Architecture and Design Oriented Solutions for a Sustainable Life
Soluciones Orientadas A La Arquitectura Y El Diseño Para Una Vida Sostenible
The State of The World
Globalization
Globalization is the system that replaces the cold war system; It has rules and logic that directly or indirectly affect politics, the environment, geopolitics, and the economy in all countries of the world. The factor underlying globalization is the order of exploitation. If you can’t see the whole world and the relationships that shape it, you can’t take a strategic stance for the well-being of your own country. Today, globalization refers to the commercial network covering the world in the virtual environment. This network has accelerated the interaction between societies and homogenized societies. Capitalist culture spread all over the world, and the number and area of urban centers based on consumption, not production, increased.
In this book, Friedman describes today’s globalization system and its functioning.
- What do the Lexus and the olive tree symbolize?
The world is currently undergoing two struggles: the drive for prosperity and development, symbolized by the Lexus LS, and the desire to retain identity and traditions, symbolized by the olive tree.
Globalization and Architecture
Architectural structures, as well as mere remembered architectural images, serve as significant memory devices in three different ways: first, they materialize and preserve the course of time and make it visible; second, they concretize remembrance by containing and projecting memories; and, third, they stimulate and inspire us to reminisce and imagine.
Globalization has been driving the standardization of spaces and architecture. It has been transforming cities, shifting spatial patterns, and shaping the built form and environment. This homogenization has been leading to similar built spaces and has been disconnecting man from the built environment. Whereas, architecture that responds to its context forms something more meaningful. There is a dialogue generated between architecture and its surrounding, between the user and architecture. One has to preserve what has been built before, interpret it, and respond to it to the present context. These become triggers that activate spaces where the user creates a dialogue and a connection with the built environment.
Becoming Distant: Time-Space
According to Giddens, the fundamental dynamic of globalization is capitalism. Just like goods and money, the acquisition and display of social and cultural things is an indispensable desire in society, and this desire is functional in creating a sense of belonging to that society, providing individuals with a social position, that is, creating itself in a “modern” way. Today, the identities of individuals are determined by looking at symbols related to consumption patterns. The concepts of time and space ceased to be tied to a particular region and became the common use of all world societies. The good side is that people can have information about a subject that is not related to their own region and can discuss world problems, But the worst part is that he is alienated from himself and the problems of his environment. Today, individual identity is a constructible project.
- What is social democracy Third Way?
The Third Way is a political position akin to centrism that attempts to reconcile right-wing and left-wing politics by advocating a varying synthesis of center-right economic platforms with some center-left social policies.
Social democracy has been described as the evolutionary form of democratic socialism that aims to gradually and peacefully achieve socialism through established political processes rather than social revolution as advocated by revolutionary socialists.
Power and Polarization
According to Bauman, “While one party is experiencing the globalization process on a global scale, the other party is in the process of localization”. In other words, globalization polarizes people. It is the upper culture, that is, the elite segment, that is globalizing and holding the technology. Despite this, the subculture and the underclass remain local. This causes inequality to deepen around the world and become permanent. In other words, technological developments serve the purpose of polarization and division rather than meeting and merging different cultures.
Compression: Time-Space
David Harvey defines globalization, which is the result of the “compression of time and space” created by communication technologies in the post-modern world, as “the creation of an instantaneous and depthless world”.
Harvey’s basic approach to postmodernism is sound. Rather than rejecting postmodern developments as superficial and merely transitory, he believes they represent a new paradigm of thought and cultural practice that requires serious attention.
Harvey coined the term “time-space compression” to refer to the way the acceleration of economic activities leads to the destruction of spatial barriers and distances.
Social Media
Social media has helped many businesses grow and promote themselves and has helped people find a better way to connect and communicate with one another. On the other hand, it’s also provided many people with problems involving mental health, emotional insecurities, and waste of time.
Social media manipulates society. The psychology of addiction, the placement of advertising algorithms for those who aim to make money, the use of persuasive technologies, the separation of people through interventions such as control of elections — miscommunication.
