Harmonic Infinities

Proportional harmonies, the structures of Phi and the underlying quantum mechanics are the inherent patterns of the universe. Understanding these is achieved through many paths of inquiry - mathematics, music, natural science, philosophy and religious practice. They tie together as universal patterns and channels of energy, and are also expressed in the structures of music, which explains the video above.

These are inherent properties and relational structures to all things in the universe, as Einstein, Bell and Bohm discovered, and they are now beginning to be understood as parts of the whole interconnected life that nature and human society is bound by. Understanding this impact of human societies on the earth's systems is a crucial part of coming to grips with this energetic structure that plays out in nature. Its creativity and intelligence is orders of magnitude greater than our own, yet resonates with us.

As soon as we understand that in this biosphere the balance of these things is critical to life, and that there are limits to its tolerance for the degradation of extractive processes and the unbinding of carbon that took the earth millenniums to absorb, the path forward to a collective way of life that balances within the earth's natural bounds will become evident. The synchronicity of this approach is embedded in the Eden Projects and its association with the C&C method of carbon reduction.

May we enter a new beginning with the understanding of the true challenges of the world before us.

A Small Moment

A photo above of a traditional station of the cross in a public underpassing in Zagreb, Croatia last year. I love to see people in small moments of grace, and their meditation upon meaning. It happens in the big European cathedrals while the sermons float past the crowds of tourists in many languages, focusing on the local faithful who look inward while the world moves past their walls. It happens on winding streets looking over the piazzas of Rome and the waterways of Venice.

It happens in Nepal while the Buddhists mingle with people on the streets, touching each with a moment of retrospection. It happens in India in the streets and temples jammed with humanity among the Hindu traditions of erotic sculpture and Gods of Death and Life. And in Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and Thailand with the connection of common culture and the touch of children with strangers and friends. The small celebrations of the Chinese in their festivals in the public square. The ablutions of the Muslims in their daily call. In Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia, the sacred is blessed every day with the scattering of petals and the immersion in meditation. The African dusk is a time to gaze into the long shadows of the bush, and celebrate the native traditions with people from all over the world. Mexico is a celebration of The Dead in the zocalo, and in life with people in private spaces and the cathedrals in every square.

In our USA, these moments are more rare and formalized, not part of the everyday ebb and flow of life in all its gifts and trials. Somehow the quiet inner spaces and human connections have been drained from the common sphere of life in our cities, and the sprit retreats in the face of the commercialized public space. It somehow seems impolite to express that centered moment except in formal structures, the warp and weave of human life and its meaning is not strongly expressed in our isolated communities.

I would hope that our emerging global community can help bring these connections back into our everyday experience, unburdened by theologies, cliques and partisanship. I am heartened to see the flash music that erupts in civic and commercial spaces to break open the closed off pursuit of things. I love the public holiday events that are celebrated in parks and open city plazas, where people feel free to express their connection to life, music, ideas and play.

Urban Regeneration

A remarkable urban green space has been developed in Copenhagen in response to a site with heavy traffic and no urban forestry. It uses ribbons of concrete that support pedestrian movement through a site of trees and native plantings, in effect, unpaving the city.

The result is a sustainable and fully accessible urban space covering an area of 7.300 m2. Like a giant dune of sand or snow it slips in between the buildings, thereby creating a spatial coherence in the design. Simultaneously, the urban space, elevated 7 meters above the surroundings, ensures the mobility of pedestrians and cyclists, leading from SEB and the harbor past The Danish National Archives and on to the Tivoli Congress Center.

This kind of creative engagement, along with net zero building structure design, is the best hope for sustainable cities as a node of intelligence and human community.

It Begins to Turn

The COP 18 global conference in Doha is once again exhibiting the display of climate change brinksmanship. It's probably the last time that opportunities will be available to the global community to actually come to an agreement about the reduction of carbon emissions in time to salvage the ecosphere from catastrophic warming. There's no escape, the USA is now experiencing the disastrous consequences of climate change on the food and water supplies as severely as the rest of the world.

The only hope is that leadership will be asserted not only in agreements, but in myraid ways by all countries. The growing awareness by people all over the globe is beginning to coalesce on strategies that are being undertaken in many ways. But this also means a shift in our values away from the corporate model and into a humanistic value system, a critically necessary step in the cooperation of the world governments and their people in this immense crisis we face.

But this can be the beginning of a new way of living deeply in this natural world, while it still exists.