its that time of the semester, discouraging time!
sustainable practices has got me . . . discouraged. The brightest and most intelligent people I know are spending the majority of their lives stagnant behind computer screens, typing away. Change is active yet we are idle.
The world is going on without us, and not a single person here is doing a thing about it. we sit, we talk, we sit some more. the pattern is the pattern for a reason.
I guess I keep hoping for some moment of enlightenment which will somehow solve all the problems with one mathematical solution that I can answer by the time my thesis roles around in December. why can't it be as easy as e = mc squared? why do i feel like no one else cares? (because I guess really, they don't).
I think as humans we forget we have no right to be on this earth, we feel entitled instead of remembering everything is limited. We believe we deserve this life, when the earth really could care less.
I fight with myself on a daily basis, practice what you preach. yet I spent hours a day consuming electricity on my computer, I eat non sustainably grown foods, I order coffee all the time in cups I trash soon after, i take planes across oceans more times then I can count in a year, I wear cashmere, I don't always recycle. I am just like everyone else, I have no belief simply because I am 'aware' of the economy and opportunity cost I am any better then the person eating a big steak shopping at walmart driving an suv.
I am here too, consuming, ruining, taking up space, I'm sure my life is responsible for many deaths of many acres of rainforest and animals that my grandchildren will only hear about because there will be none left for them to see because we destoryed them all. Nature will be contained in zoos and we will all be dying of cancer at 30 and wondering why the icebergs have all melted away and why the birds vanished and the ones still here no longer sing.
my notes from the guest speaker:
Material suppliers with corporate contacts allow for more drastic scale then small changes
Access to supply chains and manufacturing at global scale
What is convergence culture?
What is Consumer empowerment?
What is happiness?
LCA cs CSC
What are you trying to solve for?
Big vs small picture- things don’t have answers or resolved
Get very big picture, nature of systems thinking
Granular level of details of materials kw and elementary levels of design
Find people outside of your discipline
International organization > country > region>industry>company> product systems > products>materials>species> human
EU standards: check out ROHS, WEEE, LEED, EPEAT,
US makes 5% of population 25% of energy China now consumes more then the use except for oil, 2x more meat and steel
Patagonia Herman Miller Interface Inc (check out mission zero) GE BP Toyota green dot (Europe) …. Companies and mass level who think about enviro
Research life cycle analysis of products and life cycle stages (cradle to grave)
Pre.nl (life cycle of early stage impact assessment software for XP)
Greenpeace.org/electronics
Earth doesn’t care; we are proving for our right to be here.
Back-story of what we consume. Can be powerful beyond the products we create. The process of consumption has shut us down. Enable us to make powerful decisions beyond light bulbs and paper/plastic.
Check out designs:
The wattson
Pruis- allows for element of play while telling you with immediate real time feedback
Kill-a-watt
Bp carbon footprint
Uncommon projects- Ybox
Bruce sterling
Japan food traceability
World change or treehugger.com
Black sheep collection
Deminwear (eco Swedish design store on LES)
Commodity level industries and VC in Silicon Valley, getting attention for commodities and specific supply chain management
Happiness:
Not setting goals
Zen Buddhist philosophy
GDP vs happiness
How do we measure success when the economic measurements are no longer the measurement?
“Experience Economy” book out of Harvard
Comments
Hey..it's not that bad is it? After all, school may be a little boring now..but as you grow older, you will have fond memories of university days. It's a little rough here and there. But the payoff is massive!
Posted by: Mike Welling | April 18, 2007 10:57 AM