It has its benefits, but it can also affect you negatively. Learn how to prevent the negative effects of it. Position your social media in a way that serves you positively.
Sustainable Technology
Sustainable technology is an umbrella term that describes an innovation that considers natural resources and fosters economic and social development. The goal of these technologies is to drastically reduce environmental and ecological risks and to create a sustainable product.
Sustainable technologies have come a long way in the past few decades, driven by environmental awareness and the rising costs of fossil fuels.
- What are some sustainable technologies?
- Nanotechnology,
- Next-Generation Nuclear Power,
- Biofuels,
- Bioplastics,
- Smart Monitoring and Predictive Analytics,
- Tidal Energy,
- Sustainable Transport Systems,
- Green Construction(Self-sufficient and LEED buildings and construction methods)
- Public and electric transport
- LED light technology
- Solar power,
- Carbon capture and storage technologies.
One way businesses and individuals have begun to tackle climate change is through the use of sustainable technology.
We have lost our sense of being here and now. Utopia and dystopia together. For example, when I touch an icon, I find it more real to take a taxi in 5 minutes, because we do not see each other with the taxi passing by on the street. Another example is Metaverse. But the metaverse is neither utopian nor dystopian. It’s a combination of multiple elements of technology, including virtual reality, augmented reality, and video where users live within a digital universe.
Dystopia, Utopia, Posthumanism, and Liquid Modernity
Utopian describes a society that’s conceived to be perfect. Dystopian is the exact opposite — it describes an imaginary society that is as dehumanizing and as unpleasant as possible.
Utopia: A place, state, or condition that is ideally perfect in respect of politics, laws, customs, and conditions.
Dystopia: A futuristic, imagined universe in which oppressive societal control and the illusion of a perfect society are maintained through corporate, bureaucratic, technological, moral, or totalitarian control. Dystopias, through an exaggerated worst-case scenario, make a criticism about a current trend, societal norm, or political system.
Information, independent thought, and freedom are restricted. A figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society. Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance. Citizens have a fear of the outside world.
- What is a Utopian society?
A utopia typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. Hence utopian and utopianism are words used to denote visionary reform that tends to be impossibly idealistic.
Posthumanism
Posthuman or post-human is a concept originating in the fields of science fiction, futurology, contemporary art, and philosophy that means a person or entity that exists in a state beyond being human.
Posthumanism is an important theoretical corrective sweeping through many disciplines in the academy and centers its approach on re-thinking the category of “human,” both in terms of our relationship to non-human animals, and in terms of the increasing role of digital technologies, especially developments such as artificial intelligence.
A posthuman approach to architecture expands the architectural subject beyond the human user extends the architectural building material to include assemblages of inorganic and organic and invokes the architectural assemblage as a multi-scale territory. The post-parametric (or posthuman) imagination suggests that what was formerly known as nature is an environment bristling with hybrid subjects.
Liquid Modernity
The concept of liquid modernity was coined by the sociologist and philosopher Zygmunt Bauman as a metaphor to describe the condition of constant mobility and change he sees in relationships, identities, and global economics within contemporary society.
Zygmunt Bauman is a well-known postmodernist philosopher. He saw modern society as being largely characterized by a need for order — a need to domesticate, categorize, and rationalize the world so it would be controllable, predictable, and understandable.
The term “the fluid society” stands for the unfolding digital society, which will irrevocably be organized differently from the current one. In which there will be more global digital cooperation in numerous contexts. This is not only desirable but also necessary in order to master the major problems of our time. These collaborations will have to take place digitally as much as possible because that is more efficient, cheaper, and more sustainable. A different way of thinking is necessary, to overcome the great contradictions between people and cultures and to come into balance with a healthy nature and living environment.
The State of The Architecture
Capitalist Architecture
Today, 74% of the population lives in urbanized areas of Europe. The pressure of the increasing population and consumption policies brought us to the breaking point not only with the environment we live in but also with ourselves. Today, architecture is a tool used to control the masses over the exchange value of buildings.
For example, The house was made an object of political economy as a commodity to be invested in. However, home as a place is a home where we realize ourselves, touch with the eternal values that belong to us in essence, and get help to live more fully and more closely in the world.
