Good Morning SuperForest!
Jackson here, and I’ve got some great news to start your Tues.
As I have written many times before, I live in New York. I subject myself (and my chihuahua) to life in this zany, aggressive town because it seems to be the city on Earth with the greatest number of ideas and opinions all slammed into one another. Everyone is out on the streets, showing off their ideas. Best ideas win.
As a part of my work for SuperForest, I try to keep an eye on the state of “Green.” (Here is our attempt at defining that often used word.)
For us, “green” is any idea, product, or technology that allows us to move away from fossil fuels and into a future with more plant life.
Over the past several years, I have seen New York utterly awaken to the idea of green sustainable living, and now, going out and talking with people all over town, from all walks of life, I have come to a conclusion:
Green is go.
A critical mass has been reached. Petroleum is over, and any company that refuses to face this is going to be in for a very hard time.
Green living will become the norm, and soon we will talk about sustainability much like we talk about the radio, or the telephone… We won’t.
Green living will simply be ubiquitous, and the current inefficient system will be thought as ridiculous as child labor, slavery, and commercial whaling.
Everything I see around me reinforces this in my mind.
Everywhere one looks, people are slowly backing away from oil companies, car companies, plastics companies, fertilizer companies, and are looking into ways we could still have power, transportation, plastics, and fertilizer, without using petroleum ever again.
Can we do it?
Yes, we can. All the answers are there!
That’s the truly thrilling part!
Josh Tickell, a man who has spent the majority of his life studying the energy crisis and ways to solve it, has this to say:
“It poses a much bigger question, like how are we going to deal with playing God with genetic engineering? What are we going to do with that? That’s a much bigger question than how do we address the energy crisis. We already have the solution to the energy crisis.”
Did y’all read that right? This man has been studying the problems we face intently for more than 20 years, and he’s saying that we already have all the answers we need. All we’ve got to do is summon the drive to implement them.
So, what are the answers?
Sadly, the solutions cannot be summed up in one word… I’ll need two.
Silver Buckshot.
What the world seems to be hoping for is a Silver Bullet. Superman from the sky swooops in to deliver us from all our problems. One magic pill we can swallow and then go back to racing our dune buggies. Ain’t never gonna happen.
What is happening is the Silver Buckshot approach. No single “bullet” could ever pierce the layers of issues we face, but a shotgun blast of ideas from hundreds of angles will tear right through it. Some shots will miss, others will graze, and some will hit dead center. But by allowing for a more varied approach, we will retain the flexibility we need to continue growing. Silver Buckshot means algae fuels, advanced recycling techniques, bioplastics, plasma gasification, landfill-to-energy tech, smart grids, solar/wind/geothermal, electric cars, composting, greater urban density, etc. etc. etc.
Buckshot! Hundreds of thousands of bullets. Pow! Pow! Pow! Hundreds of thousands of people contributing tens of millions of potential solutions. We shall use the internet to aggregate the solutions and force the best ones to rise to the top like sweet, rich, cream.
The name of the game in the coming years is flexibility. We as a species, particularly in the developed Western world, must be like the reed in the wind. We shall bend, and bend, and bend again. As many times as is necessary… But we shall not break.
A field of reeds growing together, sheltering one another, sharing bending techniques, this is what we shall be and this is the capability that the internet has offered us.
And so, what’s a green blog to do now that the “end of Green” is in sight?
We shall return once again to the Humanifesto.
The belief that all are equal and should be treated as such. The belief that technology will allow us all to grow together while minimizing our impact on our planet’s finite resources. The belief in the power of manners and social grace to transform and inspire.
We cannot say for certain what the future holds… Save for this:
The Earth will eventually return to a bright green state. SuperForest’s work is to ensure that we humans are living on it when it does.
SuperForest will now concentrate much harder on examining other cultures and ideas, in the hopes of spreading the Humanifesto and provoking cross-cultural exchanges of ideas, and examining how technology can make life more sustainable for all Earthlings. In the hopes of defusing xenophobic misinformation. In the hopes of turning “them” into “us.”
We will use our positivity plus the internet to spread a message of peace. Peace through Communication. Peace through Respect. Peace equals more and better life for all humans.
In short, there is much to look forward to and be hopeful about, provided that you can bend and flex with love in your heart and a smile on your face, and teach others how to do the same.
That is what we are working on.
Love to All.
Have an excellent day!
-Jackson
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