process and established environmental philosophy.<br><br> The results express nature through structure, look to the earth as a design generator, and understand that the built environment is merely another extension of the natural environment. Many architectural movements throughout history have been in$uenced by a philosophy that in$uenced the pervading culture. Brunelleschi has his Humanism; Eisenman his Deconstruc6on. Finding an ecological aesthe6c in architecture will require the same method. This thesis will "rst overview architecture movements from the 20th century 3 such as Modernsim, Post-Modernism, Deconstruc6vism, and 1960s Eco-Architecture 3 to show this connec6on and give context for the current Sustainable movement. Next, the work will inves6gate established environmental philosophy, biology, and ecology that might have implica6ons for design. The American Pastoral Ideal held in high regard by Thomas Je!erson and Ralph Waldo Emerson will give some insight about how the thinkers at the dawn of the industrial revolu6on conceived the cvirgin d land of a new republic and changing technology. The Biophilia Hypothesis explains why humans have such an innate need to connect to nature. Deep Ecology or Ecosophy suggests that humans should s6ll live in harmony with natural processes. While Deep Ecology ABSTRACT theorists argue over whether humans are part of nature (monis6c) or not (dualis6c), the Gaia Hypothesis "rmly proposes a monis6c view, sugges6ng that the earth is one large organism with interconnected processes. Autopoiesis explores the rela6onship between structure and func6on by theorizing that internal processes inherently maintain the greater whole. Finally, Pleistocene Hypothesis suggests that humans have an innate desire to return to a tribal society that humans lived in prior to the inven6on of agriculture. The thesis will then connect philosophy and process by looking to architectural and aesthe6c theorists. Human evolu6on is a controversial issue in the scien6"c community, but some theorists, such as Ian McHarg, have found a connec6on between evolu6on and the crea6ve process as an indicator that humans are indeed s6ll evolving. Janine Benyus 9 theory of Biomimcry looks to nature for form and func6on of built environments. While the inclina6on might be to see technology as apart from nature, Leo Marx wrote that technology, aesthe6cs, and nature can fuse together without contradic6on in both the design and building process. Finally, mass customiza6on and the inven6on of nonlinear systems has allowed architects such as Kieran/Timberlake u6lize the posi6ve aspects of prefabrica6on to create unique structures that grow outside the shipping crate. A choice few case studies to bolster arguments will give visualiza6on to prior theore6cal discussions. The paper will conclude with summary arguments of how discoveries found in the thesis might apply to architectural and design prac6ce. This thesis will use various methods of research to establish arguments. The work will u6lize interpre6ve historical research to iden6fy key ideas within scien6"c and philosophical books and ar6cles that apply to topic of inquiry. Some qualita6ve research will aid in discovering the human connec6on to nature. Logical argumenta6on research will make up the substance of the study as structures of thought from di!erent disciplines fuse together to reinforce the overarching arguments. Finally, case studies will be carefully chosen that u6lize many characteris6c established in the conclusions of the paper. PROPOSAL RESEARCH METHODS D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 7 ARCHITECTURE OR REVOLUTION cWELL, THE TRUTH IS, BRIAN, WE CAN 9T SOLVE GLOBAL WARMING BECAUSE I F---ING CHANGED LIGHT BULBS IN MY HOUSE. IT 9S BECAUSE OF SOMETHING COLLECTIVE. d 1 - President Barack Obama, from 2008 presidential debate preparation 8 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 9 Human civiliza6on is in free fall, diving closer and closer to the ground below & and no one no6ces. This is the scenario Daniel Quinn writes of in his novel, Ishmael , regarding the state of the environmental crisis on Earth. He compares human civiliza6on 9s trust in its culture with the faulty and lethal no6on of passengers trus6ng in an aircra& powered by human pedaling.<br><br> 2 The passengers enjoy the exhilara6on of $ight and wide open view of the sky. The pilot observes that the aircra& is slowly losing al6tude, but no ma7er. The aircra& has successfully taken everyone this far, and everyone trusts in its ability to con6nue. The pilot pedals harder, trying to slow the aircra& 9s descent. No help. The pilot feels the pull towards the earth as the ground begins to swallow up his view. The only thing le& to do to save everyone is abandon ship. If they only had more people to pedal. & But that wouldn 9t ma7er, now would it? An aircra& powered by human pedaling doesn 9t follow the laws of aerodynamics. It was always in freefall. This parable that Quinn uses to illustrate his point might sound drama6c, but such are the 6mes of hurricanes, famines, epidemics, ex6nc6ons, tsunamis, and other naturally occurring disasters that have become rou6ne in the last decade. Quinn uses this scenario to sha7er a civiliza6on-wide trust in a culture that does not fall in line with the laws of nature, for such a civiliza6on has no other des6ny than catastrophe. There might seem to be li7le hope in Quinn 9s words, but he o!ers some in the form of each living organism 9s most miraculous capability: crea6on. The character Ishmael 9s advice to his pupil at the close of the novel looks toward a new way forward: c& You must be inven6ve 3 if it 9s worthwhile to you. If you care to survive. & You 9re an inven6ve people aren 9t you? You pride yourselves on that, don 9t you? & Then invent. d 3 Inven6on is the piece of the sustainable movement of the 21 st century in which architecture "nds its natural place. The sustainability movement grows in