Another example is that construction companies are making interventions that will bring undue burden to the city in order to create a company image through size and form by directing the architects they employ to bad copies.
Capitalist Architecture in a Posthumanist World
Capitalist architecture in a posthumanist world explores vacant commercial buildings as the failure of capitalist enterprise to create separation between the human and the nonhuman.
The Stages of Capitalism and the Styles of Architecture
Building a Mars Base Is A Bad Idea
Why? Think again from every angle.
Star architect Bjarke Ingels is working for the Mars Science City, which will operate as a space simulation campus near Dubai where scientists will work on “man’s march into space.” The scientists will work in laboratories dedicated to researching self-sufficiency for energy, food, and water for life on Mars. The project ties in with Elon Musk’s plans to launch in 2022 through space exploration company SpaceX to begin an 80–150-day trip to Mars. According to the project, the company’s rockets can also be used as a mode of transportation around the world, allowing passengers to hop between any city in under an hour for the price of a budget airline flight. But residents and environmentalists say the explosions, noise, and beach closures are disrupting the peace and harming wildlife in Boca Chica, Texas. If a rocket explodes in the ocean, it will create space-related environmental problems, including debris, light pollution, and carbon emissions.
The State of The Nature
Biodiversity
Biodiversity is the biological variety and variability of life on Earth. Biodiversity is a measure of variation at the genetic, species, and ecosystem levels.
The tendency of globalization to dominate the planet has resulted in rapid planet-wide ecosystem change and massive biodiversity loss. Increasing human population and overconsumption have caused habitat and resource depletion, pollution, and climate change. Biodiversity means that human use, knowledge, and beliefs affect, and are therefore affected by, the ecological systems of which human communities are a part.
Biodiversity is the rich variety of life on Earth. There’s variety in genes, variety among species, and a variety of ecosystems. Everything is interconnected or dependent on everything else.
- How do humans benefit from biodiversity?
If we look at the human benefit from an anthropocentric approach: Biodiversity provides many basic needs that people derive from biodiversities such as food, fuel, shelter, and medicine; provides important services such as seed dispersal, climate regulation, water purification, nutrient cycling, and agricultural pest control; It also has value for potential benefits yet unrecognized, such as new drugs and other possible unknown services. But in fact, biodiversity is a “right to exist” regardless of its benefits; It determines who we are, how we shape our relationships with one another and social norms.
Biodiversity is usually explored at three levels: genetic diversity, species diversity, and ecosystem diversity. These three levels work together to create the complexity of life on Earth.
Urbanism, Architecture & Biodiversity
Biodiversity boosts ecosystem productivity where each species, no matter how small, all have an important role to play. For example, A larger number of plant species means a greater variety of crops. Greater species diversity ensures natural sustainability for all life forms.
The State of The Thought System
Balance
According to economist Kate Raworth, the main task of 21st-century economists is to find solutions to two global problems:
1. Poverty,
2. Excessive consumption.
To stop the pursuit of continued growth, it is necessary to balance the deficiencies and excesses in the ecological and social context.
The Doughnut, or Doughnut economics, is a visual framework for sustainable development — shaped like a doughnut or lifebelt — combining the concept of planetary boundaries with the complementary concept of social boundaries. The name derives from the shape of the diagram, i.e. a disc with a hole in the middle.
Ecological Thinking and Deep Ecology
Deep ecology, environmental philosophy, and social movement are based on the belief that humans must radically change their relationship to nature from one that values nature solely for its usefulness to human beings to one that recognizes that nature has an inherent value.
Deep ecology argues that the natural world is a complex of relationships in which the existence of organisms is dependent on the existence of others within ecosystems. It argues that non-vital human interference with or destruction of the natural world poses a threat therefore not only to humans but to all organisms constituting the natural order.
According to Næss, deep ecology is not one direction. It is rather a valuable theory to contemplate and is ready for criticism. The theory of deep ecology is not radical in itself, but the idea is above the humans and puts nature into the focus instead of humans. It emphasizes the intrinsic value of nature. As Næss emphasized, we must “not only protect the planet for the sake of humans but also, for the sake of the planet itself, to keep ecosystems healthy for their own sake”.
