WEBVTT

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I think we're elites are like tiny little enzymes that affect a catalytic

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shift. But an enzyme is not supposed
to be a major organ. It's not

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supposed to become the heart of the
liver. But you can't live without

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those tiny enzymes. So a thing like
linda's foreign or arcosanti you're

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meant to be catalytic enzymes
affecting and bringing in new information

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and creating the conditions of
transformation. But they're not supposed to

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be cloned and mass produced and turned
into big institutions. Linda smart

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isn't supposed to become Harvard.
Arcosanti isn't supposed to become you

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know Los Angeles. And if it does then
obviously it will turn into its

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opposite and it'll lose its vision.

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One of the most important things that
I've learned from looking at history

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is how everything turns into its
opposite. That you begin with a vision

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and you end up with a bureaucracy

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and therefore one has to be open to
the fact that when you're trying to do

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good you can create the conditions of
evil and that I've studied that in

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countless occasions in history but
also found it happening in myself. I

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quit M. I. T. And the university to
set up a yogic center for for the

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humanities. Very catholic. I mean the
Catholics are in the scholarship the

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way the Protestants are into social
action. The Benedictines approached

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the love of God through the love of
learning. So by trying to set up a

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place for the love of learning and the
love of God. I was acting like very

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much like an ex roman catholic. But
what happened was it turned into its

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opposite. And a lot of the linda's
foreign fellows ended up working for

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jerry brown and jerry Brown started
running for the presidency. Mhm. So

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there was a danger that when and I was
even approached by nelson

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Rockefeller when he was trying to run
so that there is a danger.

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What?

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No. Yeah, that's right. And then he
went to jimmy carter the trilateral

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commission, they got some big net
brzezinski instead of me because I said

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no and I would never be any good at
that. And um the danger was that I

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could see linda's fine becoming its
shadow. And the only way that we could

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deal with that was to raise it into
consciousness, tibetan book of the

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dead style and all the linda's foreign
fellows gathered this summer on the

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theme of the cultural contradictions
of power and what do we do if society

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pays attention to us? Because we've
been used to being ignored

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because, you know, the new alchemy
Institute got a grant from the Canadian

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government and by raising that into
consciousness and walking through that

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ghost, we were able to purge it and
keep this one on the track as a center

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for the creation of a new culture by
working with the soil of culture and

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working through the centralization of
culture and the centralization of

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learning and the intellect and the and
maintaining the voice of the

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humanities against the domination of
behavioral science and all

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universities and elementary schools.
So that what I learned from the

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contemplative was that if

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if you confront your shadow. Well,
Alan Watts said a beautiful thing. I

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said, if you run away from a ghost,
the ghost feeds upon your energy and

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chases you. If you turn and walk
through the ghost, it disappears and

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evaporates because the ghost in a
sense, is related to your psychic state.

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If you become afraid and you generate
your shadow, and I say, oh my God,

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linda's front is becoming a hippie
trilateral commission, then you feed

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that thought form and give that
fantasy and illusory reality that it

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doesn't have. I mean, we're obviously
nowhere near any resembling a hippy

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trilateral commission. Uh on the other
hand, it's a threat. It's a danger

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by raising it and making it an object
of meditation and practice where all

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the fellows come together policy
areas. One of the fellows 25 of us, then

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we could walk through it and disperse
it and release it. And so I think

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the political danger that was haunting
us has been broken and were now

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free to return to our basic work,
which in a sense, is in an age in which

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the university, the corporation and
government have been wed together to

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correction

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in the words of Carl Sagan. They have
accumulated, not speculation, but

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reasonably hard evidence on the extent
shape age, contents and ultimate

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fate of the entire universe.

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Their interest is in the largest unit
of measure.

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Well listening to the stimulating
opening discussions today? I couldn't

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help but ask myself whether the person
speaking was big bang or steady

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state

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because all of us are certainly part
of that.

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Other physicists are concerned with.
Atomic study in quantum mechanics,

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infinitesimal particles and energies.
The world of the very small.

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Their interest is in the smallest unit
of measure

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geologists concern is the formation
and structure of the earth.

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Geographers concern is the surface of
the earth. Climatologists, concern

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is the prevailing natural conditions
on earth, Sunshine, temperature, wind

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, precipitation,

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chemists, concern is for the
composition, structure and substance of earth

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as a group. Their interest is in this
planet as the site in its structure

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and its materials and in its
conditioning. The earth is their unit of

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measure.

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Botanists concern is plant life
zoologists, animal life biologists, living

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organisms, ecologists, there are inter
relationships of organisms and

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their environment.

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Their group interest is in harmonious
existence and coexistence of life

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forms as a unit of measure,

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anthropologist concern is homo sapiens
sociologist concern is society's

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social institutions and social
relationships,

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psychologists. Concern is mental and
behavioral characteristics.

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Their group interest in general is
humans as a unit of measure.

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My point is excellence of performance

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and the dedication of many people in
many scientific disciplines. Using

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many units of measure over many years
time have built a very large body of

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knowledge about earth and vicinity.
It's given conditions and its life

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forms,

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the natural context.

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Environment

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has been rather clearly defined

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now. What about Homo Sapiens? What has
he she done to this wondrous of

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fear with all this knowledge.

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Modern version hope. Oh simians,

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Homo sapiens has for the most part
almost completely failed to understand

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that this knowledge must be used as
the generator for any harmonious

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modification of earth for human
purpose.

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Without mass dedication to this
thesis, there will be little excellence in

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the design of the built environment.

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The fact of the matter is that most of
the built environment is not even

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designed at all, or if so not
seriously, it happens

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because material gain is the prime
motivator and the unit of measure

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in the main professionals. And I speak
primarily of professionals in my

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own field which is architecture who
professed concern and have opportunity

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and ability.

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Two actually do something seemed to be
preoccupied with style as an end in

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itself,

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it's an international disease.

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These people play highly esoteric
games among themselves, sacrificing

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concern for an organic and cohesive
whole.

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They sacrificed this for very private
ego. Images,

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there is a real preoccupation with it
in our current society,

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an imagery will never be a substitute
for vision.

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One must ask if most professionals are
really seriously seeking as

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individuals

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that inner balance so necessary to a
person to selfishly search for a

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human environment.

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Excellence doesn't seem to be the goal
and dedication is not the stance,

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the ego is in the way

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it has become the unit of measure,

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and as I see it, it is quite
insufficient to cope with the larger forces

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at work in the environment,

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sadly enough, that small percentage
for whom the human, his unit of

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measure has deeper meaning and who
have the wisdom and ability to shape a

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human environment seldom or never have
that opportunity.

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They may struggle responsibly and
relentlessly with dedication

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to the excellence of the vision of a
higher level of human consciousness

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and a human environment in sympathy
with such a desire as a real objective

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,

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but there's a well nigh impossible
task.

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However, pessimism is not the order of
the day, nor is it the tone of my

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thoughts at a festival. Optimism in
the sense of joy should prevail

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what I have been saying really is in
the past or at most present, there is

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the future, and with it in my mind
comes hope and hope lies in the young.

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In recent years, one senses a new
maturity in youth. Some basic change has

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occurred.

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The human brain

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and mine has evolved to that point
where intelligent young people have

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become aware that a more inclusive and
more comprehensive approach to

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dealing with the environmental issues
that are crystallized by anyone's

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interface with both the natural order
and his her fellow beings is

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necessary.

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It is requisite that has individuals

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their cognitive of and order in their
own minds. The complexity of

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measuring units now in use in society.

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Then they must simplify.

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They possess the ability to do so in
increasingly large numbers

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and we must strive to assure that
their behavior will be responsible,

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that they will know and respect their
earth. And the dedication to

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excellence in achieving a human
environment

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can only be developed in harmony and
communion with the natural order

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and we must try to influence them in
making this choice. Thank you.

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Mhm. I think some of you are being
blinded by the sun. Would you like to

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move over to one side or the other? I
understand

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face this way or that way.

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Mm.

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Okay. Um

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my name is Peter blake and I'm
chairman of the School of Architecture, the

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boston Architectural Center and I'm an
architect as well. Um I thought

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that I'd I'd like to talk about these
two concepts excellence and

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commitment. Bye. Reading a short part
of a an article that appeared in the

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boston globe about a week ago and it
said Dateline Washington, the

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Department of Housing and Urban
Development is shutting down its new towns

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program, putting an end to a sad
that's unquote, sad, painful and

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expensive effort unquote to build
innovative new communities throughout

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the nation. The new community's effort
is one of the best publicized

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failures of all federal urban
programs. One official declining to be

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identified said its reputation was so
low that quote, we didn't want to

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tarnish the urban policy unquote the
new towns initiative losses in the

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eight year new communities program now
total $149 million in the Office of

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Management and Budget has refused to
release planning funds to revive the

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program, Then goes on to say, after a
lot of blah blah blah. Uh The

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department will try to sell off most
of the seven projects. It's

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liquidating. These projects are in
Jonathan Minnesota. Perhaps the best

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known of the new towns as well as Park
Forest South in Chicago, cedar

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riverside in Minneapolis flower mound
near Dallas texas, Riverton and

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Ananda near Rochester new york and new
fields near Dayton Ohio. Now. Um

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Mhm. I think that we who are sitting
in one of the most interesting new

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towns in the world today on the
beginnings of one should uh comment on

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this announcement, which frankly I um
welcome. I think perhaps new towns

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did not have been built, should not
have been planned by the feds to to

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start with. But in any case, the
failure has now been recognized and

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losses are being liquidated. And if
any of you want to buy a used new town

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, um you have to write to MS. Patricia
Harris, who is the Secretary of

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Housing and urban development in the
in Washington D. C. Um

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There are, I think there are two

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examples perhaps of

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one of the issue of Excellence in
architecture and urban design and the

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issue of excellence. Uh and the issue
of commitment,

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but to most of us who are architects,
the person who has been most

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influential in the formulation of
ideas and so on in the past 10, 15 years

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has been a man called robert venturi
in philadelphia. And mr venturi,

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whose books are very well known as
buildings are quite well known to is um

00:16:27.340 --> 00:16:33.947
of course famous for his statement
that uh Main Street usa is almost all

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right. He is famous for having an
effect, said that the way to uh

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deal with the urban problem in America
is to join mid cult America to join

00:16:50.450 --> 00:16:54.846
middle America to join Main Street and
to emulate, in fact, what Main

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street and the strip in las Vegas and
Levittown new york and other

00:16:59.419 --> 00:17:03.837
communities of that sort have done
his, he himself happens to be an

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extremely sophisticated person, very
scholarly man, very excellent

00:17:09.019 --> 00:17:14.316
architect. And it seems to me,
although I'm very fond of him and I admire

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his intellect, it seems to me that it
is an incredibly condescending

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attitude for an intellectual and a
person who might very well in another

00:17:24.119 --> 00:17:31.226
time have been committed to
excellence, to say to the rest of the a

00:17:31.259 --> 00:17:35.897
population, let them eat bread if
that's what they want. You know, let's

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give it to them, let's give them main
street, let's give them storefronts

00:17:38.740 --> 00:17:42.526
, let's give them the back of the A
and P. That's what they want, that's

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what they'll get um that it seems to
me is not a commitment to excellence

00:17:50.170 --> 00:17:56.907
of the kind that architects in the
past of head, that most of us, I think

00:17:56.940 --> 00:18:02.157
uh still believe in. It seems to me to
be a commitment to the kind of

00:18:02.190 --> 00:18:10.190
middle american uh the streetscape
kind of middle american mentality that

00:18:11.740 --> 00:18:16.197
the Nixon administration was so very
much in tune with that other recent

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administrations have been in tune
with. It does not to me seem to be a

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very

00:18:23.339 --> 00:18:29.440
valid, very respectful way of treating
your fellow men and fellow women.