business, transporta6on, construc6on, among other areas to reduce waste, reduce energy use, and bring the human lifestyle back in line with nature 9s processes. Famous architects build taller buildings with the highest ra6ngs from interna6onal regula6ng agencies. This becomes the measurement for sustainable or cgreen d design. Engineers produce ways to cul6vate energy from the sun, warmth from the earth, water from the sky, among so many other inven6ons, for human u6liza6on. The technological discoveries for sustainable construc6on are catapul6ng and con6nue to produce new innova6on so fast that the ra6ng systems rarely remain unchanged. The solu6on to reconnec6ng humanity to Earth will take more than technology and more than design. The solu6on will demand a fundamental change in what culture has deemed as true for millennia, as Quinn addresses in Ishmael . The philosophers, ecologists, anthropologists, and psychologists who birthed and fostered the environmental movement since the 1960s contend there is no shortcut to compromise in addressing the environmental crisis. This reconnec6on with nature, some theorists pose, will occur through a reminder of human evolu6onary history and the cpa7ern that connects d all life. 4 This reminder that humans are part of the earth 9s natural processes will spawn a new design method that will reinvent tradi6onal no6ons of approach, programming, aesthe6cs, performance, construc6on, and technology. This new process will reveal an ecological architecture of the 21 st century that represents the most sustaining product of nature, diversity. 1 cSecrets of 2008 the Campaign. d (2008). Newsweek . (1/7/2010) h3p://www.newsweek.com/id/167581/page/2 . 2 Quinn, D. (1992). Ishmael . New York, NY: Bantam/Turner. pp. 105-110.<br><br> 3 Quinn. pp. 250. 4 Bateson, G. (1979). Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity . New York, NY: Du7on. pp. 10. 10 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 11 cWHEN OPERABLE WINDOWS MAKE NEWS AND SET A DESIGN STANDARD, WE HAVE REACHED AN ASTONISHINGLY LOW POINT IN ARCHITECTURE. d 5 - William McDonough, from Big and Green architectural precedence 12 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 13 Revolu6on became the mantra of 20th-century architecture as each style rebelled against past precedent and touted its own individuality. Modernism of Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe was the "rst to embrace the machine age and its mass produc6on. Post-Modernism of Robert Venturi and Denise Sco7 Brown rebelled against its forerunner 9s starkness and embraced symbol and sign. Deconstruc6on of Peter Eisenman and Rem Koolhaas de"ed Post-Modernism 9s meaning and adopted abstrac6on as its muse. Phenomenology of Juhani Pallasmaa brought architecture back to basics by inves6ga6ng human sensory experience. Each architects fought for his or her ideas, but ul6mately, architecture would not approach revolu6on un6l climate crisis on a global scale pushed Sustainability to the forefront and changed the way the world viewed architecture. Modernism, which dominated architectural style from the 1920s through the 1950s, trumpeted logic and order as the moral impera6ve to create beauty. Modern architects idealized forms and materials of industry in the necessity to create a new architecture to re$ect the age of machines. Decora6on became evil, while classical geometries became re$ec6on of a higher order that connected to the human spirit.<br><br> 6 Le Corbusier lambasted Rome and one of its greatest sons, Michelangelo, in order to distance himself from past styles and decora6ons: cRome is the damna6on of the half-educated. To send architectural students to Rome is to cripple them for life. d 7 This arrogance, however, served the architect in claiming architectural rightness. However, by 1954 with the crea6on of Notre Dame du Haut, even the master Le Corbusier was breaking his own rules in the form of abstracted, massive, and sweeping curves of concrete. NOTRE DAME DU HAUT by Le Corbusier. Ronchamp, France. 1955. 1 Robert Venturi echoed a new and opposing sen6ment in Complexity and Contradic2on in Architecture : cArchitects can no longer a!ord to be in6midated by the puritanically moral language of orthodox Modern architecture. I like elements which are hybrid rather than 8pure, 9 compromising rather than 8clean, 9 distorted rather than 8straigh5orward, 9 ambiguous rather than 8ar6culated 9 & . d 8 Venturi con6nued his poe6c list of contrasts that trashed all that Modernism represented for paragraphs. His solu6on for a new architecture was to embrace the decora6on, signage, and layers of meaning found on the cdecorated shed d even in what he called cugly and ordinary d. 9 His cshed d or Philadelphia 9s Guild House, was full of symbol from Italian Palazzos, the Philadelphia grid, and Las Vegas in its signage. The honesty of the references and decora6on, Venturi argued, was what made it superior to the cduck, cone large ornament, d also known as Paul Rudolf 9s Crawford Manor.<br><br> 10 By the 1980s, the Deconstruc6vists, led by the philosophy of Jacques Derrida, strived to strip away all meaning and historical reference to create an architectural style that was truly all about architecture. Unlike the self- proclaimed cboring d architecture of Venturi, architects like Rem Koolhaas, Peter Eisenman, Frank Gehry, and others created evoca6ve abstrac6ons that seemed to ful"ll their aims. Like Gehry, Eisenman too exhibited disdain for Modernism 9s moral impera6ve, but instead of claiming that Modernism 9s lack of decora6on created giant GUILD HOUSE by Robert Venturi. Philadelphia, PA. 1961. 2 HOUSE VI by Peter Eisenman. Cornwall, CT. 1976. 3 14 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 15 decora6ons, Eisenman argued that Modernism indeed followed the same rules of classical architecture s6ll full of reference and history. In cThe End of the Classical: The End of the Beginning, the End of the End, d Eisenman touted c6meless, d cnon- representa6onal, d and car6"cial d architecture as the true cmodern d solu6on.