“Why do I write?”

Why do I write? For many people in America, the answer to this question may look similar to, “well my teacher told me to do it” or “It was assigned to me.” I don’t think this question does anyone any justice, to be honest. In my opinion, The question that is so provocative to ask is not “why do we write?” rather “Why do we have to write?”. Writing has been synonymous with humans ever since humans have been around. Whether it’s a rock, paper or a computer the same message resonates. It all embodies communication, the very essence of what makes humans who they are. Without adequate communication cell phones would not be on earth today, not to mention so well adapted. Communication has been at the forefront of human development and innovation and writing has been the tool in which it has been utilized. Writing has shed light on great minds and ideas that have come from them. These ideas have shifted society’s focus and brought new ages and ways of thinking. These new ways of thinking have brought with it new innovative products and concepts that have forged new paths and created the world we know of today.

Writing has been at the epicenter of human relations. in fact, you most likely would not be born without it. Even before cell phones, which made it easier via text message to communicate with people through the art of writing, potential love partners were tediously writing letters of affection to one another. These letters grew unbreakable bonds between individuals using self-expression to divulge each other’s love. This leads to physical meetings which turn to intimate interactions. The end product is a new baby human ready to “write” their own journey.

The very human existence has been written down and shared since the very beginning of time. Everything we know of today has been birthed on paper. The question of “why I write” is a bit of an undeveloped one, compared to the question of “why do we have to write?”. The undoubtedly answer to that is, “well because we do.” Just like eating, sleeping, and breathing, writing has been an intrinsic and vital part of the human experience and existence. So, when your teacher asks you to form that ten-page thesis paper that you have been dreading, she is not trying to kill you, rather she is giving you life. Just like the past, the future of humanity relies on writing. The next great ideas will be written down somewhere and constructed by wonderful human minds. Whatever the platform may be “writing” will always be there to guide us forward. If we ever lose our way as the old adage goes It’s written in the stars.

Humans equal complexity

Society is complex however, when you break it down into a systems perspective it’s really not. The human needs four basic things to survive, Water, Food, sleep, and people. The fourth one may be a little surprising, but it’s true. Studies have shown that people essentially need people in order to sustain a fulfilling life. One example of this was during World War II. The Third Reich tried to make the Arian population grow while practicing eugenics. They formed birth houses called Lebensborns where they would invite their most revered German soldiers and best looking German girls, and they would essentially produce children and go back to war. Many of these German soldiers would eventually die and never see the children, and the mothers would be shipped back to their homes in Germany leaving the babies to be raised in these factories. While there, these babies would have very little human contact. They would be rocked by machines called bassinets and fed by non-human entities. The goal was to form a super race, but the implications led to just the opposite. Because of the lack of contact with human hands as an infant, the children grew up developing severe mental disabilities. Many of them had anxiety resulting in trust issues, along with many other social and intellectual deficiencies. The reason: They didn’t have human touch and nurturing.

This is the same with adults, whether you realize it or not you love people. You may say that you hate all humanity in its entirety, and that you can’t stand your friend for not remembering your birthday, but at the end of the day try going a week without talking to someone, or longing for human contact or intimacy. It’s impossible. One of the many reasons why this is impossible is because of reproduction. If we really did “Hate” people then we wouldn’t want to fall in love, and if we didn’t fall in love we wouldn’t want to reproduce, which would result in a dwindling of society.

A human being needs to be wanted. We are social creatures that long for human interaction, and if we don’t get it we will die. Either from lack of reproduction or just because of the depression that set in from lack of human interaction. Societies’ antidote is intimate collectives. Just like inherent change in itself, nothing can be done alone. Everything that you’ve done and thought about in your life was either a collective effort with you and other human beings, or thoughts instilled in your mind by other human beings. You have done nothing single-handedly in your life ever. Even getting up in the morning takes a collective effort. Whether you wake up from an alarm clock that another human has made for you, or from an internal clock that another human (Your mother) has allowed you to have. In my opinion, the remedy when thinking about a sustainable world starts with inclusion and “collectivists”. I come to this conclusion because it won’t be a one-person’s vision that solves everything. It will be multiple visions coming together to make one reality. Our greatest assets as humans are not our individual minds. Yet, our greatest asset as a network of human beings is the ability to connect those minds together.

That brings me to this election, where we have a man who insists he can do everything by himself without a collective effort. Immediately when I hear that I see a man who is disconnected from humanity, a man who fails to realize the beauty of human beings as a whole. Here’s a man that claims he sees the potential that human beings possess, however, lacked to realize our most important traits.

OVERFLOW

Overpopulation is a serious issue for mankind, and in my opinion, it may even be our most serious one at that. Multiple issues stem from overpopulation, poverty, sanitation, hunger, social equality etc. If our population was safely managed, then we would assist in cultivating a more sustainable existence for mankind. The only dilemma is that we already have over 8 billion people on earth, and are constantly growing. So, decreasing the population would either include killing innocent people, or limiting birth rates for the future. Both in which you could argue are morally, and ethically wrong solutions. Humans are in what I would call, the most crucial dilemma that mankind has ever faced. If we continue to grow in size the sustainability of our world will dwindle. Poverty will increase, disease will run rampide while quality of life will be futile.

(Model sustainable values: Take time to have values-based discussions before determining actions.) I think before we take actions in solving this critical issue we need to sit down as a collective unit and come up with a reasonable solution. The solution doesn’t have to be as drastic as the Georgia guide stones proclamation to keep the population at around 500,000,000 individuals but maybe we can possibly come to a more plausible solution. It all comes back to communication. We are not 8 billion individuals trying to get “our own” we are 8 billion humans sharing the same earth. We are all one. We came to this earth as one and we will all leave this earth as one.

