New York Times Response
(1) This image was found in the article “64 Pounds of Trash Killed a Sperm Whale in Spain, Scientists Say” published on April 12th, 2018. This image is powerful to me for two reasons. Firstly, this image is very provocative and realistic. This visual form of communication is somehow able to condense so much into one powerful snapshot. To some degree, this image is more powerful than a thousand words when addressing how immense human activities take effect on other species and on the environment. Secondly, the subject of this image itself also contributed to why this image stands out among others. The fact that these creatures are mysterious and immensely powerful within their territory serves as a reminder that even the strongest of them all cannot survive the damages caused by humans, which puts the thought in our heads that, in a sense, we all participated in a murder on a creature that is powerless to fight back.
(2) As terrifying as many environmentalists and scientists described how the future can be, I have a rather hopeful and positive attitude towards how the future unfolds. I think in the distant future, innovative designers and intellects will be able to change the course of Earth’s future entirely through inventions and new scientific findings. An excellent example of a transformation taking effect would be the transition from gas to electric cars. In terms of animal extinction, I think that if wildlife conservation is successfully carried out in the next couple of decades, animal population will have a great chance of increasing again and their habitats will recover slowly.
(3) I believe the destruction of habitats is the leading cause of extinction. Therefore, ways of sourcing materials and production process will most likely evolve by a lot over the next 50 years. This implies that, as a designer, I also have to learn the skills of producing and sourcing responsibly and evolve with the time.
(4) By reading this article, I am now more conscious when it comes to sourcing materials for my final project. Additionally, I will also pay a closer to the companies that make these products and their past histories in relation to sustainability and the environment. Since the sperm whale was killed by plastics, I will definitely avoid plastic at all cost. Finally, when obtaining materials made from animal byproducts, I will now pay a closer attention to whether the suppliers are ethical and treat these animals with respect.
Social Resiliency
(1) Infrastructural and urban resiliency mainly deal with urban planning and architectural designs that will help minimize damages and prevent deaths in the face of natural disasters. Social resiliency, on the other hand, deals with how established communities and social systems are able to efficiently provide support systems and come up with solutions when a crisis occurs. One is more about predicting future and coming up with resilient designs, whereas the other involves active participation and is something that can only be established with numbers.
(2) As I mentioned above, social resiliency is how quickly an established social structure or community is able to respond and create a support system in the face of crisis. The scale of social resiliency can be as small as between one family member to another, or as big as between one nation to another. Social resiliency focuses on three factors, which are the abilities to adapt, reorganize, and grow. Prevention rehearsals and communications are usually ongoing even if the crisis has not even taken place.
(3) How well social resiliency is established can directly affect how many lives are saved in the face of natural disasters. In situations like this, time is extremely precious. An informed and well-prepared community will know exactly what to do and not waste time or resources by coming up with less informed decisions on the spot. Ongoing participation in the same community also helps create connections and bonding opportunities, therefore increasing the chances of action during a crisis, for the members know one another on a personal level.
(4) Truthfully, I do not think designer’s efforts in directly strengthening social resiliency will have as great of an impact compared to thinking about it in a different way. Perhaps I am overly pessimistic, but to some degree, I do not think people truly care about how their actions affect the environment. I think one way for designers to have a substantial impact in revolutionizing people’s actions would be pushing sustainability and environmental protection to the point where these concepts become the mainstream or the popular culture. By making sustainability something mainstream and “hip,” more people will participate willingly and enthusiastically. People are driven by desires, and if sustainability becomes a factor that determines social status and is a trademark of intellect and sophistication then people will want to push this agenda in order to better their own images. Another real-life observation I made is that people will not change their ways for the worse just because of the environment. For example, people will not turn off their air conditioners just because they know it is harmful to the environment, because there lacks a better alternative. Hence, I find that it is less impactful for designers to continuously list everything wrong with the environment and more important that we quickly come up with replacements that are equally effective if not more. A perfect example of this would be Tesla electric cars.
(5) Over the past 2 weeks, The New School students have been actively addressing the situation that the cafeteria staff members were placed into. Fliers and posters regarding this issue can be found anywhere at school and in my dormitory. Even though people may disagree, but at least it has become an open and active discussion among the students. Even though I was not a person directly being supported by this movement, I did come to the realization that there is in fact a supporting network within the student body.
(6) Designers may encourage social resiliency by making participation easier and more exciting. I believe for this particular case, consumer psychology can be highly beneficial in establishing that. How do you make a social resiliency platform as addictive as Facebook? Using participation in politics, for example, if there is an app that allows citizens to directly voice their opinions and vote and actually have legitimate authority figures make decisions based off of it, I believe people will engage with it far more often and changes will be made more efficiently. Therefore, one way designers can go about tackling the issue would be developing a platform with legitimacy that allows people to participate no matter when it is and where they are.
(7) All three ideas for my final project deal more with the situations that are ongoing in my community or in New York City more than it is about social resiliency. Using social resiliency as the main source of inspiration seems to involve more communication and information based designs, which is slightly beyond my ability. Additionally, because this project needs to benefit me first and foremost rather than anyone else, I find tangible objects that I can actually use to be more suitable.