<br><br> 11 By stripping architecture of its human-centeredness, idealiza6on of form, and moral order, the architect argued that architecture could truly func6on only as architecture for the "rst 6me, therefore having no beginning or origin and no end to the process of design. As Venturi 9s muse was Las Vegas, Koolhaas 9 muse became Manha7an and its chao6c and oversized culture that would make human scale, balance, and tradi6onal programming obsolete, which he chronicled in Delirious New York in 1978. 12 Koolhaas embraced the fantasy, the conges6on, and the chance that occurred in Manha7an 9s history. The sky was the limit, yet the sky became increasingly limitless, which led the architect to theorize a new set of rules for cbigness d in architecture and planning, which would be the subject of his follow manifesto, S, M, L, XL . 13 The responses that birthed from the rebellion against Modernism opposed one another, yet originated from the Post-Modern discussion of sign, symbol, and simula6on that reinvigorated the discourse and aesthe6c of architecture. Both also embraced the over-s6mulated, over-crowded urban environment as the model for contemporary living. Public response was also similar in that it elicited the extreme of both posi6ve and nega6ve.<br><br> Phenomenology, led by architects such as Juhani Pallasmaa, Peter Zumthor, and Steven Holl, moved in yet another opposing direc6on as the theory developed in prac6ce through the 1970s into CCTV HEADQUARTERS by Rem Koolhaas. Beijing, China. 2002. 4 the 21 st century. Phenomenological architecture, highly in$uenced by the wri6ngs of philosophers Mar6n Heidegger and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, strived to bring the human sensory experience and scale back to architecture. Pallasmaa wrote that Modernism failed due to its cone-sided visual emphasis; Modern design has housed the intellect and the eye, but it has le& the body and the other senses, as well as our memories and dreams, homeless. d 14 Pallasmaa con6nued by extolling natural materials for their cexpression of age and history d as well as their ability to engage the senses. 15 The movement explored existen6al issues and experience by reawakening the human body within the built environment. cArchitecture is essen6ally an extension of nature into the man- made realm, providing the ground for percep6on and the horizon to experience and understand the world. d 16 The Phenomenological movement and its inves6ga6on into the connec6on between nature and humanity would prove to be a precursor to a great climax in human cultural history caused by the environmental crisis. As the majority of the progressions in NYU PHILOSOPHY DEPT. by Steven Holl. New York City, NY. 2007.<br><br> 5 16 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 17 20 th -century architecture primarily aimed to create revolu6onary aesthe6c theories, buildings became less place-inspired, less energy e#cient, more wasteful, less durable, and generally less in line with natural processes. Modernism championed mass produc6on and touted the house as a cmachine for living. d Post-Modernism rejected the spare forms of its predecessor by infusing buildings with symbol and meaning. Deconstruc6on stripped architecture of its morality, symbolism, and human-centeredness by fully embracing abstrac6on. Phenomenology brought human experience back into architecture, but failed to address the energy and waste problems of its buildings. The push and pull of aesthe6c argument con6nued as architects ignored tradi6onal fundamentals of site, culture, and community. James Wines wrote in a 1991 ar6cle, cGreen Dreams d: cWhat is consistently apparent is the overwhelming tendency of 20 th -century architecture to treat a building 9s environment as something apart from or adjacent to it. d 17 An ecological design movement in the 1960s among architects such as Frei O7o, Paolo Soleri, Ian McHarg, and Buckminster Fuller used nature as inspira6on and a design generator. However, with the strength of other aesthe6cs styles, the ecological inspira6on lived a short existence, and the philosophy quickly dissipated by the 1970s. 18 However, in the 1990s, the increasing awareness of climate change and further development of technology birthed a reinven6on of the movement that would become Sustainable architecture or green design. Sim van der Ryn wrote in his 1996 book, Ecological Design , in response to voices of prior opposi6on: cNow these damn voices seem to be embracing sustainability and sustainable development 3 terms that suggest the acceptance of limits and recogni6on that our material wealth and physical well- being depend on nature 9s own health. d 19 With e!orts from the LEED cer6"ca6on and accredita6on processes, the scien6"c and func6onal aspects of buildings were fully ARCOSANTI by Paolo Soleri. Arcosan4, AZ. 1970-present. 6 established at the dawn of the 21 st century. William McDonough 9s cThe Hannover Principles de"ned guidelines for architects that aimed to crecognize interdependence, d crespect rela6onships between spirit and ma7er, d and crely on natural energy $ows, d among other things.<br><br> 20 Sustainable design contained the moral necessity that Modernism craved, it claimed the originality that Deconstruc6vism desired. Sustainability le& architecture and design is at a crossroads, one that will required innova6on as well as a rediscovery of tradi6onal building techniques, a global as well as a local perspec6ve, and a fusion of nature and technology. Unlike so many aesthe6cs movements that were built for those who could a!ord the price tag and educa6on it took to understand the buildings, sustainable design a7empted to reach everyone. It was the movement that aimed to bring down the concrete slab that divided humanity and nature to remind humanity that the two were never divided. ADAM JOSEPH LEWIS CENTER by William McDonough + Partners. Oberlin College. Oberlin, OH. 2000. 