00:18:29.640 --> 00:18:31.640
That is one however, one enormously powerful point of view today point of

00:18:35.180 --> 00:18:39.256
view that is gaining adherence
everywhere. That is saying in effect, we

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can't do anything with american cities
anyway, in american suburbs,

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they're uniformly awful or worse. So
let's just try to fit in and do the

00:18:49.589 --> 00:18:54.907
best we can under the circumstances.
The other kind of

00:18:54.940 --> 00:19:02.467
um commitment, the other kind of
dedication is, I think, exemplified in

00:19:02.500 --> 00:19:09.947
this place here. I've known uh power
for about 25 years or more. And the

00:19:09.980 --> 00:19:14.717
last time I was here was about five
years ago and the place was had a few

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foundation walls and one or two of the
arches. It has what you've seen,

00:19:19.390 --> 00:19:25.967
what you see here today was built with
incredible selflessness, incredibly

00:19:26.000 --> 00:19:31.607
hard work and a number of part of a
great many people with tremendous

00:19:31.640 --> 00:19:37.306
dedication with a tremendous
commitment to an ideal and I think there is

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nothing in my mind other than total
admiration for what has been achieved

00:19:42.859 --> 00:19:49.486
here and what I'm sure will be
achieved in the years to come. I received a

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statement which I think Parlow read in
part earlier this morning, I

00:19:54.710 --> 00:19:59.286
received it a few days ago and in it
is a sentence in which he points out

00:19:59.319 --> 00:20:02.806
that

00:20:02.839 --> 00:20:08.026
it should be the declared intentional
determinant pursuit. It should be

00:20:08.059 --> 00:20:14.597
the declared intentional policy, I
guess, of public authorities to uh

00:20:14.630 --> 00:20:18.986
faster to support the determined
pursuit of exotic ideas which offer the

00:20:19.019 --> 00:20:22.996
opportunity of testing, verifying and
assessing notions, systems and

00:20:23.029 --> 00:20:26.647
situations now, which may well become
run of the mill in the next century

00:20:26.680 --> 00:20:33.907
, 20 years or so away. He makes the
point that in a, in today's uh,

00:20:33.940 --> 00:20:38.726
America, there are no alternative
lifestyles being developed in terms of

00:20:38.759 --> 00:20:43.347
new towns in terms of new communities
and this, this may very well be the

00:20:43.380 --> 00:20:47.677
only one I happen to disagree with him
slightly. I also think that there

00:20:47.710 --> 00:20:51.476
is one other new town in America that
I find interesting, that's Disney

00:20:51.509 --> 00:20:58.046
world in Orlando, but perhaps that
isn't a completely relevant case in

00:20:58.079 --> 00:21:05.707
point. However, having said all kinds
of things and really deep admiration

00:21:05.740 --> 00:21:09.286
about this place, I want to bring up
the one issue which obviously is

00:21:09.319 --> 00:21:15.107
being made by uh, everyone who knows,
uh, Asadi, everyone who's been here

00:21:15.140 --> 00:21:21.986
, everyone who will be here and that
is, is this in fact an answer to the

00:21:22.019 --> 00:21:26.806
problems of the design of city
planning of survival of cities in America?

00:21:26.839 --> 00:21:33.816
Or is this an escapist uh solution?
Uh, a way of getting away from it all

00:21:33.849 --> 00:21:39.897
, A way of escaping all the nasty
unpleasant of other problems that all of

00:21:39.930 --> 00:21:43.947
our cities face. I've never lived in
this kind of environment before. I've

00:21:43.980 --> 00:21:49.526
always lived in cities like new york
and now in boston, I find it very

00:21:49.559 --> 00:21:54.796
difficult to relate the kind of thing
that I see here to anything other

00:21:54.829 --> 00:22:01.137
than perhaps a very, very beautiful
shangri la a very beautiful place far

00:22:01.170 --> 00:22:05.836
removed from the real problems of the
real world. The racial problems, the

00:22:05.869 --> 00:22:10.516
economic problems, the terrible
problems of pollution, terrible problems

00:22:10.549 --> 00:22:18.407
of uh mechanisms of functional
organisms that no longer work.

00:22:18.440 --> 00:22:23.207
I raised this really as a question
because it is a question that is being

00:22:23.240 --> 00:22:28.097
asked of everyone and Pablo and I have
talked about in the past. I'm sure

00:22:28.130 --> 00:22:31.707
that all of you pointed up at one time
or another, I raised it simply

00:22:31.740 --> 00:22:34.036
because I think that's what we ought
to be talking about. One of the

00:22:34.069 --> 00:22:37.697
things that we ought to be talking.
So, I think at this point I'll stop

00:22:37.730 --> 00:22:45.730
and pass microphone too, Jeff Cook
keep the groups separate. Uh huh. Yes,

00:22:47.460 --> 00:22:52.976
we have a rather unbalanced panel with
three architects and a sculptor.

00:22:53.009 --> 00:22:57.806
I'm Jeff Cook from the College of
Architecture at Arizona State University

00:22:57.839 --> 00:23:03.276
and of course it's very easy for us to
look at the surroundings that we're

00:23:03.309 --> 00:23:09.546
in at the moment as a kind of model,
as a kind of test of whatever the

00:23:09.579 --> 00:23:15.336
issues are that we think are troubling
the world. Um and we hope to find

00:23:15.369 --> 00:23:20.207
if goodness is expressed in terms such
as excellence and commitment, then

00:23:20.240 --> 00:23:25.127
potentially we hope to find those
things here. I guess I find that a

00:23:25.160 --> 00:23:29.086
little bit troublesome, I'm not ready
or willing to pass judgment on this

00:23:29.119 --> 00:23:37.119
place and one sense or another. In
fact, I'm sort of amused that

00:23:37.339 --> 00:23:41.407
professionals often speak about the
thing that they do. We're in a living

00:23:41.440 --> 00:23:46.717
as practice. And I tend to think that
that's what this is, this is

00:23:46.750 --> 00:23:52.806
practice, that this is the first
stroke that it's a sketch. And I think

00:23:52.839 --> 00:23:57.667
personally that it would be very wrong
for us to look on this as having

00:23:57.700 --> 00:24:05.607
any finality in terms of suggesting
solutions or conclusions two urbanity

00:24:05.640 --> 00:24:09.506
or to the built environment.

00:24:09.539 --> 00:24:11.907
Um

00:24:11.940 --> 00:24:17.707
I uh I was going to play the Devil's
advocate, but I think I've already

00:24:17.740 --> 00:24:20.677
been

00:24:20.710 --> 00:24:28.256
sort of upstaged. I was, I was going
to at one stage sort of proposed that

00:24:28.289 --> 00:24:31.526
we should talk about the opposite of
excellence and commitment that we

00:24:31.559 --> 00:24:35.937
should talk about mediocrity uh and
that we should talk about the second

00:24:35.970 --> 00:24:42.927
class. Ron girly told us that
excellence was first class and I think that

00:24:42.960 --> 00:24:46.897
really is an important issue to raise
though, is what sort of culture do

00:24:46.930 --> 00:24:54.930
we live in and is excellence prized.
Um is commitment respected, the times

00:24:55.910 --> 00:25:03.910
and places that we live in. I'm not
sure that those goody goody goals have

00:25:05.230 --> 00:25:10.746
much significance that they have much
weight with the ordinary person. And

00:25:10.779 --> 00:25:18.347
I've heard it alluded to more than
once today, the kind of comment that

00:25:18.380 --> 00:25:25.006
smacked of ego trips and elitism and
this is really difficult because

00:25:25.039 --> 00:25:29.417
professionals by definition ought to
be able to do something better than

00:25:29.450 --> 00:25:35.816
somebody else and thereby they set
themselves apart and there we get this

00:25:35.849 --> 00:25:38.996
excellence and commitment.
Incidentally, I think I tend to think that the

00:25:39.029 --> 00:25:43.006
commitment ought to come before the
excellence.

00:25:43.039 --> 00:25:51.039
Well, um against these kinds of
thought, I've wondered what kind of a

00:25:51.210 --> 00:25:55.806
proposal I might make uh

00:25:55.839 --> 00:26:01.347
with respect to the issue of art and
the environment and the opportunity

00:26:01.380 --> 00:26:08.516
to be able to speak together. And it
seemed to me that it might be better

00:26:08.549 --> 00:26:16.197
to suggest not an architectural or
sculptural or musical solution, um, but

00:26:16.230 --> 00:26:23.407
rather to suggest a more personal kind
of a direction. And maybe it's not

00:26:23.440 --> 00:26:30.607
so much a solution as a kind of
resolution of the frustrations of our time.

00:26:30.640 --> 00:26:38.640
Um, I wonder whether the pursuit of
excellence and the question of, of

00:26:41.940 --> 00:26:48.736
planning for the future shouldn't
begin with ourselves with some kind of

00:26:48.769 --> 00:26:54.506
as Ron girly mentioned to return to
the natural order, whether it

00:26:54.539 --> 00:27:00.226
shouldn't be directed toward a re
examination of ourselves and our

00:27:00.259 --> 00:27:06.377
personal lives. Um I happen to be
involved very heavily in solar energy

00:27:06.410 --> 00:27:11.387
and the issues of energy applications
to buildings and the rest of our

00:27:11.420 --> 00:27:17.296
built environment. And I, I really get
turned off by the many

00:27:17.329 --> 00:27:22.597
professionals who make a lot of noise
in those many fields and then they

00:27:22.630 --> 00:27:30.630
go out and jump in there, big car and
of go home to a life which seems to

00:27:31.230 --> 00:27:38.506
be so completely at odds to their
daily commitment. And I I sent that that

00:27:38.539 --> 00:27:45.006
kind of fracturing, that lack of
integrity um, is evident in more

00:27:45.039 --> 00:27:51.516
professions than those people who were
involved in solar. And so I would

00:27:51.549 --> 00:27:58.347
prefer to avoid looking at the
aesthetic uh, as an as an isolated issue. I

00:27:58.380 --> 00:28:06.380
wonder whether we couldn't move all of
us both you toward some sort of

00:28:08.440 --> 00:28:16.440
a concept of life itself is an art
form. Mm. The idea that, first of all,

00:28:17.170 --> 00:28:22.986
one must get his own house in order
his own personal life. Uh, and then

00:28:23.019 --> 00:28:29.697
secondly, obviously uh, this hopefully
can be expanded to become a kind of

00:28:29.730 --> 00:28:32.707
communal responsibility.

