Scientists find a problem - the Earth’s climate has been disrupted and humanity must confront a crisis of global proportions. They study it and offer solutions. Policy-makers hold meetings. They’ll figure out how to implement those solutions. Industry takes care of us, providing our energy needs and supplying us with goods [...]

The social institutions we have today are largely inadequate for solving our problems. Rather than focusing in problem solving, I would like to recommend we shift our focus to problem setting - the way in which we go about determining what the issues are and how to explore what the solutions should be. [...]

The role of community has perhaps been most glaringly absent in recent years in the realm of political organizing.  Many of us grew up experiencing politics as a solitary confessional in the ballot box every few years (if we voted at all).  The internet has helped change this, exemplified in the email sharing behind MoveOn.org’s [...]

One thing that makes change difficult is the challenge of thinking about something new. It is much easier to imagine things we’ve seen before. This is where new visualization tools like Walk Score come in.
They allow us to see things in a different way.

Technorati Tags: green living, urban design

Wealth is about more than the size of your pocketbook. A better measure might be the size of your address book. Better still, the depth of bonds shared among the people listed there.
Our pop culture media is filled with imagery of wealth in the form of material stuff - the latest gadgets, a [...]

Last night I attended a panel discussion on environmental justice at the Berkeley Public Library. One of the speakers on the panel was Timothy Burroughs, Climate Action Advisor for the City of Berkeley. He has the exciting job of getting the city’s mandate to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (to an aggressive target of [...]

One of the great challenges faced by humanity is to wrangle in the unchecked power of for-profit corporations.  They have infiltrated our governments at all levels and rule supreme in the global arena where no enforceable laws exist.  Corporate profits flourish as death and destruction grow all around.
This has got to end and it is [...]

Think of something high tech. Let me guess, a gadget came to mind. Perhaps it was the latest portable communications device. Or it might have been something for your computer.
A little known fact about how our brains work is that the categories we reason with are shaped by prototypes or “best examples.” [...]

An article in Adweek sums it up nicely with its title, These Brands Build Community. Successful businesses on the web are finding that they needn’t pay huge amounts for advertising if they do a good job at serving their customers. The lovefest that ensues is strong enough to drive traffic to their sites.
This [...]

I have an addiction: I love books! My wife won’t let me near a used book store without an armed escort, and for good reason. I’d come home with another pile of paperbacks that have no place on the cramped shelves in the living room or the office. I calm my moral [...]