7 18 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 19 5 McDonough, W. (2003). cForward. d Big and Green: Toward Sustainable Architecture in the 21st Century. Gissen, G. (Ed.) New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press 6 Le Corbusier. (2008). Towards a New Architecture . BN Publishing pp. 72-73.<br><br> 7 Le Corbusier. pp. 173. 8 Venturi, R. (1966). Complexity and Contradic2on in Architecture . Garden City, NY: Museum of Modern Art, Doubleday. pp. 22. 9 Venturi, R., Brown, D. S. & Izenour, S. (1977). Learning from Las Vegas . Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. pp. 90.<br><br> 10 Venturi, R., Brown, D. S. & Izenour, S. pp. 81-103. 11 Eisenman, P. (1984) c The End of the Classical: The End of the Beginning, the End of the End . d Hays, K.M. (Ed.). (1998). Architecture Theory since 196 8. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. pp. 534. 12 Koolhaas, R. (1994). Delirious New York: A Retroac2ve Manifesto for Manha3an . New York, NY: Monacelli Press. 13 Koolhaas, R. (1995). S, M, L, XL . New York, NY: Monacelli Press.<br><br> 14 Pallasmaa, J. (1996). The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses. London: Academy Edi2ons . pp. 10. 15 Pallasmaa, J. pp. 21.<br><br> 16 Pallasmaa, J. pp. 28. 17 Wines, J. (1991). cGreen Dreams. d Architectural Theory, Vol II. An Anthology from 1871-2005 . (2008) H. Mallgrave & C. Contandriopoulos (Eds.) Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. pp. 583-84.<br><br> 18 Mallgrave, Harry Francis and Chris6na Contandriopoulos. (Eds.) Architectural Theory. Vol II , pp. 582. 19 Van der Ryn, Sim. Ecological Design . Washington, DC: Island Press, 1996, pp. 5-6.<br><br> 20 McDonough, William. cThe Hannover Principles. d The Hannover Principles: Design for Sustainability . 1992, pp. 5. cTHE GRAND SHOW IS ETERNAL. IT IS ALWAYS SUNRISE SOMEWHERE; THE DEW IS NEVER ALL DRIED AT ONCE; A SHOWER IS FOREVER FALLING; VAPOR EVER RISING.<br><br> ETERNAL SUNRISE, ETERNAL SUNSET, ETERNAL DAWN AND GLOAMING, ON SEAS AND CONTINENTS, EACH IN ITS TURN, AS THE ROUND EARTH ROLLS. d 21 - John Muir, from his personal journals the culture of change: an investigation of ecology, philosophy, and society 20 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 21 The wildness of the American landscape has cap6vated the imagina6on of Western culture since the "rst European se7lers arrived. Later, adventurers braved unknown terri- tory to chart the con6nent. In the mid-19 th century, the American government proposed to protect uninhabited land by crea6ng a state and na6onal parks systems, beginning with Yosemite Na6onal Park in 1872. Today, 3.5 million people gather to the park every year to catch a glimpse of wildness before heading back to their cubicles and classrooms for the 51 weeks un6l next year. 22 The Ahwahneechee, who inhabited Yosemite before the Europeans arrived, weren 9t seduced by foreign exo6cism. Yosemite was their cubicle. They didn 9t feel a need to protect it from themselves by an act of Congress because they lived a life connected to the earth. This di!erence between a civiliza6on of environmental destruc6on, in which people went skydiving to feel a thrill, and a civiliza6on of environmental regard, in which daily life came with enough thrills, was principally a cultural di!erence. The human mind of today forgot its connec6on to nature, but the human genome, did not. Natural desires went unful"lled because current human civiliza6on did not sa6sfy them, and this in turn caused a variety of cultural a%ic6ons. Environmental philosophers, psychologists, anthropologists, YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK Photographed by Ansel Adams, 1944. 8 and ecologists strived to understand how and when culture changed course as well as the best solu6on to reconnect humanity with nature. Many environmental theories and inves6ga- 6ons arose in the 1960s, when Americans began to ques6on the status quo. Na6onwide environmen- tal awareness began in 1962 with the publishing of Rachel Carson 9s Silent Spring in which her cindictment of the indiscriminate use of pes6cides raised overall ques6ons about the serious threats posed to hu- man health. d 23 In addi6on to raising health concerns, she ques6oned the anthropocentric culture in which command over nature was the dominant viewpoint. Following her lead, environmental theorists looked to the wri6ngs of Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, D. H. Lawrence, Robinson Je!ers, and Aldous Huxley for in- spira6on. Ecologically conscious religious in$uences included Taoism, Saint Francis of Assisi, 19 th -century Roman6c counterculture in Europe, and the Zen Buddhism of philosopher Alan Wa7s and Beat poet Gary Snyder. In science, they looked to Carson as well as conserva6on- ist Aldo Leopold, Sierra Club founder Dave Brower, and popula6on theorist Paul Ehrlich. 24 The theories di!ered in several ways, but remained united in their goals to remind humanity of its link to the environment.<br><br> JOHN MUIR Conserva4onist and advocate for the American wilderness. 