00:28:32.740 --> 00:28:37.976
So this double barreled responsibility
first to self and then communal,

00:28:38.009 --> 00:28:44.107
communal has to do with both.
Maintenance and enhancement.

00:28:44.140 --> 00:28:48.756
Um, in terms of maintenance, we all do
all this stuff all the time. You

00:28:48.789 --> 00:28:52.147
know, we get up in the morning and
that in itself is sometimes an

00:28:52.180 --> 00:29:00.180
incredible act. It's not very often an
artistic act. Um, and uh, the the

00:29:00.450 --> 00:29:07.006
little acts of grooming and I suppose
actor, maybe a good word to use. Um

00:29:07.039 --> 00:29:13.607
can these not be the basis for just a
little bit of sublimation,

00:29:13.640 --> 00:29:20.627
then there's the business of fueling
ourselves of energizing ourselves

00:29:20.660 --> 00:29:26.607
with food? Do we feed? Do we feed or
do we dime?

00:29:26.640 --> 00:29:30.957
There's the daily maintenance of our
mind uh and its expansion and

00:29:30.990 --> 00:29:33.457
stimulation.

00:29:33.490 --> 00:29:40.927
There's the parallel for our bodies uh
the business of maintaining and

00:29:40.960 --> 00:29:46.417
hopefully enhancing the resilience uh
of the physical thing that sort of

00:29:46.450 --> 00:29:50.207
carries the rest of us around the
current popularity with jogging. Of

00:29:50.240 --> 00:29:54.407
course, this is a kind of

00:29:54.440 --> 00:30:02.440
very popular attempt to roll all of
that into one particular discipline.

00:30:02.539 --> 00:30:04.806
Uh

00:30:04.839 --> 00:30:10.207
And then these are just ways of
looking itself.

00:30:10.240 --> 00:30:16.467
The art of living though really has to
do with sharing. It has to do with

00:30:16.500 --> 00:30:21.637
the enhancement and the incremental
improvement of the time that we live

00:30:21.670 --> 00:30:29.670
in and here is where service and where
sharing with others becomes a much

00:30:30.130 --> 00:30:33.207
larger kind of fulfillment.

00:30:33.240 --> 00:30:39.276
Well, that's the kind of what it's uh
it's an idea that maybe all of us

00:30:39.309 --> 00:30:45.720
ought to be more artists, all of us
ought to have more integrated lives.

00:30:45.819 --> 00:30:47.819
There are other issues which are perhaps a lot easier to face. The where

00:30:53.240 --> 00:30:59.457
all of us are someplace and one of the
observations I would make about the

00:30:59.490 --> 00:31:05.766
20th century is the kind of nomadic
civilization that we live in. Uh One

00:31:05.799 --> 00:31:13.506
of the things about industrialization
is that it is nomadic, that it is

00:31:13.539 --> 00:31:21.306
totally universal in its availability
and even cultural attributes

00:31:21.339 --> 00:31:27.496
increasingly have a kind of instant
replay potential. Well, this then

00:31:27.529 --> 00:31:35.529
gives us a special kind of a frame of
reference um because in effect we

00:31:35.880 --> 00:31:43.880
need to develop disciplines of
integrity uh that can travel that can

00:31:44.789 --> 00:31:48.607
survive and can

00:31:48.640 --> 00:31:56.640
persevere in a materialistic and
nomadic setting traditionally because

00:31:56.839 --> 00:32:04.839
cultures that had integrity. Um we're
very locally based. They had a place

00:32:06.289 --> 00:32:13.217
, they had a focus and I think that
certainly is one of the fracturing

00:32:13.250 --> 00:32:19.597
aspects of the life we have now we
sell them. It seems we sell them settle

00:32:19.630 --> 00:32:24.506
in one spot long enough to get our act
together.

00:32:24.539 --> 00:32:32.066
Uh And lastly, one might examine the
house of this kind of program. Uh and

00:32:32.099 --> 00:32:38.107
again, I'm afraid I have a very modest
kind of suggestion. Uh It seems to

00:32:38.140 --> 00:32:41.746
me that it not only takes the sort of
dedication and commitment that's

00:32:41.779 --> 00:32:46.336
already been described, but again, it
takes a particular focus of

00:32:46.369 --> 00:32:52.756
particular direction, It takes
concentration, it takes specialization if I

00:32:52.789 --> 00:32:59.586
could use an architectural analogy. Um
the Parthenon, which has often been

00:32:59.619 --> 00:33:05.207
acclaimed, was really built three
times. Uh and obviously the third time

00:33:05.240 --> 00:33:08.607
was better than the second and the
second time was better than the first,

00:33:08.640 --> 00:33:14.847
but the concept of a greek temple,
which is epitomized in the kind of

00:33:14.880 --> 00:33:18.996
approach to perfection that the
Parthenon represents was not a new

00:33:19.029 --> 00:33:22.496
invention with that building. Uh that
was a building type that had been

00:33:22.529 --> 00:33:27.336
practiced and here we come back again
to some of my earlier words, the use

00:33:27.369 --> 00:33:34.127
of the word practice uh for a series
of centuries. Uh, so that with that

00:33:34.160 --> 00:33:40.417
kind of continuous dedication to a
certain theme, there was an approach to

00:33:40.450 --> 00:33:45.276
perfection. Um so those are a few
thoughts which I would very much

00:33:45.309 --> 00:33:48.707
appreciate some interaction on,

00:33:48.740 --> 00:33:52.806
Okay, okay, uh

00:33:52.839 --> 00:33:59.167
my name is chris Robinson, I'm a
sculptor from south Carolina and Mhm I

00:33:59.200 --> 00:34:04.347
came in here on very short notice and
I spent most of my time here being

00:34:04.380 --> 00:34:09.077
involved with that commitment of
finishing the work that I came here to do.

00:34:09.110 --> 00:34:12.227
In fact, every time I glance out the
window and see the sun setting, I

00:34:12.260 --> 00:34:17.486
keep getting this feeling that I
should be outside working. Yeah, So in

00:34:17.519 --> 00:34:22.747
spending my time, who are my
commitment on my work, I came somewhat ill

00:34:22.780 --> 00:34:26.217
prepared for this panel and I've been
sitting here and joked with the

00:34:26.250 --> 00:34:31.546
panelists at first that I'd listen and
hopefully go last and hopefully

00:34:31.579 --> 00:34:37.526
find something that offended me
sufficiently to get my dander up and have

00:34:37.559 --> 00:34:41.026
something to talk about for a while.
Well, I listened and listened and

00:34:41.059 --> 00:34:46.717
listened and listened to these panels
before and I was disappointed that

00:34:46.750 --> 00:34:52.316
nothing came about that really
offended me. We can try again. Okay, I'm

00:34:52.349 --> 00:34:57.416
I'm hoping now that I'm setting you
up, but then I turned to the next

00:34:57.449 --> 00:35:01.336
alternative. I tried to think of
something that I could use to

00:35:01.369 --> 00:35:05.867
sufficiently defend the other
panelists and what strikes me as somewhat

00:35:05.900 --> 00:35:11.606
even sadder is I couldn't even come up
with that. Uh huh.

00:35:11.639 --> 00:35:15.526
I really feel in some ways like the
odd man out, I tried to figure the

00:35:15.559 --> 00:35:19.907
similarities, the idea of dealing with
space and I tried to figure the

00:35:19.940 --> 00:35:24.936
differences and I kept coming up with
stagnant old things like form and

00:35:24.969 --> 00:35:32.969
function, things like that.

00:35:35.639 --> 00:35:38.206
Um What?

00:35:38.239 --> 00:35:43.206
Yeah,

00:35:43.239 --> 00:35:46.706
I was

00:35:46.739 --> 00:35:51.006
Uh huh

00:35:51.039 --> 00:35:55.006
That's that's what I was just gonna
say essentially that I can sit here

00:35:55.039 --> 00:35:59.327
and try and give you some description
of why I'm here but I don't think

00:35:59.360 --> 00:36:02.566
that's really fair for the panel and
there'll be an opportunity for that

00:36:02.599 --> 00:36:08.796
tomorrow. But after setting up all
these suggestions and having high hopes

00:36:08.829 --> 00:36:12.907
and not really any answers perhaps as
was suggested earlier. The best

00:36:12.940 --> 00:36:17.807
thing is unless there are some other
immediate comments to turn to you and

00:36:17.840 --> 00:36:23.247
hope that one of you can sufficiently
offend me or us into some more

00:36:23.280 --> 00:36:27.997
stimulating discussions. Okay.

00:36:28.030 --> 00:36:30.997
Mhm

00:36:31.030 --> 00:36:33.396
recommendations.

00:36:33.429 --> 00:36:40.296
This is progress throwing automation
and in our communities. Yes. What?

00:36:40.329 --> 00:36:48.329
Yeah. No. Okay. Mhm. I want to
accumulate. Mr You see, he said I'm

00:36:52.929 --> 00:36:57.796
wondering what your architect it is

00:36:57.829 --> 00:37:00.896
community at large

00:37:00.929 --> 00:37:08.066
news to you officer, however, appears
to himself as a professional, jesus

00:37:08.099 --> 00:37:12.097
man as artists as the works.

00:37:12.130 --> 00:37:18.296
Just go beyond building. Ask

00:37:18.329 --> 00:37:23.197
the scope as a boy.

00:37:23.230 --> 00:37:31.097
Well, let me uh let me answer. This is
as honestly as I can. I think that

00:37:31.130 --> 00:37:37.486
architects in a capitalist society are
in very bad trouble because most of

00:37:37.519 --> 00:37:44.617
the time the person who hires them for
whom they work or the authority or

00:37:44.650 --> 00:37:49.436
the people who hire them are not the
users. And yet the dialogue that

00:37:49.469 --> 00:37:54.376
architects want to engage in should be
and is I mean architects want to

00:37:54.409 --> 00:37:58.117
engage in a dialogue with the users
for the future users or close

00:37:58.150 --> 00:38:04.557
facsimile thereof. And yet the people
they seem to be responsible too are

00:38:04.590 --> 00:38:08.637
people who may never use any of the
structures of cities and communities

00:38:08.670 --> 00:38:14.126
at all. I think that this is a very,
very serious dilemma. It has been for

00:38:14.159 --> 00:38:21.497
architects for many generations and
any society which is not in effect a

00:38:21.530 --> 00:38:28.177
socialist society and how it might
work whether it might work out

00:38:28.210 --> 00:38:30.986
differently in a

00:38:31.019 --> 00:38:35.907
uh in a an ideal socialist society, I
don't know. But in recent years, as

00:38:35.940 --> 00:38:40.876
you know the it has been very
difficult for clients to impose their

00:38:40.909 --> 00:38:46.787
buildings on the users. And so the
pressure from user groups from

00:38:46.820 --> 00:38:51.486
beginning with the people that drain
Jacobs organized and so on, you know

00:38:51.519 --> 00:38:55.416
um has been sufficiently great so that
architects have been able to work

00:38:55.449 --> 00:39:00.206
with the users of their buildings
rather than with the clients. The people

00:39:00.239 --> 00:39:06.267
pay the bills and I think by and large
this is improved the end product

00:39:06.300 --> 00:39:10.276
immeasurably, but I think the
preference on the part of most architects is

00:39:10.309 --> 00:39:16.986
to work with the users of the
communities that they been to serve.

