a full 1.5 hr documentary available now of Lester Brown's book. You can watch it for free here and can go here to download the PDF version of the book.
April 21, 2012 at 03:11PM 