9 22 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 23 Before 1960s counterculture and the founding of America 9s na6onal parks, a landmark of technological innova6on shook the Western world. The Industrial revolu6on irrevocably changed human life on earth in the late 18 th century. More people travelled farther than they ever had previously, new products appeared in stores from countries con6nents away, and companies produced goods faster and easier. The development of steam power and mechaniza6on in Great Britain in the swept Europe and later America to produce railroads and paved the way for electricity, plumbing, and mass produc6on. These technological marvels changed daily life for people and centered ac6vity around dependence on the machine. Despite the Western world 9s growing industrializa6on, a pastoral ideal remained present that inspired poets, essayists, and painters across con6nents to hold onto the connec6on to nature. This ideal stretched from Bri6sh Roman6cism of the 18 th century with poets like William Wordsworth and John Keats through Transcendentalism in America in the 19 th century with writers like Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Later, Impressionist painters captured the changing landscapes of their countries as if to capture na6ons in the midst of radical transforma6on. Perhaps no one embodied this shi&ing struggle from pastoral to mechanical like Thomas Je!erson, who served as president of the United States at the dawn the American industrializa6on. cTHE LOVER OF NATURE IS HE WHOSE INWARD SENSES ARE STILL. TRULY ADJUSTED TO EACH OTHER; WHO HAS RETAINED THE SPIRIT OF INFANCY EVEN INTO THE ERA OF MANHOOD. d 25 - Ralph Waldo Emerson, from Nature THE AMERICAN PASTORAL IDEAL Je!erson, who spent much 6me at his estate at his Mon6cello in Virginia, deeply respected the agrarian lifestyle and wanted America to retain what he viewed as its virtue in the wake of technological progress. Author Leo Marx dedicated his book, The Machine in the Garden , to this American iden6ty crisis: cA whole series of ideas we iden6fy with the Enlightenment helped to create a climate conducive to the Je!ersonian pastoral. I am thinking of the widespread tendency to invoke nature as a universal norm; the con6nuing dialogue of the poli6cal philosophers about the condi6on of man in the 8state of nature; 9 and the simultaneous upsurge of radical primi6vism (as expressed, for example, in the cult of the Noble Savage) on the one hand, and the doctrines of perfec6bility and progress on the other. d 26 Je!erson valued the idea of virtuous farmer who was content to own few possessions and work his property while remaining free from avarice and greed. Many economists of the day, including Adam Smith, thought this to be a good basis for a wealth in America. 27 While concepts such as the Noble Savage (a term that today causes much controversy in its subversive racism) were popular in "c6onal literature as well as essays, Je!erson 9s focus was primarily on the farmer. cThose who labor the earth are the chosen people of God, if ever He had a chosen people, d he wrote in 1780 in his Notes on the State of Virginia, d whose breasts He has made his peculiar deposit for substan6al and genuine virtue. d 28 Thoreau admired the same ideal as he documented his life of self-reliance at Walden Pond in Massachuse7s in 1846, where he famously cwent to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essen6al facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. d 29 However, as Thoreau moved back to Concord, Je!erson came to terms with the fact that he could not avoid the progress, ambi6on, and wealth the people of his country desired. He eventually realized that keeping factories in Europe to keep and ideal alive would not work and began to be seduced by the machine. However, he thought that retrea6ng the factory from the dank, dark ci6es of Europe and moving them to bright, pastoral environments would keep the countryside beau6ful. He a7empted to retain the same myth.<br><br> 30 By 1844, technology was so ingrained in wealth of the people that it became a symbol of American abundance. The na6on embraced progress as singularly KINDRED SPIRITS by Asher Durand. Oil on Canvas. 1849. 10 24 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 25 posi6ve in humanity 9s pursuit for perfec6on. The country, however, never lost its love for landscape. Marx used American landscape painter George Inness 9 The Lackawanna Valley (1855) as the quintessen6al example of cthe na6onal preference for having it both ways. d 31 The train uni"ed the composi6on, as the natural landscape seemed in harmony with the smoke billowing into the air. This type of thinking, Marx contended, cenabled the na6on to con6nue de"ning its purpose as the pursuit of rural happiness while devo6ng itself to produc6vity, wealth, and power. d 32 As technological advancement enveloped American culture, a desire to keep that pastoral ideal alive lingered. Why? It wasn 9t un6l more than one hundred years later, with yet another climax of the counterculture movement, that the ques6on started ge8ng some answers. Those answers would prove to unse7le the basis of human civiliza6on. THE LACKAWANNA VALLEY by George Inness. Oil on canvas. 1855.<br><br> 11 People from around the world $ock to Keukenhof, a tulip park near Lisse, The Netherlands, to gaze at the 7 million tulips planted each year that cover the horizon in the brightest colors of nature. This fascina6on people share to see this elegant $ower en masse re$ects Biophilia, a hypothesis conceptualized by Edward O. Wilson in the 1980s to describe humans 9 cinnate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes. & From infancy, we concentrate happily on ourselves and other organisms. We learn to dis6nguish life from the inanimate and move toward it life moths to a porch light. d 34 German social psychologist Erich Fromm "rst used the term in the 1960s to express the human desire to remain alive, happy, and around other life, while avoiding death and proximity to mechanical objects. 