00:39:17.019 --> 00:39:22.586
I wouldn't means in my mind

00:39:22.619 --> 00:39:28.887
one of my favorite people I never
really met him but was about to just

00:39:28.920 --> 00:39:34.117
before he died was you have schumacher
and I know you're familiar with his

00:39:34.150 --> 00:39:38.486
small is beautiful philosophy.

00:39:38.519 --> 00:39:45.497
The conditions in the the world of uh
huh building the environment today

00:39:45.530 --> 00:39:52.896
are such that since the all mighty
dollar is the standard of measure, very

00:39:52.929 --> 00:39:59.086
large machines which turn out plans
for buildings for corporations

00:39:59.119 --> 00:40:05.486
in a very impersonal kind of way or
the order of the day. And mhm one can

00:40:05.519 --> 00:40:11.977
see in cities like boston or even in
some of the european cities now,

00:40:12.010 --> 00:40:19.276
which used to be dignified by church
towers as the prime visual element

00:40:19.309 --> 00:40:27.309
are now dignified by banks and
insurance companies and profit money making

00:40:27.389 --> 00:40:33.546
material gain is the motivation which
is shaping today's environment and

00:40:33.579 --> 00:40:37.287
that kind of idealistic, wonderful
kind of relationship that we want to

00:40:37.320 --> 00:40:44.677
think of between architect and client
doesn't exist and it will not exist

00:40:44.710 --> 00:40:52.710
until these great machines are
destroyed until the society itself rises

00:40:53.610 --> 00:40:57.997
and says that if we want to have a
fine environment, we are going to have

00:40:58.030 --> 00:41:05.077
to break down and many people working
on small scale things

00:41:05.110 --> 00:41:11.077
will make fine built environment. But
under the conditions that we have

00:41:11.110 --> 00:41:16.526
today, there will be no such thing if
we could pursue this question a

00:41:16.559 --> 00:41:21.477
little bit because while we approach
the subject of mediocrity with tongue

00:41:21.510 --> 00:41:26.936
in cheek, I think we've already had
two readings from two eminent

00:41:26.969 --> 00:41:34.376
educators that the, that the
marketplace is not interested in excellence,

00:41:34.409 --> 00:41:39.267
that architects are indeed looked on
as a service personnel for business

00:41:39.300 --> 00:41:46.336
aspirations. And I wonder if there is
anything we have to say about what

00:41:46.369 --> 00:41:51.767
turns, let's say the commitment of
prospective architects, young students

00:41:51.800 --> 00:41:56.717
who enter architectural schools and
the kind of transformation as they

00:41:56.750 --> 00:42:01.517
gradually realize the kind of real
world that they must face as a

00:42:01.550 --> 00:42:05.367
prospective professional.

00:42:05.400 --> 00:42:09.867
Would you like me to? Yes, I sure. Um,

00:42:09.900 --> 00:42:13.227
I'm not quite sure. I agree with your
interpretation of what I said, but

00:42:13.260 --> 00:42:18.836
the you're quite right in saying that
in the world as it is now in this

00:42:18.869 --> 00:42:23.796
country. Architects are considered
service personnel to a client who may

00:42:23.829 --> 00:42:31.267
very well be uh a Rockefeller or
whatever. I mean the most grotesque uh,

00:42:31.300 --> 00:42:38.956
example of building for a client
rather than the users is the Albany Mall

00:42:38.989 --> 00:42:44.827
in upstate new york and Albany new
york. Where the client was nelson

00:42:44.860 --> 00:42:50.776
Rockefeller. Period one man, he got
the money for it and he was the one

00:42:50.809 --> 00:42:54.827
who had to be satisfied. His ego had
to be satisfied. The tens of

00:42:54.860 --> 00:42:59.597
thousands of people who are working
there now were never considered, never

00:42:59.630 --> 00:43:03.447
asked, never interviewed, never
pulled, neither were the tens of thousands

00:43:03.480 --> 00:43:09.666
of people who were displaced when that
fascist construction took place.

00:43:09.699 --> 00:43:13.416
It's quite true that architects are
considered service personnel today in

00:43:13.449 --> 00:43:18.037
this country. But I think that at the
same time, the two things that are

00:43:18.070 --> 00:43:21.876
happening first. The thing that I
mentioned already that the community

00:43:21.909 --> 00:43:27.986
groups are beginning to feel their
strength, their beginning to resist and

00:43:28.019 --> 00:43:33.137
they're beginning to insist on being
consulted. The second thing is that

00:43:33.170 --> 00:43:39.236
my point was not that architects that
people I didn't want excellence.

00:43:39.269 --> 00:43:44.617
That may be true, or it may not be
true. My point is that architects who

00:43:44.650 --> 00:43:50.597
think that they do have a sense of
quality of what buildings should be

00:43:50.630 --> 00:43:53.467
like should

00:43:53.500 --> 00:43:58.077
try to set examples of excellence. I
mean, if I were if I overheard a

00:43:58.110 --> 00:44:04.666
couple of doctors say, uh, my God,
give him drunk food, it'll probably

00:44:04.699 --> 00:44:08.157
kill him. But that's what he wants. I
would not have very much confidence

00:44:08.190 --> 00:44:12.327
in those doctors. And that is the kind
of talk that goes on among good

00:44:12.360 --> 00:44:16.657
many architects. You know, who say
Main Street is almost all right. Let's

00:44:16.690 --> 00:44:20.727
blog Main Street. So, that was my
point. My point was not that we should

00:44:20.760 --> 00:44:26.086
abdicate from trying to set examples.
I'm sorry, I've talked much to you

00:44:26.119 --> 00:44:32.907
have any thoughts. Well, it's a I
think the young people and that's I

00:44:32.940 --> 00:44:38.106
really have confidence in them to do
something about this. And one of the

00:44:38.139 --> 00:44:43.767
points I was trying very much to make
was that they should not be spending

00:44:43.800 --> 00:44:51.447
their time working with the ego,
images of some people who happen to be

00:44:51.480 --> 00:44:55.856
successful practicing architects
today.

00:44:55.889 --> 00:44:59.327
They really should be going after the
basics and they really should be

00:44:59.360 --> 00:45:06.316
finding out about their earth and what
the life on it really is and how

00:45:06.349 --> 00:45:12.086
from that kind of a basis an
architecture of meaning and the built

00:45:12.119 --> 00:45:18.557
environment can come, that will be
something different than we have now.

00:45:18.590 --> 00:45:23.097
To me, that's the exciting thing about
being in the world of building an

00:45:23.130 --> 00:45:29.086
architecture that everything still
lies ahead because to this point

00:45:29.119 --> 00:45:35.557
practically nothing has been done that
has substance or will remain.

00:45:35.590 --> 00:45:40.376
They ask us very frequently. Uh huh.
I'm the Dean of the College of

00:45:40.409 --> 00:45:44.546
Architecture at the University of
Arizona. They ask me why are you

00:45:44.579 --> 00:45:50.247
training so many architects? The
market is overloaded already. We don't

00:45:50.280 --> 00:45:56.796
need them. But who is saying that the
practitioners who run big plant

00:45:56.829 --> 00:46:04.829
medals are saying that man is by
nature of building animal and uh

00:46:06.380 --> 00:46:11.316
to him falls the responsibility of
modifying and altering the earth's

00:46:11.349 --> 00:46:18.017
surface and that is an awesome
responsibility in my mind

00:46:18.050 --> 00:46:24.807
and large numbers of young people need
to grow up understanding what these

00:46:24.840 --> 00:46:32.840
real issues are about environment can
not be misled and drawn away by

00:46:33.150 --> 00:46:41.150
flashy images and superficial uh huh
catchy kinds of things.

00:46:41.179 --> 00:46:46.347
That's why I talked about the
preoccupation with style, this is nonsense,

00:46:46.380 --> 00:46:51.477
this is not going to lead us to an
architecture or an environment or a

00:46:51.510 --> 00:46:53.747
community

00:46:53.780 --> 00:47:01.780
of any quality of any kind where
excellence and dedication or issues

00:47:04.480 --> 00:47:08.546
be here. Who wanted to something else.

00:47:08.579 --> 00:47:14.347
You've never looking to individuals.

00:47:14.380 --> 00:47:17.247
Mhm.

00:47:17.280 --> 00:47:24.517
Mhm. Use your friend. Mhm. And yet do
architects of the architects that

00:47:24.550 --> 00:47:30.447
you work with encouraged individuals
rather than the large corporations

00:47:30.480 --> 00:47:35.526
because communities really begin
angels. And I think our consulting is

00:47:35.559 --> 00:47:37.947
particularly

00:47:37.980 --> 00:47:45.980
a community of individuals I built
that way. Yeah. Are you

00:47:49.780 --> 00:47:54.747
for individuals excellence?

00:47:54.780 --> 00:47:59.327
Well, the group is made up of
individuals and each of us is born an

00:47:59.360 --> 00:48:05.447
individual and it will always be an
individual. And each of us has to face

00:48:05.480 --> 00:48:12.637
the issue of measuring him or herself
against the natural order and

00:48:12.670 --> 00:48:17.836
against fellow human beings and

00:48:17.869 --> 00:48:23.876
fellow human beings measuring
themselves against each other create scenes

00:48:23.909 --> 00:48:29.037
very frequently but

00:48:29.070 --> 00:48:34.256
a sack a self sacrifice of some kind a
rising above the superficial ego.

