This is an extended version of the eight categories of the Basic Human Dignity Needs Holistic Index, with over 600 sub-categories.
Basic Human Dignity Needs include:
ENVIRONMENT - Food - Greenhouses
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ENVIRONMENT - Food-Greenhouses
Sept. 28, 2002
There are great things happening at solaroofgarden.com! If you
have not visited recently I would like you to take a look
around. I am sure you will want to see the Elliotts' Lively-Up
Greenhouse (see pictures at our PEOPLE & PROJECTS section) the
uses our Liquid Solar processes including the Bubble Insulation
and Shading systems. The Elliotts are having an open house at
their Homestead and are showing off their solar greenhouse on
the weekend of October 5th.
We are glad to be part of the OneWorld community and we are
also building a relationship with DevelopmentSpace.com as well
as the ecovillage movement through our collaboration with
Sustainable Village - a distributor of appropriate
technologies: www.sustainablevillage.org.
We are now transforming solaroofgarden into an opensource Web
Community through improved interactive features that are coming
soon at our improved website. I have been truly inspired by the
degree of participation that is already happening and which is
expanding so rapidly that I am glad to say that some members
are stepping up to take leadership roles and offer their
assistance. We now have over 1100 members and receive several
hundred visits per day and to create more interaction we now
sponsor an active discussion forum which you can visit at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/solaroof/
As the World Summit on Sustainable Development has mobilized
new energy and hope for real change I have noted that "saving
the environment" is beginning to take second place to the
development of sustainable human habitats and communities. I
would like to share with you below my thoughts on a People
First vision for sustainable living and how we can make this
happen.
An Opensource Collaborative Initiative:
GrassRoots Solutions for Sustainable Living
By: Richard Nelson
(For more information visit www.solaroofgarden.com)
Is it not providential that in an era of global problems we
have now a global communication & collaboration capability? The
internet gives inspired individuals the capability to speak
directly to the World - to reach the people out there who are
also creating solutions - and the means to work with them in
GrassRoots collaboration.
Let me explain that while I believe that we are moving in the
right direction - we could, if we had better vision of what
sustainability means, mobilize a greater COLLABORATION among
designers, builders and, inclusive of the DIY approach,
individuals and families acting in their own homes and
communities - and this could result in real change.
Consider that the power of a collaboration is not measured by
numerical strength but by the strength of a shared vision.
Therefore collaborations can start to manifest their power
almost from their beginnings. GrassRoots collaborations can
create a powerful up-welling for change when people, at a
deeper level of their consciousness, are aligned in great
numbers by a common vision.
It is true that people are moved to action by threats - we are
all familiar with the commanding power of force. We can be told
to "do what is right". Some of us can be mobilized by guilt and
conviction that we must remedy wrongs when they are discovered.
Many are motivated to remediate the negative effects of human
activity and will campaign for good governments everywhere to
create and enforce self-imposed restrictions and regulations
for the sake of the environment and the Global Ecology. The
ENVIRONMENTAL movement has had this kind of vision: one that
puts the environment first and calls for people to sacrifice.
This is well and good, but it is not enough. The vision of
SUSTAINABILITY has something to add. "Sustainable Living" is
not about the environment - it is about you and me - how we
live and make our livelihood. It is a vision for and about
people. It is a banner that can put people first without
apology. Most parents will connect with the idea of sustainable
living because it is concerned with our children; that they
will have a better life than our generation and a secure
future.
A sustainable living vision calls us take to take positive
steps to change our lives, at home and in our local
communities. I believe this vision will be effective because it
allows and encourages people respond in a GrassRoots initiative
and together create positive energy and innovative solutions
that actually change our personal and collective lifestyles.
Such a response cannot be commanded - it must be inspired by
the vision (and the challenge) of sustainable living. The
sustainable living movement would have this kind of vision: one
that puts the PEOPLE first and calls for a GrassRoots
collaborative that is focused on our "built" habitats; our
homes and communities.
My conclusion is that the sustainable living vision can inspire
the self-motivation and creative excitement needed to drive a
worldwide collaboration. Such a collective effort should not
adopt traditional organizational and administrative structures.
It needs to express a self-directing and self-organizing style
that can encourage and mobilize a massively parallel effort by
multitudes of inspired people who can now share information,
communicate and collaborate in teams over the Internet. This
Web Community (modeled after the GNU/Linux development
community) will not be problem focused but rather, solution
centered and capable of rapid creation and testing of
solutions; followed by wide spread implementation. When the
criteria is sustainable living then a merit based system of
collaboration will sort out the best practices that are
accessible, affordable, adaptable, and appropriate to the local
conditions. Sustainability as a vision will deliver solutions
that are scalable from where we live - in our homes - to where
we work and play in our communities.
Sustainability looks at the HUMAN HABITAT in its relation to
the natural environment. In distinction to environmentalist's
focus, which is on the disruption of the natural world by
humans, Sustainable Living would bring a natural order to our
built environment so that we can live self-sufficiently within
the bounds of our homes, communities and our commercial and
industrial sites. At its best, achieving sustainability would
completely eliminate the impact of human communities and
activities on their surroundings. Our habitations could become
more decentralized and interfaced with nature because our
proximity would do no harm; in fact our activity would seek to
become beneficial and restorative of the damage that our former
un-sustainable lifestyles have already inflicted.
Where is this program to be implemented? That would be your
home and mine. Who is in charge? That would be you and me, all
working together in small groups. This process is also
inclusive of everyone who wants to enjoy a sustainable
lifestyle. It will be discovered that there is no better
lifestyle to be found at any price. We will build a secure,
healthy, satisfying, natural and harmonious way of life. We
will discard, avoid and gradually eliminate the toxic, harmful
and destructive aspects of modern living. There will be many,
many pioneers and a huge variety of solutions for sustainable
living. This GrassRoots know-how will be opensource; openly
accessible to everyone with permission to use, improve, make,
duplicate and distribute in any manner possible to the
imagination and resourcefulness of this worldwide web
community. We will publish and share our experience and know-
how without restriction or the constraints imposed by
proprietary rights to know-how.
Therefore, I hope you can support me in this conclusion:
Sustainable Development can only be based on our knowledge of
Sustainable Living and this is a grass roots issue. It is
bottom up - not top down. Information and knowledge guide it -
but it must be a REALITY and not a philosophy. It is to be
expressed in ACTION and not only words. It is concerned with
our day-to-day life and will affect the ordinary things that we
all do every day. Perhaps it is the focus on "development" that
is tripping us up and confusing some of the thinking. I believe
we should, in the first place, replace this term with "living".
After all - development focuses on growth rather than
equilibrium. Sustainable Living is dynamic but implies an
accomplished state of being. Let's get this right first (not
the cart before the horse) and sustainable development will
naturally follow.
At the beginning of this new millennium, we now possess the
communication and collaboration means to mobilize an
unimaginably large pool of human capacity, skills, know how and
talent, - therefore, why not build a sustainable living vision
that everyone can share and act on by participation in a
GrassRoots internet collaboration?
Visit our site here:
http://www.solaroofgarden.com/
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