35 Wilson 9s use of the word and the hypothesis he builds around it is deeply intertwined with human evolu6on and its connec6on to other organisms. This connec6on, he argues, is the reason for the vital importance of conserva6on. Wilson expresses great respect for Charles Darwin for the simplicity and clarity of evolu6onary theory. He notes that evolu6on needs no mathema6cal equa6ons or computer modeling. The naturalist summarizes Darwin by sta6ng, cNew varia6ons in the hereditary material arise con6nuously, some survive and reproduce be7er than others, and as a result organic evolu6on occurs. d 36 Wilson 9s explana6on for the gene-culture connec6on surrounds the idea that humans thrived in hunter/gatherer socie6es among other organism for nearly all of their existence. Language and culture grew within the con"nes of this learning environment. He calls it cbiocultural evolu6on, during which culture was elaborated under the in$uence of hereditary learning propensi6es while genes prescribing the propensi6es were spread by natural selec6on in a cultural context. d 37 Wilson asserts that a7rac6ons and fears of speci"c organism or landscapes prove that the human mind evolved in the same place, and that humans s6ll carry those genes with them. Examples of this are the demonizing symbolism of the serpent and pervading fear of heights cTO THE DEGREE THAT WE COME TO UNDERSTAND OTHER ORGANISMS, WE WILL PLACE A GREATER VALUE ON THEM, AND ON OURSELVES. d 33 - Edward O. Wilson, from Biophilia THE BIOPHILIA HYPOTHESIS 26 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 27 throughout history.<br><br> 38 Wilson claims that no ma7er where people tend to se7le, they go to great lengths to select property that looks like the African savanna, with its open land of moderate vegeta6on and nearby water. This loca6on is highly selec6ve for mind evolu6on because of its abundance of omnivorous food sources, eleva6on change for the purpose of surveying the land, and lakes and rivers for sustenance and protec6on. 39 When people cannot be near nature, they seek escapes in gardening or hun6ng. They adorn their surroundings with animal and plants mo6fs. Because Biophilia is inherent in humanity 9s evolu6onary process, it also involves the innate struggle for advantage, where the desire for progress enters the equa6on. This paradoxical rela6onship of personal expansion vs. life resolves through biophilia 9s ability to increase contentment and rejuvenate the spirit. Therefore, in humanity 9s own self-interest, the ethics of conserva6on and defense of diversity must be a primary concern. 40 Wilson sees no line between the survival of species near dis6nc6on and the survival of the human spirit.<br><br> Environmentalist Paul Shepard is the "rst to theorize human biocultural evolu6on that Biophilia and other philosophies in the environmental movement u6lize. He would spend his life dedica6ng studies to the Pleistocene Paradigm. He claims that during human evolu6on in the Pleistocene epoch, da6ng back its beginnings about 2.5 million years ago, the human mind, gene6cs, and culture evolved in a hunter/gatherer society among other living organisms. Human evolu6on transformed the species into the perfect organism to live that lifestyle. cIn that archaic past we perfected not only the obliga6ons and skills of gathering and killing, but also the knowledge of social roles based on age and sex, celebra6on and thanksgiving, leisure and work, childbearing, and ethos of life as a gi&, and a meaningful cosmos. d 42 However, unlike Biophilia, which proposes conserva6on as an answer, Shepard proposes an overall ques6oning of current human civiliza6on. He proclaims that if humanity doesn 9t look back to cultural prac6ces during the Pleistocene, there will be no healthy future. He admits it 9s not a popular viewpoint 3 that such roman6cism and nostalgia doesn 9t seem relevant in the age of progress. 43 However, he notes that a disconnec6on to the past directly causes the ailments of current human civiliza6on. cWe perceive the dark side of our present condi6on as our failure to adhere to our standards of 8civiliza6on. 9 Crime, tyranny, psychopathology, addic6on, poverty, malnutri6on, starva6on, war, terrorism, and other forms of social disintegra6on seem to be the weakness and $aws in our ability to live up to the expecta6on of being civilized. d 44 Shepard contends that being ccivilized d is not the answer. Instead, a return to the bonds of the past is the only answer. He doesn 9t propose wiping out all evidence of current civiliza6on and returning to a hunter/gatherer society. The environmentalist believes that a mere acknowledgement and understanding of the past and its connec6on to social ailments is enough to make changes. cWe truly are a successful species in our own right that lived in harmony with the earth for millions of years 3 a cWE CAN GO BACK TO NATURE ... BECAUSE WE NEVER LEFT IT. d 41 - paul shepard, from Coming Home to the Pleistocene THE PLEISTOCENE PARADIGM 28 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 29 species that has not changed intrinsically. d 45 Shepard creates a collec6on of pieces of the Pleistocene Paradigm according to occurrences within ontogenic phases of life as well as social interac6ons and other miscellaneous condi6ons.<br><br> 46 These are aspects that di!er from the current cultural norms. Ontogenic or developmental features include some ideas that may seem shocking today such as no reading un6l the age of 12; contact with scenes of birth, death, and copula6on scenes from birth; extended lacta6on; and freedom of movement by 18 months of age. Current society would consider some of these ideas to be abuse or neglect. Other aspects such as few toys, and dense family structure, and self- subsistence within a sharing culture seem like goals society should work to achieve. Many of the social characteris6cs seem idyllic and include poli6cal hierarchy, social roles, and general behaviors. The poli6cal aspects include the earning of pres6ge through integrity; poli6cs based on par6cipa6on, not representa6on; inter-tribal mee6ngs to reduce tensions such as peace pipe rituals; and a "re circle of 10 adults serving as a council for the tribe. Tribe size tends toward 500 to 3,000 individuals with li7le contact with strangers, but immense hospitality when they arrive. Aunts, uncles, and grandparents play an ac6ve role in family life with gender and age roles di!ering from place to place. Other miscellaneous pieces involve health, belief systems, and forms of celebra6on. Running, walking, omnivorous ea6ng, u6liza6on of natural medicines, and hun6ng and gathering for food encapsulate health. Celebra6on and social gatherings