00:48:34.289 --> 00:48:42.289
To the point of getting in touch with
one's real deep ego is it's an issue

00:48:42.340 --> 00:48:50.340
for everyone in society today, not not
just architects and these kinds of

00:48:50.690 --> 00:48:58.356
things happen not in a short period of
time, but people like Carl Sagan

00:48:58.389 --> 00:49:02.287
once again are dealing with the
evolution of the human brain that

00:49:02.320 --> 00:49:08.666
understanding the sense of a new level
of consciousness developing in

00:49:08.699 --> 00:49:14.307
which some of the kinds of things that
uh huh we're talking about I think

00:49:14.340 --> 00:49:19.637
have a much better chance of occurring

00:49:19.670 --> 00:49:25.497
but the individual human being is the
real unit of measure in life, the

00:49:25.530 --> 00:49:32.077
degree to which individual beings come
together because of their desire

00:49:32.110 --> 00:49:38.887
for things like excellence, because of
their dedication to things will

00:49:38.920 --> 00:49:46.336
evolve into the possibility of a finer
environment for us. That

00:49:46.369 --> 00:49:52.026
maybe I could reply in a different way
speaking about the profession. Um I

00:49:52.059 --> 00:49:55.816
think I would agree with the
observation that architects at least in this

00:49:55.849 --> 00:50:03.646
country seem not to be terribly
responsive to the public at large, nor

00:50:03.679 --> 00:50:08.117
potentially to issues of excellence.
Um and maybe that's one of the

00:50:08.150 --> 00:50:11.767
reasons why we're here to do something
about it. I would make an

00:50:11.800 --> 00:50:16.017
observation that that the
architectural profession doesn't behave the same

00:50:16.050 --> 00:50:20.477
way everywhere and in particular um in
England where I've had some

00:50:20.510 --> 00:50:26.247
experience over the last generation or
so, the architectural profession

00:50:26.280 --> 00:50:32.537
has made itself uh huh more or less
indispensable to society. It is made

00:50:32.570 --> 00:50:37.626
society and in that case that mostly
has to do with collective

00:50:37.659 --> 00:50:42.356
governmental agencies, believe that
architects are really necessary to the

00:50:42.389 --> 00:50:50.327
society. And this is in England, I'm
speaking about Britain. Um and

00:50:50.360 --> 00:50:55.727
thereby uh there is a great deal more
interaction and inter

00:50:55.760 --> 00:51:02.727
responsibilities between the
profession and the public at large. I don't

00:51:02.760 --> 00:51:09.497
know whether I could say that the
built environment. Um it is discernibly

00:51:09.530 --> 00:51:15.256
better yet, but it seems to me that
that at least is one situation which

00:51:15.289 --> 00:51:20.097
may have some promise if I were to
make excuse for american architects

00:51:20.130 --> 00:51:27.916
would be that they do after all have
to live in the same a kind of value

00:51:27.949 --> 00:51:33.566
system that everyone else lives in and
they can very easily starve

00:51:33.599 --> 00:51:37.717
themselves if they don't match the
needs of the society and there goes the

00:51:37.750 --> 00:51:41.026
excellence right out the window.

00:51:41.059 --> 00:51:45.626
They are controlled by the people who
pay the tune.

00:51:45.659 --> 00:51:53.336
I wonder what our sculptor has to say
that this kind of dilemma. How'd you

00:51:53.369 --> 00:51:57.327
get your bread?

00:51:57.360 --> 00:52:04.316
Yeah. Well it's interesting to me that
you suggest that

00:52:04.349 --> 00:52:12.349
let the people take over and control
the shape of architecture. Mhm. I as

00:52:12.679 --> 00:52:15.617
somebody else in the audience
mentioned, think that would be an

00:52:15.650 --> 00:52:19.856
interesting idea to pursue. But if
it's such a good idea, why isn't it

00:52:19.889 --> 00:52:26.146
done the potential certainly exists to
do it.

00:52:26.179 --> 00:52:31.206
This also begins to address the
question of and I haven't found out who is

00:52:31.239 --> 00:52:37.517
for and who's against yet. But the
question of elitists versus looking at

00:52:37.550 --> 00:52:43.617
whole societies um looking at set
pieces of art versus looking at whole

00:52:43.650 --> 00:52:47.517
environments.

00:52:47.550 --> 00:52:55.550
Yeah. Uh huh. Some other day I think
there's some Mhm. Yeah.

00:52:58.150 --> 00:53:06.150
Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Whether the object
should as you can work products and

00:53:07.789 --> 00:53:14.206
you're gonna do I don't know. Mhm.
Sounds to me as a weapon introduced

00:53:14.239 --> 00:53:21.517
requirements without having who was
here responsibility? The body's head.

00:53:21.550 --> 00:53:24.217
 Mhm. Anderson

00:53:24.250 --> 00:53:28.617
you can see the war but these

00:53:28.650 --> 00:53:32.106
seen it before.

00:53:32.139 --> 00:53:36.217
Oh

00:53:36.250 --> 00:53:42.217
you are 100.

00:53:42.250 --> 00:53:50.250
They don't need you probably speaking
on the bar, we are so self into the

00:53:50.539 --> 00:53:58.539
world we need soul expression or not
for our creation. Do you love through

00:54:00.630 --> 00:54:06.537
the process? Best octopus was going to
do requires us to remain no sense

00:54:06.570 --> 00:54:12.447
of responsibility because people a
creative imagination, recreation

00:54:12.480 --> 00:54:17.106
meetings with violent with the Lord
made in this world severe depression

00:54:17.139 --> 00:54:21.807
got so he uses

00:54:21.840 --> 00:54:29.840
you know the job you were created that
you wouldn't have much better. The

00:54:30.400 --> 00:54:34.407
whole society wanted

00:54:34.440 --> 00:54:42.137
that we engage in various schools,
universities, magazines. Whoa. Mostly

00:54:42.170 --> 00:54:50.106
in France. But when you don't have to
do this beautiful

00:54:50.139 --> 00:54:58.139
from the best. Yeah. Is I think most
of you were No, you better start to

00:54:59.650 --> 00:55:07.650
like he's changing schools. Let's
change the visibility. Er

00:55:15.539 --> 00:55:21.006
You must share.

00:55:21.039 --> 00:55:26.807
We talk to ourselves with most market

00:55:26.840 --> 00:55:32.336
issue, a different position. You must
derive rights over the boy. We just

00:55:32.369 --> 00:55:38.506
got this arrangement about someone who
say to us, you know what they want

00:55:38.539 --> 00:55:46.177
first. Doctors. Either way is wrong.
The most inviting you to leave. You

00:55:46.210 --> 00:55:51.677
can see they can look for letters and
argument. I don't use the wonderful

00:55:51.710 --> 00:55:59.710
isn't it? With no ill moment almost to
expect specifications. It's okay. I

00:56:02.730 --> 00:56:10.730
think that cannot sign for us to say
that as soon as possible. Yeah, he

00:56:11.400 --> 00:56:14.436
just wants to get that's a lot of
people work from the losses of the

00:56:14.469 --> 00:56:19.287
countries that you want. We don't have
a position of great about we're not

00:56:19.320 --> 00:56:23.336
creating.

00:56:23.369 --> 00:56:27.396
There are always uh, happy,

00:56:27.429 --> 00:56:31.227
happy instances. I don't think that
one should get the idea that we're

00:56:31.260 --> 00:56:34.497
completely pessimistic.

00:56:34.530 --> 00:56:41.066
There are many sizable occasions where
architect client or community have

00:56:41.099 --> 00:56:46.197
really made very good contributions.

00:56:46.230 --> 00:56:50.796
There's another question back there.

00:56:50.829 --> 00:56:58.546
Yeah. Before as much our work music,
okay you do that on a single hospital

00:56:58.579 --> 00:57:05.077
, you might be able to do it on the
16th department house. We might be

00:57:05.110 --> 00:57:11.236
able to live in a small sort of both
used development.

00:57:11.269 --> 00:57:16.997
There is a big part of their what
Bart's fare

00:57:17.030 --> 00:57:20.296
dr

00:57:20.329 --> 00:57:27.836
mhm. His name full direction. Uh

00:57:27.869 --> 00:57:32.307
Let me try to answer and I think after
that we probably have to quit this

00:57:32.340 --> 00:57:37.997
room. I was I was using that working
with the user in some metaphorical

00:57:38.030 --> 00:57:43.356
sense for example, many times take a
dormitory, student dormitory at the

00:57:43.389 --> 00:57:46.276
university. Obviously you're not going
to be able to talk to the people

00:57:46.309 --> 00:57:51.086
who are going to be there in five
years from now or 10 years man. But

00:57:51.119 --> 00:57:54.296
there is a great difference between
working with the buildings and grounds

00:57:54.329 --> 00:57:58.477
department of the university which is
staffed by a bunch of idiots most of

00:57:58.510 --> 00:58:03.296
the time who paint everything green
and number every door, you know, which

00:58:03.329 --> 00:58:07.467
is the only interest and working and
really talking to students and

00:58:07.500 --> 00:58:14.836
finding out how students like to live
now in uh in boston where Ron used

00:58:14.869 --> 00:58:20.296
to live and I still do um there is a
dormitory as many of you know by alta

00:58:20.329 --> 00:58:25.807
which was done in 1948 in which almost
every room, every student room is

00:58:25.840 --> 00:58:30.287
slightly different from every other
room. Now, that was an incredibly

00:58:30.320 --> 00:58:34.497
radical idea and extremely sensitive
perception on the part of alta

00:58:34.530 --> 00:58:38.577
because he realized that students
don't want to be treated like numbers at

00:58:38.610 --> 00:58:44.756
the same time before then. And since
then thousands of student dormitory

00:58:44.789 --> 00:58:49.197
rooms in the greater boston area have
been built, but people who have

00:58:49.230 --> 00:58:51.537
never talked to anyone have been
designed by architects, We've never

00:58:51.570 --> 00:58:55.217
talked to anyone except the buildings
and grounds people at Harvard and

00:58:55.250 --> 00:58:58.847
MIT and so on. So I think it's a, I
was using the term user and

00:58:58.880 --> 00:59:01.876
metaphorical sense, you know, if you
talk to the people, the kinds of

00:59:01.909 --> 00:59:06.727
people are going to be using it, the
kinds of people as widely as possible

00:59:06.760 --> 00:59:10.396
rather than to your clients. I think
that's anyway, I think we have to

00:59:10.429 --> 00:59:15.677
leave. Thank you very much.

00:59:15.710 --> 00:59:22.977
Can I take you say I had to,

00:59:23.010 --> 00:59:28.986
I think you can find in old
traditional societies that

00:59:29.019 --> 00:59:35.847
what we call doctors. Medical man, I'm
not really isolated practitioners

00:59:35.880 --> 00:59:38.787
that look only after

00:59:38.820 --> 00:59:42.907
the body. In most traditional
societies, you have the conception of the

00:59:42.940 --> 00:59:50.486
medicine men, the healer, who is much
more than than the men who is

00:59:50.519 --> 00:59:54.967
trying to repair part of your body
when it is worn up. He is a man who is

00:59:55.000 --> 01:00:00.526
trying to see how you have got out of
the equilibrium of things. What is

01:00:00.559 --> 01:00:06.506
the relation of the human being to his
entire future forces and how this

01:00:06.539 --> 01:00:10.577
whole system got out of balance?