It is described as “deep” because it is regarded as looking more deeply into the reality of humanity’s relationship with the natural world, arriving at philosophically more profound conclusions than those of mainstream environmentalism.
- Inherent value,
- Diversity,
- Vital Needs,
- Population,
- Human Interference,
- Policy Change,
- Quality of Life,
- The Obligation of Action.
How Cities Live?
Jane Jacobs sought the answer to these questions: “What factors make a city safe?”, “What is a neighborhood like?”, “What is the location of a neighborhood in a metropolitan area?”. She advocates giving the city residents the right to have a say in planning and mobilizing the means of organizing their own city.
By arguing that cities were living beings and ecosystems, she advocated ideas such as “mixed-use” development and bottom-up planning. Furthermore, her harsh criticisms of “slum clearing” and “high-rise housing” projects were instrumental in discrediting these once universally supported planning practices.
Jacobs wanted cities filled with paths for pedestrians rather than broad streets for cars. The most important thing about urban planning, she thought, was how people would live in a city — not how visionaries thought she should live.
Jacobs believed that building density would have no effect if the buildings were too standardized in terms of age and form, if the blocks were too long, or if the buildings only served a single-use.
BioCities
Biophilic design is a concept used within the building industry to increase occupant connectivity to the natural environment through the use of direct nature, indirect nature, and space and place conditions.
The biophilia hypothesis (also called BET) suggests that humans possess an innate tendency to seek connections with nature and other forms of life. Edward O. Wilson introduced and popularized the hypothesis in his book, Biophilia (1984). He defines biophilia as “the urge to affiliate with other forms of life”.
A biophilic city has activities for residents and tourists alike that enable connection with and enjoyment of nature, that encourage learning about the specific nature of that place, keep ecosystems healthy or regenerate them, and enable participation in activity outdoors. (Beatley, 2011).
Biophilia is the passionate love of life and of all that is alive. Nature underpins every person’s wellbeing and ambitions.
In rapidly growing numbers, people around the planet are waking up to the challenges facing humanity. People are working across all domains of human endeavor to address the global scale of social, ecological, economic, and cultural challenges of the 21st century. Of this positive momentum, the practice of biophilia, Paul Hawken, author of Blessed Unrest, suggests that the work of making the world a better place for all comprises the largest movement in human history.
In 2013, we formally launched the Biophilic Cities Network, which now includes about fifteen cities.
Biophilic urbanism was presented as an emerging planning and urban design approach that aimed to systematically integrate nature into the urban fabric, igniting the potential to transform barren urban spaces into places that are restorative and conducive to life.
Biophilic Cities facilitates a global network of partner cities working collectively to pursue the vision of a natural city within their unique and diverse environments and cultures.
Biophilic experiences can reduce stress, improve cognitive function, and enhance mood and creativity. These and other outcomes can increase health and wellbeing, as well as productivity.
Holistic and Combative Approach
Our age is an era in which humans and non-humans are inextricably linked. It is necessary to learn to endure the burden of living and dying together in a damaged world, to provide the tools to build more livable futures.
The Anthropocene is defined as the time when anthropogenic changes such as the steam engine started changing the planet. The capital scene is a term used to describe an era in which all of nature is transformed by the focus on the accumulation of capital. They are both related in the fact that they are apocalyptic in nature and can make all organisms go extinct in the distant future.
She abandons anthropocentric thinking and conceptualizes it as what he calls “Chthulucene” to restructure our relationships with the Earth and all its inhabitants.
The Chthulucene, alternatively, is “made up of ongoing multispecies stories and practices of becoming-with in times that remain at stake, in precarious times, in which the world is not finished and the sky has not fallen — yet” (Haraway, 2016b).
She has formulated the concept of “situated knowledge” to argue that the perception of any situation is always a matter of an embodied, located subject and their geographically and historically specific perspective, a perspective constantly being structured and restructured by the current conditions.