revolve around narra6ve, par6cipatory music, games, and feas6ng. Belief systems include a spirituality of all life, exploring the earth 9s history through art, the science of the physical world, kinship with ancestors, and living present with seasonal and daily cycles. Each member has ul6mate freedom of movement, skill learning, and marriage decisions. Shepard doesn 9t desire a return to these aspects of human life, but to cincorporate them the best we can by crea6ng a modern life around them. We take our cues from primal culture, the best wisdom of the deep desires of the genome. We humans are ins6nc6ve culture makers; given the pieces, the culture will stage itself. d 47 The Biophilia Hypothesis and Pleistocene Paradigm play into a greater environmental movement of the 1960s and 1970s known as Deep Ecology. Arne Naess, a 1960s chair of the philosophy department at the University of Oslo in Norway, coins the term in 1973 to dis6nguish it from cshallow d movements with more anthropocentric concerns of pollu6on and resources. 49 Deep ecology strives to look at the long-term, bigger picture and ask the deeper ques6ons. Libertarian Socialist and Environmentalist Murray Bookchin as well as former Vice President Al Gore a7acked the movement, labeling it misanthropic, with Gore claiming the philosophy treats human beings as foreigners on their own planet. However, author and Professor George Sessions claims that these a7acks occur due to people with alterna6ve philosophies pushing their own agendas and using Deep Ecology as an extremist or New Age foil. 50 Such misinterpreta6on is understandable because the ideas that Deep Ecology proposes aren 9t sugges6ons to put into e!ect over a century, they are immediate steps to human survival and require the intense cultural change Quinn espouses in his Ishmael novels. Naess appeals for people to put down their gadgets and realize that Western culture doesn 9t have an energy crisis; it has a consump6on and lifestyle crisis.<br><br> 51 Taxpayers would rather spend millions on new tech-savvy gadgets to clean up the environment rather than make the hard choices that would require less 6me, money, and labor. No ma7er how many technological advances spur forth, cbasic human needs, such as a meaningful work in a meaningful environment, d remain unful"lled. cOur culture is the only one in the history of mankind in which the culture has adjusted itself to the technology, rather than vice versa. d 52 This technological addic6on, Deep Ecologists believe, stems from one event in human history, and it isn 9t the industrial revolu6on. Instead, it is the event that separates current civiliza6on with the Pleistocene, the prolifera6on of agriculture. 53 Quinn demonstrates the point best in a lecture form from the novel he wrote a&er cIN COUNTRIES LIKE THE UNITED STATES, THE CRISIS IS RATHER ONE OF LIFESTYLE, OF OUR TRADITIONS OF THOUGHTLESSNESS AND CONFUSION, OF OUR INABILITY TO QUESTION WHAT IS AN IS NOT WORTHWHILE IN LIFE. d 48 - Arne Naess, from an interview in 1982 DEEP ECOLOGY 30 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 31 Ishmael , The Story of B : Many di!erent styles of agriculture were in use all over the world ten thousand years ago, when our par6cular style of agriculture emerged in the Near East. This style, our style, is one I call totalitarian agriculture , in order to stress the way it subordinates al life-forms to the relentless, single-minded produc6on of human food. Fueled by the enormous food surpluses generated uniquely by this style of agriculture, a rapid popula6on growth occurred among its prac66oners, followed by an equally rapid geographical expansion that obliterated all other lifestyles in its path (including those based on other styles of agriculture). This expansion and oblitera6on of lifestyles con6nued without a pause in the millennia that followed, eventually reaching the New World in the "&eenth century and con6nuing to the present moment in remote areas of Africa, Australia, New Guinea, and South America. 54 Totalitarian agriculture, Quinn argues, leads to the crea6on of a 4000-year-old civiliza6on dependent on arduous human labor. The disguise of this event as a harmless development in human history is due to what Quinn calls the Great Forge8ng, in which myths from every civiliza6on from ancient Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, India, and China through the teachings of Buddha, Jesus, Muhammad, and Plato and even into Bacon, Descartes, and Newton simply didn 9t acknowledge human hunter/gatherer history.<br><br> 55 Like Shepard, Deep Ecologists believe that the original ctrauma d of this separa6on from the earth is the cause for social ills because humans have lost their sense of meaning. The psychic homelessness from a vanished landscape leads to addic6ons and violence that is never understood because true human history, un6l recently, is not discussed. To "ll the void, technology becomes the "rst addic6on of choice in order to feel in control of the environment. 56 However fooled and betrayed humans might feel, the hope lies in knowledge and in the cease of denial. Merely a7aining the knowledge and understanding the origin of cultural wounds, is enough to heal and reconnect with nature. As a cultural solu6on, Deep Ecology advocates for intense changes in human culture.