01:00:10.610 --> 01:00:18.316
So the role of culture in this
processes to promote continuous

01:00:18.349 --> 01:00:26.066
reintegration is to promote and
enhance process of harmony

01:00:26.099 --> 01:00:32.037
and this has been so in all
traditional societies and in our society. I

01:00:32.070 --> 01:00:37.077
think culture does it symbolically by
trying to invent various codes and

01:00:37.110 --> 01:00:43.526
various interactive messages whereby
by symbolic relationship we get into

01:00:43.559 --> 01:00:48.977
harmony with ourselves and with with
the rest of them. You knew this in

01:00:49.010 --> 01:00:55.017
terms of physical processes, we have
all the quantitative measures whereby

01:00:55.050 --> 01:00:58.717
bodies kept in equilibrium. But on the
social and cultural level there are

01:00:58.750 --> 01:01:05.486
those more subtle symbolic
interactions which culture takes care of,

01:01:05.519 --> 01:01:11.546
sometimes marvelous well and without
much awareness of what of our

01:01:11.579 --> 01:01:17.276
awareness, what it is doing. Instead
of rumbling. I'll just

01:01:17.309 --> 01:01:22.276
try to read one or two paragraphs
which summarize my position,

01:01:22.309 --> 01:01:27.577
which is to say that the idea of
cultures healer designates a process

01:01:27.610 --> 01:01:34.296
whereby the individual is psychically
and spiritually renewed by it when

01:01:34.329 --> 01:01:40.057
at the same time he positively
contributes to it. Culture is healer that

01:01:40.090 --> 01:01:47.217
works in two ways by transmitting to
us the invisible psychic energy which

01:01:47.250 --> 01:01:53.316
makes us feel to belong at home at one
with ourselves and at one with

01:01:53.349 --> 01:01:57.407
other human beings. And I think this
environment that has been created

01:01:57.440 --> 01:02:04.657
here is as good example as any of
certain building forms that have more

01:02:04.690 --> 01:02:11.947
than physical shapes to them that have
certain symbolic significance. The

01:02:11.980 --> 01:02:16.367
forms that work on us and the form
that we find conducive and enhancing. I

01:02:16.400 --> 01:02:22.416
think my case really addressed on your
experience of this environment and

01:02:22.449 --> 01:02:28.166
your realization whether and in what
sense this is a healing environment,

01:02:28.199 --> 01:02:35.006
whether in what sense men does not
live by bread and butter alone, but

01:02:35.039 --> 01:02:38.867
those subtle spiritual interactions,
What is it in the nature of those

01:02:38.900 --> 01:02:42.066
environments which are rich, spiritual
and cultural that makes us feel

01:02:42.099 --> 01:02:46.026
good, that makes us feel somehow
healed and mandate. What is it in this

01:02:46.059 --> 01:02:51.997
environment that makes us feel good?
And I think the introspection of this

01:02:52.030 --> 01:02:55.997
process of experience would reveal
that there is a peculiar kind of

01:02:56.030 --> 01:03:02.267
healing process where by many of the
processes of disintegration of us is

01:03:02.300 --> 01:03:09.367
cultural beings have been somehow
mended. So I'll finish reading this bit

01:03:09.400 --> 01:03:16.967
by suggesting that secondly, by
challenging us to contribute to it

01:03:17.000 --> 01:03:23.146
and by engaging and absorbing us into
its own life. Both processes have a

01:03:23.179 --> 01:03:27.256
healing power for without them, the
individual becomes tomorrow's the rain

01:03:27.289 --> 01:03:32.756
schizophrenic. In short, we are a part
of the life of culture and culture

01:03:32.789 --> 01:03:38.796
is an intrinsic part of our life. Put
otherwise, culture shapes the

01:03:38.829 --> 01:03:46.829
individual, who in turn contributes to
the ethos of the culture. So we are

01:03:47.300 --> 01:03:51.847
aware that we are complex and fragile
systems vulnerable all the time to

01:03:51.880 --> 01:03:58.276
the processes of entropy, both
physical and psychic our body that is the

01:03:58.309 --> 01:04:04.106
live process and life processes in our
body combat this tendency to

01:04:04.139 --> 01:04:09.736
entropy by continuously reintegrating
what entropy wants to dissolve our

01:04:09.769 --> 01:04:14.356
minds and our psychic life are subject
with ceaseless entropy as well.

01:04:14.389 --> 01:04:19.057
Culture and the process is it
generates our power. Excellence, integrity

01:04:19.090 --> 01:04:23.256
. I think this is one of the most
characteristic of culture from my point

01:04:23.289 --> 01:04:26.956
of view, this integrity from the
psychological

01:04:26.989 --> 01:04:30.856
cultural and psychic level,

01:04:30.889 --> 01:04:34.847
they are constantly rebuilding what
entropy wants to dissolve in Yet

01:04:34.880 --> 01:04:39.206
another formulation. Culture is healer
signifies the anti dropping

01:04:39.239 --> 01:04:44.097
qualities of culture which keeps
constantly rebuilding The structures are

01:04:44.130 --> 01:04:49.336
a psychic and spiritual life. When
men's spiritual life is gone, the human

01:04:49.369 --> 01:04:55.706
being is, in a significant sense dead
as you may be aware, the old

01:04:55.739 --> 01:05:00.546
fashioned expression that culture is
quote, the nourishment of the soul on

01:05:00.579 --> 01:05:06.467
this definition is not far from the
truth. If my soul, we mean the variety

01:05:06.500 --> 01:05:10.356
of psychic energy that men transact
with his culture and other human

01:05:10.389 --> 01:05:15.756
beings, then the expression is exactly
right.

01:05:15.789 --> 01:05:20.327
Well, if such is the case, let us look
very briefly historically it and

01:05:20.360 --> 01:05:27.657
contemporary scene and see where we
are and what has gone wrong as you

01:05:27.690 --> 01:05:31.816
are aware in this remarkable book than
in the art of motorcycle

01:05:31.849 --> 01:05:39.546
maintenance robert. Perfect claims
that our ages somehow defunct and

01:05:39.579 --> 01:05:45.827
crippled because it lacks of quality.
In my opinion, it is because it

01:05:45.860 --> 01:05:49.997
lacks of spirituality or my second
thesis is that it is the spiritual

01:05:50.030 --> 01:05:53.997
substance of culture that keeps it
nourishing in the life. And it's

01:05:54.030 --> 01:05:57.486
because we have somehow perched
ourselves of spiritual content during the

01:05:57.519 --> 01:06:03.057
last two centuries that we find our
culture not nourishing the process

01:06:03.090 --> 01:06:08.697
really started in the post renaissance
times, but really in a big way with

01:06:08.730 --> 01:06:13.706
the evolution of the mechanistic
worldview, with the idea of the cosmos as

01:06:13.739 --> 01:06:18.387
a clock like mechanism. In perfecting
this metaphor of the universe is a

01:06:18.420 --> 01:06:22.066
clock like mechanism we have
continually, that is during the last two

01:06:22.099 --> 01:06:28.256
centuries, try to eliminate all the
elements of the universe that somehow

01:06:28.289 --> 01:06:33.066
didn't belong to the mechanistic
metaphor, that we're not express a bill

01:06:33.099 --> 01:06:38.646
through physical laws. As the result,
we have perched all non physical

01:06:38.679 --> 01:06:43.256
elements, first from physics, then
from chemistry, then from physiology,

01:06:43.289 --> 01:06:46.916
then in the 19th century, from
psychology. And then at the end of the 19th

01:06:46.949 --> 01:06:51.376
century, in the 20th century from
culture and from out in particular from

01:06:51.409 --> 01:06:58.526
for the pursuit of uh secularism meant
chasing out all the gods and by the

01:06:58.559 --> 01:07:03.026
same token, all the spiritual and
transcendental forces from it. It has

01:07:03.059 --> 01:07:06.247
been an unfortunate

01:07:06.280 --> 01:07:11.046
coincidence or a mistake of the

01:07:11.079 --> 01:07:15.057
pursuit of the mechanistic worldview,
that while trying to liberate

01:07:15.090 --> 01:07:18.686
ourselves from the constraining
aspects of religion, we attributed to

01:07:18.719 --> 01:07:23.586
religion not only those defunct
aspects of it, but also all spiritual and

01:07:23.619 --> 01:07:27.847
transcendental functions. So we have
eliminated not only the terrain of

01:07:27.880 --> 01:07:33.666
religion, but also a great deal of
transcendental and spiritual content

01:07:33.699 --> 01:07:39.436
that have gone with uh the practice
and then then the worship of religion

01:07:39.469 --> 01:07:43.546
as the result, particularly in the
second half of the 19th century, we

01:07:43.579 --> 01:07:48.447
have increasingly impoverished around
in our culture

01:07:48.480 --> 01:07:53.947
from the standpoint of the history of
art we receive from 19th century on

01:07:53.980 --> 01:07:58.436
the late 19th century and the
progressive

01:07:58.469 --> 01:08:05.026
liberation of the artist from form,
first from classical form in music, in

01:08:05.059 --> 01:08:12.097
painting and sculpture, and then from
all forms. So that in the 20th

01:08:12.130 --> 01:08:16.857
century anything goes, anything goes.
But at the same time, one has to

01:08:16.890 --> 01:08:20.467
realize that while liberating
ourselves from the constraints of

01:08:20.500 --> 01:08:25.296
traditional culture, we have liberated
art from what it was always

01:08:25.329 --> 01:08:29.076
renowned for, from being a carrier of
spiritual substance, spiritual

01:08:29.109 --> 01:08:32.456
message. And I think the plight of
modern art, particularly the second

01:08:32.489 --> 01:08:35.727
half of the 20th century art, the
plight of the avant garde is really

01:08:35.760 --> 01:08:42.067
exactly in proportion to its
abandoning its role as a carrier of spiritual

01:08:42.100 --> 01:08:50.100
substance, as the conveyor of cultural
values which have maintained our

01:08:50.720 --> 01:08:57.017
sanity and our well being for such a
long time. And no wonder that there

01:08:57.050 --> 01:09:01.387
is almost universal are vulnerable to
modern art for modern artists,

01:09:01.420 --> 01:09:07.296
particularly under healing if we are
really acting against it. I think it

01:09:07.329 --> 01:09:11.446
is for good reason for our instinct
tells her that it is not art that

01:09:11.479 --> 01:09:17.246
somehow integrates that is wholesome
for modern art, somehow on purpose

01:09:17.279 --> 01:09:22.996
assaults us and disintegrates us. In
my opinion, if we are going to

01:09:23.029 --> 01:09:28.786
survive as integrated human beings,
there must be some symbolic modes that

01:09:28.819 --> 01:09:35.206
do it for us out in this the second
half of the 20th century, somehow,

01:09:35.239 --> 01:09:42.666
somehow relegated to renounce its role
as he there. And so far nothing has

01:09:42.699 --> 01:09:45.937
emerged in its place

01:09:45.970 --> 01:09:52.267
to rephrase the point through the
words of gator, who once said that to

01:09:52.300 --> 01:09:58.876
treat men as he is, is to debase him
to treat men as he ought to be, is to

01:09:58.909 --> 01:10:03.477
embrace him. Traditional religions and
traditional art treated men as he

01:10:03.510 --> 01:10:08.336
ought to be. Philosophers from the
renaissance on and particularly from

01:10:08.369 --> 01:10:12.817
the 18th century on, particularly in
the 19th and the 20th century. And

01:10:12.850 --> 01:10:18.067
inspired by Marxist by positivism by
secularism, increasingly treated man