Phenomenology
Phenomenology is a way of thinking about ourselves. Instead of asking about what we really are, it focuses on phenomena. These are experiences that we get from the senses — what we see, taste, smell, touch, hear and feel.
The phenomenon cannot be separated from any quality that composes it. It investigates the ground on which knowledge can be established accurately, precisely, and objectively.
Phenomenology, a philosophical movement originating in the 20th century, the primary objective of which is the direct investigation and description of phenomena as consciously experienced, without theories about their causal explanation and as free as possible from unexamined preconceptions and presuppositions.
Phenomenology is a movement in philosophy that has been adopted by a number of sociologists and other scholars, and practitioners in the social and behavioral sciences to promote an understanding of the relationship between states of individual consciousness and social life.
Husserl defined phenomenology as “the science of the essence of consciousness”, centered on the defining trait of intentionality, approached explicitly “in the first person”.
In his mature work, he sought to develop a systematic foundational science based on the so-called phenomenological reduction. Arguing that transcendental consciousness sets the limits of all possible knowledge, Husserl redefined phenomenology as a transcendental-idealist philosophy.
Sustainability
- What is the first definition of sustainability?
In 1987, the United Nations Brundtland Commission defined sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
Brundtland Report, also called Our Common Future, the publication released in 1987 by the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) introduced the concept of sustainable development and described how it could be achieved.
Introducing the four pillars of sustainability; Human, Social, Economic, and Environmental.
Simply put, sustainability is about small changes we can make to help look after the planet. Making these changes helps protect animals, plants, and our natural resources so that future generations will be able to enjoy them.
Sustainable development practices help countries grow in ways that adapt to the challenges posed by climate change, which will in turn help to protect important natural resources for our and future generations.
Sustainable development is a carefully planned strategy to embrace growth while using resources more efficiently, with utmost consideration of immediate and long-term benefits for our planet and the humans who live on it.
The 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) to transform our world:
GOAL 3: Good Health and Well-being
GOAL 6: Clean Water and Sanitation
GOAL 7: Affordable and Clean Energy
GOAL 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
GOAL 9: Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure
GOAL 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities
GOAL 12: Responsible Consumption and Production
GOAL 16: Peace and Justice Strong Institutions
GOAL 17: Partnerships to Achieve the Goal.
These 17 goals set forth a challenge for humanity to decouple economic growth from climate change, poverty, and inequality.
Solution-Based Approach in Life
A solution-oriented approach helps people to develop goals and solutions rather than just explore and analyze current problems. It is different from more traditional helping methods in that it focuses on the present and the future, on goals and how to achieve them.
Every person approaches a problem in a different way. Some focus on the problem or the reason why a problem emerged (problem-focused thinking). Others prefer to think about possible solutions that help them to solve a problem (solution-focused thinking).
Adopting a solutions-focused mindset means letting go of the belief that we as individuals and society know all the answers. It requires asking hard questions, embracing collaboration, and seeking out experts who can help think in new ways. Additionally, it means being truly committed to a sustainable mission.
Being solution-oriented means you won’t sleep until you help find the answer and/or fix a problem. Solution-oriented people don’t just solve problems, they help identify the source of a question or challenge and provide the right or a better, way of doing things.
Here, I would like to say a special thank you to my professor, Mrs. Naime Esra Akın, for sharing her experience and knowledge with us. Thanks to her presentation for Sustainable Solutions Inspired by Nature: Architecture and Design Perspective Program by Kale Design and Art Center (KTSM), I was able to write this article. I would like to thank Kale Holding very much for this program that you have created in order to provide many interdisciplinary interactions by learning together in order to leave a meaningful trace in the world.
I was selected as a fellow student-architect in the Nature-Inspired Sustainable Solutions: Architecture and Design Perspective Program by Kale Design and Art Center(KTSM). I believe that we will establish a loving, sensitive, and sustainable bond with nature through architecture and many disciplines in the ecosystem that we will create with our talents and our pure desire to learn. I’m so happy and proud to be a part of the ‘Take Care World Movement’.
I will continue to share what I learned with all of you, stay tuned.