<br><br> 57 All organisms and landscapes have intrinsic worth and the right to $ourish apart from mere human u6liza6on. Naess, like Wilson, sees human self-realiza6on in organic diversity, but maintains that diversity has value in itself. Humans cannot and should not diminish diversity. The global popula6on is not sustainable, and individual culture, overall human survival as well as that of non-humans c requires a smaller human popula6on. d 58 Policy change is integral to prevent undue human intrusion with the non-human world culmina6ng in exceedingly di!erence views of economics, technology, and the environment. Main ideological shi&s will require the release of cultural consump6on in favor of increasing quality of life. cThere will be a profound di!erence between bigness and greatness. d 59 Finally, Naess urges that those who come to agree with the tenets of Deep Ecology have an obliga6on to encourage and execute change. Naess advocates for a simpler lifestyle, with few possessions. He proposes recrea6ng the idea of the factory by keeping them small in size and serving domes6c, not interna6onal, needs. He admits that this type of restric6on and emo6onal connec6on to life o&en leads to, as he says, ctak[ing] your own life very seriously. d 60 However, he contends that the rewards, a self-realized contentment and connec6on to the earth, not to men6on the subsistence of the species, are worth it. 32 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 33 cIN TRUTH, NEITHER FAITH IN GOD NOR TRUST IN BUSINESS AS USUAL, NOR EVEN SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT, ACKNOWLEDGES OUR TRUE DEPENDENCE; IF WE FAIL TO TAKE CARE OF THE EARTH, IT SURELY WILL TAKE CARE OF ITSELF BY MAKING US NO LONGER WELCOME. d 61 - James Lovelock, from The Revenge of Gaia THE GAIA HYPOTHESIS James Lovelock, a s6ll living and s6ll publishing environmentalist and scien6st, proposes quite a di!erent outlook and general theory of the world than the theories previously examined. Lovelock 9s ideas come with controversy, both in their validity and in their implica6ons. Lovelock proposes that the myth of Mother Earth or Gaia is in a sense true: cthe Earth 9s living ma7er, air, oceans, and land surface form a complex system which can be seen as a single organism and which has the capacity to keep our planet a "t place for life. d 62 Lovelock contends that the earth is actually a self-regula6ng system that keeps Earth in a state of homeostasis. Metaphorically, he calls it an organism. Evolu6onary biologists Stephen Jay Gould and Richard Dawkins argued strongly against the Gaia Hypothesis from a scien6"c standpoint and diminished it to nothing more than metaphorical descrip6on. 63 Since his "rst coining of the Gaia terminology in the 1960s, Lovelock has bolstered his arguments in favor of this idea with help from scien6sts studying cyberne6cs and self-organizing systems 64 , which will be addressed in this paper later. The important aspects of Gaia for society are the ideas surrounding human ecology and humanity 9s place in the respect to the environment as well as Lovelock 9s theories on climate change. cIf Gaia exists, the rela6onship between her and man, a dominant animal species in the complex living system, and the possibly shi&ing balance of power between them, are ques6ons of obvious importance. d 65 Unlike theories of Deep Ecology, Biophilia, and the Pleistocene Paradigm, the Gaia Hypothesis "rmly places humans within Earth 9s processes despite technological progress. Just because humanity can 9t grasp this doesn 9t make it nonsense. Instead of hoping for a great remembering in the like of Deep Ecology, Lovelock predicts dire 6mes for the human species due to increased carbon emissions and the doubt that humans will be spawn fundamental cultural change. Scien6sts aren 9t sure when the point of no return will happen, but Lovelock sees climate change as an eventuality that will cause civiliza6on to make an abrupt shi& to focus on the quickest technological "xes. Some of his forecasts read like a post-apocalyp6c science "c6on novel. In this case, Lovelock proposes the controversial no6on for environmentalists of fully embracing nuclear technology because carbon emissions from coal are far more dangerous than nuclear waste.<br><br> 66 He also predicts that food sources from overpopula6on and famine will cause the inven6on and prolifera6on of synthe6c food, space-mounted sunshades, and machines that will pump carbon dioxide out of the air. For the "rst 6me, humans won 9t be able to rely on Earth for much of its natural comforts anymore. Humanity will be the cstewards of climate d on Earth. 67 cIn several ways we are uninten6onally at war with Gaia, and to survive with our civiliza6on intact we urgently need to make a just peace with Gaia while we are strong enough to nego6ate and not a defeated, broken rabble on the way to ex6nc6on. & We may need restric6ons, ra6oning and the call to service that were familiar in war6me and in addi6on su!er for a while a loss of freedom. We will need a small permanent group of strategists who, as in war6me, will try to out-think our earthly enemy and be ready for the surprises bound to come. d 68 The future from Lovelock 9s vantage point looks grim. As for the leaders he refers to should the planet pass the cthreshold of irreversible hea6ng, d he looks to the Deep Ecologists to cbe our guide. d 69 34 DESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE D ESIGN EVOLUTION: IN SEARCH OF AN ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE 35 Felix Gua7ari, psychoanalyst and poststructuralist philosopher, proposes a monis6c view of mind, nature, and society known as Ecosophy, as opposed to the dualis6c view of Deep Ecology, Biophilia, and Pleistocene Paradigm. His theories, along with the work of colleague Gilles Deleuze, in$uenced intense researches of organizing systems in nature and humanity, which comprise the next chapter of this study. Arne Naess also used the term Ecosophy to describe the more spiritual aspects of Deep Ecology, but Guatarri 9s ideas, though using the same term, should not be misunderstood to relate in any direct sense. Guatarri 9s concern in The Three Ecologies is homogeniza6on of the human mind, environmental destruc6on, and decay of social bonds through mass media culture and global capitalism. cHuman subjec6vity, in all its uniqueness 3 what Gua7ari calls singularity, is as endangered as those rare species that are disappearing from the planet every day. d 71 Gua7ari, as a solu6on to the technological addic6on that began\x

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