01:10:18.100 --> 01:10:24.647
as his and increasingly debased him.
So our agenda now is to again,

01:10:24.680 --> 01:10:32.616
treatment is he ought to be and to re
fuse culture with spiritual some

01:10:32.649 --> 01:10:40.527
substance which it has lost and what I
feel as exciting and what I feel is

01:10:40.560 --> 01:10:43.737
happening here is that somehow, in
spite of the seeming impossibility of

01:10:43.770 --> 01:10:49.727
doing so, we have been able to again
re select this old fashioned concept

01:10:49.760 --> 01:10:54.996
of men who is made not only of clay,
but of stars and our pursuit here is

01:10:55.029 --> 01:10:59.527
the pursuit of excellence in the term
of treating men as he ought to be

01:10:59.560 --> 01:11:03.576
and therefore embracing him and this
has been always the most important

01:11:03.609 --> 01:11:10.006
aspect of culture and this is why
culture has been healer and this is why

01:11:10.039 --> 01:11:16.746
I insisted unless we are somehow able
to recapture

01:11:16.779 --> 01:11:24.576
symbolic significance of healing
process of culture. We are going to do be

01:11:24.609 --> 01:11:30.156
in trouble and we are in trouble as
you know during the last 15 years, the

01:11:30.189 --> 01:11:34.487
number of mentally ill patients that
that that has increased in the United

01:11:34.520 --> 01:11:39.937
States 400% and I'm told that half of
the beds are occupied by mentally

01:11:39.970 --> 01:11:46.927
deranged persons. And I think if we
really look at large as very perturbed

01:11:46.960 --> 01:11:53.387
mental scene of our times at so many
people being at a loose end. In my

01:11:53.420 --> 01:11:58.607
opinion, it is the result of the
culture that has been unable to somehow

01:11:58.640 --> 01:12:02.696
group people spiritually that has been
able to provide the nourishment

01:12:02.729 --> 01:12:06.866
which maybe not quantifiable, not
empirical, not physical, but yet all

01:12:06.899 --> 01:12:11.437
important. So we are sick people
because we have a sick culture somehow

01:12:11.470 --> 01:12:17.357
deprived of spirituality and this is a
few comments I want to share with

01:12:17.390 --> 01:12:25.390
you

01:12:26.750 --> 01:12:34.750
right

01:12:36.550 --> 01:12:39.116
to sell.

01:12:39.149 --> 01:12:47.149
Okay,

01:12:58.050 --> 01:13:06.050
well actually plato was already of
this opinion that our our

01:13:08.850 --> 01:13:16.116
and yet although they are all knew
they uh function in the same kind of

01:13:16.149 --> 01:13:21.107
universal way that your nose is for
sneezing your eye for seeing and also

01:13:21.140 --> 01:13:26.317
it is recognizable your nose and your
eyes. Well, I mean whatever they say

01:13:26.350 --> 01:13:34.350
granted that they say it what follows
from it. Okay,

01:13:52.470 --> 01:13:57.756
I think that I don't know and I think
that we don't know and I think that

01:13:57.789 --> 01:14:03.786
whatever arguments have been provided
so far are clearly unsatisfactory. I

01:14:03.819 --> 01:14:10.206
think that I can provide one
significant clue by pointing out that

01:14:10.239 --> 01:14:17.027
many people have suddenly die after
retirement when they retired in full

01:14:17.060 --> 01:14:21.307
strength and suddenly they found that
they have, they had nothing

01:14:21.340 --> 01:14:28.696
significant to do and the whole spirit
has with it also that the number of

01:14:28.729 --> 01:14:33.496
deaths of spouses after one of the
spouses died during the first six

01:14:33.529 --> 01:14:39.416
months is phenomenal. So one can die
of grief, which means again that it

01:14:39.449 --> 01:14:43.267
is not only the nourishment, the
physical aspect, but all other symbolic

01:14:43.300 --> 01:14:47.807
aspects of our interaction with other
human beings that are are important

01:14:47.840 --> 01:14:52.876
beyond that. I think I can speculate
as well as you can, but I think that

01:14:52.909 --> 01:14:58.607
certain coherence and meaning to life
is very necessary to go on. And

01:14:58.640 --> 01:15:02.416
again, another example how much
examples can prove? I don't know. There

01:15:02.449 --> 01:15:10.449
was a famous case of the man who was
blind from birth and gained side

01:15:11.359 --> 01:15:17.906
after an operation at the age of 40
and he was fantastically thrilled and

01:15:17.939 --> 01:15:23.557
really excited at first sure enough,
sometimes he would have to touch

01:15:23.590 --> 01:15:29.996
objects in order to see them. However,
after six months he found that this

01:15:30.029 --> 01:15:35.116
was not so exciting. After nine
months, he found that he was getting

01:15:35.149 --> 01:15:43.149
increasingly board and after 15 months
without any reason he died.

01:15:43.439 --> 01:15:47.687
I know that those examples do not
answer your question and yet in a kind

01:15:47.720 --> 01:15:51.607
of anyway, they made

01:15:51.640 --> 01:15:59.640
you had a question now that

01:16:33.630 --> 01:16:41.137
well look at the stars first, at and
at your navel next while most of the

01:16:41.170 --> 01:16:45.937
time we just do it around and indeed
sometimes and often we never see the

01:16:45.970 --> 01:16:50.107
stars. I think that the problem is
really deep one because I do not

01:16:50.140 --> 01:16:54.666
particularly blame this culture of
this generation for what is happening

01:16:54.699 --> 01:16:59.006
in the States at present is a result
of a long process. It was a

01:16:59.039 --> 01:17:02.637
progressive mechanization of the
cosmos, progressive Instrumental ization

01:17:02.670 --> 01:17:08.206
of the universe through instruments of
power whereby we were supposed to

01:17:08.239 --> 01:17:11.996
gain domination of it all and become
rational. And therefore we didn't

01:17:12.029 --> 01:17:16.336
need any spirit strapping on religion
and art for rationality. Science and

01:17:16.369 --> 01:17:21.677
technology was going to do it all for
us. And this pursuit of power of

01:17:21.710 --> 01:17:26.696
control of manipulation has been
really intoxicating for the european mind

01:17:26.729 --> 01:17:30.597
for at least two centuries. And then
we found that there is a limit to it

01:17:30.630 --> 01:17:34.097
and indeed that there is a kind of
dialectical limit to it. That after we

01:17:34.130 --> 01:17:37.817
have saturated our world with certain
instruments of power, they are big

01:17:37.850 --> 01:17:44.437
firing. And the dream of happiness and
dream of fulfillment by sheer power

01:17:44.470 --> 01:17:50.737
of manipulation isn't really turning
into a nightmare. And therefore the

01:17:50.770 --> 01:17:58.607
processes to or rethink it de novo to
rethink what are myths, what our

01:17:58.640 --> 01:18:03.097
underlying assumptions with our
ideals. And you will have to realize that

01:18:03.130 --> 01:18:06.777
it is because we have emptied our
cosmos of what all other cultures

01:18:06.810 --> 01:18:13.687
assumed to be the case. As Marshal
Selene says in his book,

01:18:13.720 --> 01:18:19.286
culture is a practical,

01:18:19.319 --> 01:18:21.887
whatever it is,

01:18:21.920 --> 01:18:26.187
practical and practical reason, we are
the only people who think that they

01:18:26.220 --> 01:18:34.220
descended from the beast. All others
think they descended from gods.

01:18:34.720 --> 01:18:38.036
I think there is a significant point
to be taken for all other people.

01:18:38.069 --> 01:18:43.166
Think that the universe, the nature is
endowed with the spire beyond

01:18:43.199 --> 01:18:47.717
beyond physical. That it it it it
somehow reverberates with the spiritual

01:18:47.750 --> 01:18:52.706
transcendental power. And we have to
re sacrifice in a sense, the cosmos

01:18:52.739 --> 01:18:57.687
around us in order to find our destiny

01:18:57.720 --> 01:19:01.277
for ourselves and in order to feel
that we are reunited with the stars

01:19:01.310 --> 01:19:04.916
again. And then I think we will have
much less difficulties of finding

01:19:04.949 --> 01:19:10.357
particular goals for for ourselves.
For we find those girls so very

01:19:10.390 --> 01:19:14.446
difficult because our universe is so
very close and and and and and and

01:19:14.479 --> 01:19:19.336
and really, uh we are trapped when we
open our universe. There'll be so

01:19:19.369 --> 01:19:24.036
many causes and and our destiny will
be united with so many other forces

01:19:24.069 --> 01:19:29.987
that you will never really ask those
kinds of questions.

01:19:30.020 --> 01:19:38.020
You wanted to continue

01:19:40.390 --> 01:19:48.390
to treat men and women as she ought to
be and beyond what he or she is.

01:19:50.319 --> 01:19:58.319
Because treating ourselves as we are,
is really

01:19:58.819 --> 01:20:04.006
treating us wrongly not giving enough
scope for for for what we may become.

01:20:04.039 --> 01:20:08.477
 If we really try to reach the stance

01:20:08.510 --> 01:20:16.510
we have just started it. We are just
doing. Mhm Yeah,

01:20:18.109 --> 01:20:25.166
tomorrow morning before I worry about
my problem with my students, with my

01:20:25.199 --> 01:20:33.199
Dean's, with my girlfriends or
whatever look and the beauty of this

01:20:33.909 --> 01:20:38.916
canyon. And we remarked myself how
incredible it is to be able to see how

01:20:38.949 --> 01:20:46.949
incredible it is to interact with
those elements are incredible. It is to

01:20:47.409 --> 01:20:51.956
to perceive and somehow transform
creatively environment. This is on the

01:20:51.989 --> 01:20:57.887
personal level, to really realize the
utter uniqueness of our being in

01:20:57.920 --> 01:21:02.116
this universe and to realize that we
are repository of fantastic endowment

01:21:02.149 --> 01:21:07.536
of life and fantastic endowment of
human genius through generations and

01:21:07.569 --> 01:21:14.576
millennia, which we are often
squandering by changing it into into those

01:21:14.609 --> 01:21:20.626
disposable goods. And then really by
maintaining the dialogue with other

01:21:20.659 --> 01:21:26.706
human beings, not on the level oh our
biological and economic being, but

01:21:26.739 --> 01:21:32.107
on the level of our transcendental
being and on yet another level, by

01:21:32.140 --> 01:21:38.357
trying to reformulate all those dogmas
and assumptions which we make about

01:21:38.390 --> 01:21:42.777
the world and ourselves, often under
the auspices of philosophies that

01:21:42.810 --> 01:21:48.586
serve tried to serve men as his as you
know. For quite a while,

01:21:48.619 --> 01:21:52.536
particularly the sixties, there was a
number of theories justifying our

01:21:52.569 --> 01:21:57.406
greed and our selfishness by alleged
aggressive nature of men. And there

01:21:57.439 --> 01:22:01.006
are many of such books. Now. Suddenly
anthropologists turn around and say

01:22:01.039 --> 01:22:05.987
, well this is really a superficial
reading, reading Leakey who is really

01:22:06.020 --> 01:22:10.477
one of the greatest of anthropologists
by examining the remnants of those

01:22:10.510 --> 01:22:15.546
home avoids some two million years ago
came to the conclusion and

01:22:15.579 --> 01:22:19.977
suggested strongly that, that our
ancestor of 2,000,002 million years ago

01:22:20.010 --> 01:22:24.567
, it was a very gentle and cooperative
creature

01:22:24.600 --> 01:22:31.557
and this theories of aggression is
somehow uh kind of manipulated outcome

01:22:31.590 --> 01:22:36.307
of trying to justify the practice of
our society. And this is one of

01:22:36.340 --> 01:22:40.387
rethinking. And then we don't have to
apologize for wanting to be

01:22:40.420 --> 01:22:43.937
altruistic, for wanting to be
compassionate, for wanting to embrace each

01:22:43.970 --> 01:22:48.687
other, for wanting to reach the stars.
And this, we're thinking it will be

01:22:48.720 --> 01:22:52.696
very important and really tremendously
important so that we find new

01:22:52.729 --> 01:22:56.906
premises and new philosophers that
will justify among other things what we

01:22:56.939 --> 01:23:01.296
are doing here and what we are doing
in weak moments and those things have

01:23:01.329 --> 01:23:09.329
to go on simultaneously. Chris has a
point.

