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Wednesday, 02 August 2006 02:48 |
From Staff Reports
A panel of environmental, media and educational specialists aimed to challenge attendees with a new outlook July 20 when it presented a forum about Black Mountain College??s famed environmental scientist Buckminster Fuller and his legacy of ideas concerning the peril of the planet.
The forum, titled ?®The Legacy of R. Buckminster Fuller,?∆ was the first of six public events affiliated with the Design Science program, a 10-day seminar taking place at UNC Asheville, whose participants sought to tackle various regional challenges using Fuller??s methodology.
 About 50 people attended the lecture at the school??s Robinson Hall.
Headlining the
presentation were Elizabeth Thompson, executive director of the
Buckminster Fuller Institute; David McConville, a board member of the
Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center; and Medard Gabel, the
Design Science Lab program director and CEO of BigPictureSmallWorld and
BigPicture Consulting, who worked with Fuller for 12 years before the
latter??s death in 1983.
The lecture??s
purpose, according to Thompson and McConville, was to introduce and
reinforce Fuller??s plans to make the earth a better place and to both
secure and maintain the planet as a priceless resource for each and
every inhabitant ?? based on Fuller??s teachings.
The
presentation??s focus for the evening was the complex subject of
Buckminster Fuller??s life and how he came to create the idea of design
science, a doctrine used by the United Nations, the U.S. government and
in academic circles more often than not in recent years.
The lecture
began with Thompson??s overview of the Design Science Lab, which she
termed an intensive workshop that employs the pioneering planning
methodology of Buckminster Fuller in the design of comprehensive
anticipatory solutions to local and global issues ?? mainly problems
concerning the environment, energy, education and health.
?®The function of
what I call design science is to solve problems by introducing into the
environment new artifacts, the availability of which will induce their
spontaneous employment by humans, coincidentally, cause humans to
abandon their previous problem-producing behaviors and devices,?∆ Fuller
said in his book ?®Cosmography.?∆
Fuller got his
start at BMC in the 1950s with other intellectuals, which led him to
develop the geodesic dome. The U.S. government quickly noticed and the
dome led to Fuller??s employment by the government soon thereafter.
According to its
mission statement, the lab aims to teach as many people as it can how
to develop strategies to make the world work for 100 percent of
humanity each and every year.
Thompson said
the program seeks to increase participant understanding of the U.N.
Millennium Development Goals ?? their importance, relevance, and ways
they can be achieved.
The U.N.
Millennium Development Goals ?? a set of blueprints for the planet??s
future established by the world body in 2000, range from the
eradication of poverty and hunger to ensuring environmental stability.
These goals are
incorporated into the Design Science Lab because they go hand in hand
with Fuller??s hopes for a more functional world, lab organizers noted.
Thompson noted
participants?? understanding of global dynamics, world resources, human
trends and needs and options for humanity??s success as a whole will
increase by looking at both the strategies and the design science
methodology used to develop them.
?®When humans
have a vital need to cross the roaring rapids of a river, as a design
scientist I would design them a bridge, causing them, I am sure, to
abandon spontaneously and forever the risking of their lives by trying
to swim to the other shore,?∆ Fuller explained in ?®Cosmography.?∆
The lecture also
included a viewing of the film ?®The World of Buckminster Fuller?∆ a
biographical piece that focused on Fuller??s works and ideas as a design
scientist working to achieve a sustainable future for all human beings.
The film
included information about Fuller??s ties to Black Mountain College and
southern Appalachia, the science of synergetics, the idea of ?®Spaceship
Earth?∆ and the geodesic domes, all of which contributed to Fuller??s
notoriety.
After exploring
different problems and solutions for the global community as a whole,
the program??s itinerary will center on specific problems occurring in
southern Appalachia, and what solutions might be for them.
The methodology
of the workshop, in accordance with Fuller??s theories, is to teach
participants to look at the largest picture possible before attempting
to zero in on a specific issue.
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