3 Final Project Ideas
(1) My design is a wooden coffee table combined with spaces to grow plants. This idea is inspired by my mother’s passion of gardening and how that is one of the few ways for us to bond. The apartment that we are currently living in now just so happens to be on the first floor. Therefore we have a space to do gardening. However, over the next decade, we might have to move and gardening will not always be an option. In response, I came up with this design that both allows coffee table to serve more than one function and make it more visually pleasing and interesting. Over the next 50 years, the exponentially growing human population may result in smaller living spaces. With this table, I can keep a piece of my mother close by no matter where I go and no matter where she will be after 50 years. Since this is a table, I will most likely be able to use it everyday.
(2) I’ve conducted some research online and many websites have pointed out that if maintained properly, a wooden table can last for as long as you want it to. Because it is such a durable product, it has little to no life cycle cost and comparably less demand in repair compare to other technologies. Another factor is that since it is a dual purpose product, it will automatically help save some of the cost that can potentially go into flower pots and planters over the next 50 years.
(3) One critical environmental change this product helps address is the consumption of water. Because the path that supports water flow through the table is designed in a way that allows water to trickle down from one plant to another, I believe it helps save more water for the purpose of planting. Overtime, this may add up to a considerable amount.
(4) Since this a very complex object, I do not think a lot of repairing will be needed. The only ways I can think of that would require the design to be repaired in some way would be if the glass somehow shatters or if the path for water flow needs to be cleaned. Since I do not intend to completely seal the glass to the table but rather let it sits on top of the wooden block with the help of gravity, it can always be easily removed and replaced. As for the pathways, I intend to leave them open and easy to reach. Therefore, any blockage can be easily removed.
(5) For the top part of this table, I would like to find a piece of glass made of recycled bottles. I learned about this material during the sustainable material workshop orientation and is interested in adopting it into my project. Since recycled glass is not a material that is directly from nature, I believe environmental change will not have much impact on its availability. As for the body, I would like to use either maple or white oak tree, because both have a proven track record of being very durable compared to other types of wood. The wood will be sourced from a sustainable forest within the United States. In comparison to recycled glass, wood is in a greater risk of decreased availability.
(6) I believe this design fulfills six out of ten criteria, which are 4. Manufacturing, 5. Function, 6. Safety, 7. Planned Production, 8. User, and 10. Design.
(1) This design is a leather cover note book made with kombucha leather and recycled paper. A notebook is definitely an object that can be used and still kept for a long period of time after the fact. Since notebooks are instruments of record of what a person has learned and a reflection of growth, I can picture myself reminiscing and referring back to my older notes 50 years later. In fact, these record of instruments can be passed down from generation to generation, so my great grand children will have a sense of what their ancestor was like. For the initial period of my interaction with this product, it will be a very simple and great tool for simply recording and idea development. Later on, it will serve me by being something meaningful that resembles myself during a certain period of time.
(2) One way of how this notebook can help promote resiliency is by reminding me to be mindful of this concept and to incorporate it into my future designs. The notebook itself is not resilient, but the idea is that hopefully my future designs inspired by this notebook will be.
(3) The environmental changes this design addresses are mainly pertaining to changes caused by human activities. These include, water pollution, deforestation, and animal extinction/cruelty. By replacing the traditional animal leather or fabric with Kombucha leather, a chain of issues that come with fabric production and using animals for their leather can be proved unnecessary. By using recycled paper, less trees will need to go into generating paper.
(4) Similar to the first design idea. I do not think this design needs much repairing. If the notebook falls apart somehow, it can easily be sewed back together. However I think the “damages” and imperfections this notebook acquires overtime actually gives it meaning.
(5) The materials that are required for this project include kombucha leather, recycled paper, and sewing kits. One of the ingredients of kombucha is tea, I can see how this product’s availability may be directly effected by environmental changes such as drought, irregular temperature patterns, and flooding. However, I do not think these changes will have an immense impact on the overall availability of tea. On the other hand, I believe recycled paper will continue to be available over the next 50 years.
(6) I believe this product matches nine of the ten criteria, which are 2. Cost, 3. Sales, 4. Manufacturing, 5. Function, 6. Safety, 7. Planned Production, 8. User, 9. Environment, and 10. Design.
(1) This design is an object that can be placed on top of candles to both contain scented oil and charge our devices. This design converts thermoelectric energy into energy we can use to charge our phones. Over the next 50 years, I believe we will become more and more reliant on our smart devices. Therefore, I believe this product will continue to serve a purpose overtime.
(2) This device promotes resiliency in a way that it is unaffected by the traditional power source. In times of crisis when electricity becomes temporarily unavailable, this device will still be able to power our smartphones, which can be a distinction between life and death. Therefore, it is a device that can help people adapt to difficult situations.
(3) This design is less concerned with environmental changes and more about saving energy and promoting renewable power sources such as heat. In a sense, it does help reduce the emission of CO2 and other harmful air pollutants by decreasing the use of electricity generated from coal and natural gases.
(4) This design can simply be repaired by switching out the thermoelectric unit or the USB charging module, which are cheap easily obtainable online.
(5) The materials required for this project include some kind of heat conducting metal, which is currently stainless steel for me, a USB charging module, and a thermoelectric unit. Although these materials are not really renewable, but individual components can definitely be recycled and repurposed into something else.
(6) I believe this design matches with eight of the ten criteria. These criteria include 1. Repair. 2. Cost, 3. Sales, 4. Manufacturing, 5. Function, 7. Planned Production, 8. User, and 10. design.