(Respect and integrity: Think through short-term and long-term goals and consequences over time, value the systems harmony over individual convenience.)

The system that we have in place right now as a society is not sustainable. If we continue like this, we will perish. I don’t have a solution for overpopulation but if the solution means some sort of sacrifices that we all have to collectively make then we need to come to that decision as a unit. We need to create a new system, and infiltrate the problems in the existing one. We are already experiencing consequences from the current systems and will continue to experience more as time goes along. Everything is interconnected; everything is affected by each other so many of the interventions lie in the very issues that overpopulation creates.

(Humility: The earth doesn’t belong to us, we belong to the earth.) Humans are essentially parasites sucking up all the natural resources from the earth. We give very little back to the environment. The earth has literally no use for us in theory and if the earth was alive which many scientists think it is. then it has every reason to kick us off at the very moment. We need to have a greater respect for our planet and not consume ourselves with our selfish ways. We need to keep a balance with humanity and nature, which we do not have at the moment. Our egotistical way and our synthetic ideologies will be the death of us. We are more concerned with inanimate objects that mean very little to the longevity of our society and less about natural resources.

(Learn and understand: Understand the nature of ecosystems and biomes.) With that being said we need to dedicate our existence to learn about the very entity that gives us the power of existence “Nature” mankind and nature are not separate entities they are intertwined with each other. When a human said I’m “One with nature” it’s kind of ironic because they say it as if they weren’t before however they were a part of nature before and always will be even after he dies. Nature is an all-encompassing entity that embodies all of us and we need to start noticing that.

(Do No Harm: Don’t do anything that depletes Earth’s Physical, chemical, and biological capital.

Give the system time to replenish and restore depleted resources and living systems.) This seems like a no-brainer but like I mentioned before that’s exactly what we have been doing to the earth as a society. When we take something from the earth we should give back. Although we have been doing this a lot more recently, it’s still something we need to collectively work on. Overpopulation falls into that problem. We keep taking space on the earth and we don’t leave room for nature. We as a society want drastic change and growth to happen overnight, however, that’s not how nature works. If it remotely works like that we would have been gone centuries ago. We as a society do forth with how we see that we can increase our own personal gain rather than what’s beneficial for all of us, including the environment.

(Grow like a tree not like an invasive species:)

The most important thing to take away is that change happens over time. The remedy to Overpopulation will not be concocted in one year, two years or even a decade. Just like how the problem arose, the solution will take even longer. We need to be patient and diligent as a collective society. With our egos aside we can do anything. If anybody should have an ego it should be earth because he’s the only one in this equation that has a say. I have faith in humanity.!!!

Design is great!

Design is great because it’s all about free expression. The notion that if you don’t like something, you are allowed to change it. “Design” is the way that you find more feasible options to life’s problems. I think that’s the beauty of design for social innovation. We are all here because we have seen things that we want to change, or have interpreted in what we deem is a better light. I feel like that is a gift. Many people go through life not questioning, and if they are they’re not expressing themselves and not acting on it. A great example would be money. Capitalism is essentially the force that drives the world. It’s practically Businesses trading with people and so forth, with the primary goal to be the richest person in the room. This cultivates a cutthroat system and mindset that forms humans into slaves for inanimate objects. Many people go about their lives not questioning this system in place. We are all taught at a very young age that wealth is measured in the green paper, and that we should do anything in our power to obtain it. When you think about it like that, it really seems silly. Here we have a world that has poverty, pollution, and inequality and we as a collective culture are too busy worrying about green paper. In fact, we limit ourselves from even helping each other due to the fact that we don’t have this synthetic green paper. Just look at it from this perspective. There are some situations where environmental organizations attempt to make initiatives to assist in the world sustainability action, but can’t forgo their work because they don’t have the money to do so. Now, isn’t that the most contradicting situation you have ever heard. We are limiting our earth’s longevity, our own livelihood over something like finance. An entity that we synthetically created. So, in the end, we are literally going to eradicate ourselves because we had to let something like money hold us back. The earth doesn’t care who is the richest person on the planet. It’ll get rid of us when it wants. It’s unfortunate to me how and why people don’t question this because in my opinion, if capitalism never existed we would be fine. Some other system would be in place where we would thrive and most likely have a more sustainable society. I always proposed if money was never invented, and we just worked not just to support ourselves, yet to support each other. Instead of everyone out to get their own, you work collectively to maintain a sustainable world. For example, you may be a doctor, however, you don’t get paid rather you do it because society needs doctors. At the same time, you get what you need for transportation. Education, entertainment, and housing. People who are contributing to society utilizing their talents will benefit individually as well. Instead of using your talents to only sustain yourself, you’re incorporating your talents to the greater good and well-being of society at large. Obviously, there would be a system connected to this in which it may not work, however, at first glance, it’s an example that the system in place today is not the optimal system, and definitely not the most sustainable one. I think this ties back to the fact that design shouldn’t be for your own personal gain. One of my dear classmates said it best when he was designing a chair. He mentioned that everyone else around him was designing for profit. They were all in it to appease their needs for the green paper. However, he had a different approach. He saw designing a chair as not a profit-making Endeavor, yet also an opportunity to design a chair that will benefit people’s lives. I truly believe this is what the economic “Myth” and the sustainability “Myths’’” means. The ability to look at design as a systems process rather than seeing every project as a dollar sign, you see it as a change to affect lives in a positive way and to never stop questioning social norms.

My New York Life !!

My New York Life!!

My New York Life!

My New York Life!