01:23:21.909 --> 01:23:27.567
I think the facts are what I have
already tried to sketch. We

01:23:27.600 --> 01:23:31.946
try to suppress our noble impulses by
thinking that we are foolish and

01:23:31.979 --> 01:23:36.126
romantic and at the same time trying
to somehow develop, which is really

01:23:36.159 --> 01:23:40.527
very much encouraged by schools and
the whole structure of society. Those

01:23:40.560 --> 01:23:45.897
aggressive and competitive instincts.
And by this token, we polarize the

01:23:45.930 --> 01:23:51.826
whole scene. I concede among my
students in the late sixties, early

01:23:51.859 --> 01:23:55.227
seventies, the whole thing somehow
loosened up and they started to evolve

01:23:55.260 --> 01:24:00.017
into alternative modes. After the
economic crunch came they are again

01:24:00.050 --> 01:24:06.376
struggling with each other really hard
to raise their great by one decimal

01:24:06.409 --> 01:24:11.217
point and they are really inflicting
pain on themselves, they are really

01:24:11.250 --> 01:24:15.067
perpetuating the wrong myth that it is
all a matter of objective

01:24:15.100 --> 01:24:19.107
attainment. It's all a matter of
raising a great by decimal point. It's

01:24:19.140 --> 01:24:22.956
all a matter of outdoing each other.
All a matter of knifing really each

01:24:22.989 --> 01:24:27.857
other by saying that I am better than
you are and therefore I cannot do it.

01:24:27.890 --> 01:24:32.246
I think this is the kind of
competitive ladder which capitalist system

01:24:32.279 --> 01:24:36.796
wants to perpetuate for. It is based
on the assumption that you know it is

01:24:36.829 --> 01:24:42.357
a jungle and therefore either you or I
without realizing that this medium

01:24:42.390 --> 01:24:50.057
has proved bankrupt for the system
itself and consequently our

01:24:50.090 --> 01:24:53.746
justification of new philosophies
which put a new light on men and our

01:24:53.779 --> 01:24:57.616
behavior which tried to justify that
it's alright to be gentle. It's

01:24:57.649 --> 01:25:00.557
alright to be loving. It is all right
to be carrying. It's alright to be

01:25:00.590 --> 01:25:05.057
compassionate to each other. That this
is really not something that, that

01:25:05.090 --> 01:25:08.727
only Sissies who cannot make it in the
other world are indulging it. But

01:25:08.760 --> 01:25:13.326
this is in the nature of things that
it is congruent with the order of

01:25:13.359 --> 01:25:18.696
things. It may be congruent with
larger evolution of man, I think

01:25:18.729 --> 01:25:23.637
rethinking those propositions and
rewiring our mind, our assumptions are

01:25:23.670 --> 01:25:28.977
these positions are behavior, it is
tremendously important for so much. So

01:25:29.010 --> 01:25:32.927
we feel so many of us so good here
because we do not have to be on the

01:25:32.960 --> 01:25:36.967
defensive, we do not have to fight, we
do not have to compete. However,

01:25:37.000 --> 01:25:41.826
once we leave here we put the chute on
and struggle again. And I think

01:25:41.859 --> 01:25:46.656
that this schizophrenic spirit doesn't
have to be that what we are trying

01:25:46.689 --> 01:25:52.147
to do here and in other communities is
much more universal than this keen

01:25:52.180 --> 01:25:57.956
competitive uh aggressive behavior,
which is really an invention of the

01:25:57.989 --> 01:26:04.946
last year's, the invention of free uh

01:26:04.979 --> 01:26:09.737
capitalist economic, free, free
enterprise system, which can be traced not

01:26:09.770 --> 01:26:15.616
to any laws of nature, but specific
pieces of legislation. Within 18th and

01:26:15.649 --> 01:26:20.546
19th century England, we have
historically invented certain institutions

01:26:20.579 --> 01:26:25.217
which we have imposed on society and
then try to evolve various ideologies

01:26:25.250 --> 01:26:28.637
and philosophies justify them and then
subverted the entire system of

01:26:28.670 --> 01:26:33.057
education and subverted and somehow
brainwashed all our students ourselves

01:26:33.090 --> 01:26:36.256
including your professors because they
are there chief villains and main

01:26:36.289 --> 01:26:40.996
enemies. They have really screwed up
your education. And then then then

01:26:41.029 --> 01:26:44.206
you're thinking in your perception and
then we are complaining that things

01:26:44.239 --> 01:26:48.256
are not working. And then we have to
read with the whole thing and then

01:26:48.289 --> 01:26:54.656
start with new assumptions. Again, I'm
not giving you any easy road to

01:26:54.689 --> 01:26:59.416
truth or normal stars. The road to
truth is always thorny and a road to

01:26:59.449 --> 01:27:03.977
studies impossible. But you have to
follow it or to summarize what I'm

01:27:04.010 --> 01:27:12.010
really saying by words of world uh

01:27:13.979 --> 01:27:16.246
no

01:27:16.279 --> 01:27:24.279
what has been Yeah, go on.

01:27:45.880 --> 01:27:51.246
Mhm

01:27:51.279 --> 01:27:55.456
Well this cosmos is so vast because we
have evolved the whole system of

01:27:55.489 --> 01:28:00.086
education supporting wrong mitts and
I've spent a number of years being

01:28:00.119 --> 01:28:04.057
educated or being brainwashed by
philosophers and I can see how philosophy

01:28:04.090 --> 01:28:09.437
departments operate. The best ones are
the worst in a sense because they

01:28:09.470 --> 01:28:14.336
really carry on this, this this gospel
of objectivity of analytical

01:28:14.369 --> 01:28:19.147
detachment, of cutting all
propositions to the extreme and to to be really

01:28:19.180 --> 01:28:23.836
best in their trade. Is to forget that
you are, you have a heart, you have

01:28:23.869 --> 01:28:29.137
feelings, you have guts, you are an
abstract brain and your great

01:28:29.170 --> 01:28:33.866
achievement is to be able to I'll do
your masters in analyzing

01:28:33.899 --> 01:28:38.687
propositions with ever new scrutiny.
And as a result there is a very

01:28:38.720 --> 01:28:44.126
curious kind of mind that comes and
this kind of mind will go to educate

01:28:44.159 --> 01:28:48.777
other kinds of minds. It is really
kind of ruthless analytical scrutiny

01:28:48.810 --> 01:28:50.847
which

01:28:50.880 --> 01:28:55.586
impinges on the entire being of
persons. And this is you know, only in the

01:28:55.619 --> 01:29:00.217
field I know best, but the same kind
of scrutiny goes all the time. So we

01:29:00.250 --> 01:29:03.737
should not think that the

01:29:03.770 --> 01:29:07.437
reversal will be easy for, for we are
up against the whole system of

01:29:07.470 --> 01:29:12.406
education which is the entire culture
that has brainwash itself and now

01:29:12.439 --> 01:29:16.706
wants to perpetuate itself for no
institution really relinquish is it its

01:29:16.739 --> 01:29:21.866
power even if it knows that it is
bankrupt without trying to drag

01:29:21.899 --> 01:29:28.237
everything with it, fortunately
enough, there is enough alternative end

01:29:28.270 --> 01:29:32.946
craves. But the battle is really in
your minds and your hearts and I think

01:29:32.979 --> 01:29:38.036
that uh by this token uh tension, it
is right, that is a revolutionary.

01:29:38.069 --> 01:29:43.746
But there is no way that you can
really have a ready made alternative

01:29:43.779 --> 01:29:49.576
world for you. For as I was starting
to say, Old Whitman, no, I nor anyone

01:29:49.609 --> 01:29:54.446
else can travel that road for you, you
must travel it yourself. However,

01:29:54.479 --> 01:29:58.897
if there is enough of us that want to
travel this alternative road, by the

01:29:58.930 --> 01:30:05.807
courage and determination will be able
to get others because other other

01:30:05.840 --> 01:30:10.637
paradigm is rolling on with great
force, but people are not happy in being

01:30:10.670 --> 01:30:15.616
in it. I think that this is one of the
remarkable sign of our times that

01:30:15.649 --> 01:30:20.246
although we are the most affluent of
all societies, we are one of the most

01:30:20.279 --> 01:30:25.336
miserable and unhappy of all
societies, for we have proved beyond any

01:30:25.369 --> 01:30:29.597
reasonable Now that affluence doesn't
provide happiness, that the

01:30:29.630 --> 01:30:35.706
consumption of energy is not a quality
of life. And consequently people,

01:30:35.739 --> 01:30:40.456
even even in a nice suburbia are
looking for for alternatives and it will

01:30:40.489 --> 01:30:46.206
be up to you to to show them how to
live an alternative life. And with it

01:30:46.239 --> 01:30:51.307
evolved alternative assumptions. My
bit is to try to underlies for you and

01:30:51.340 --> 01:30:56.826
others and myself how really

01:30:56.859 --> 01:31:01.996
contingent that is not necessary. How
really coincidental are the

01:31:02.029 --> 01:31:06.847
assumptions on which our civilization
and culture rests all the invention

01:31:06.880 --> 01:31:13.217
of men of genius, admittedly of the
17th, 18th and 19th century, they have

01:31:13.250 --> 01:31:17.767
resolved the whole universe we thought
at first for for good for for

01:31:17.800 --> 01:31:21.006
benefit of us all actually the dreams
were too narrow and they are big

01:31:21.039 --> 01:31:28.076
firing. But they show that the whole
heritage of a culture can be ridden

01:31:28.109 --> 01:31:33.046
because the heritage of medieval
culture was really great and they turn it

01:31:33.079 --> 01:31:38.156
around by their genius. But we now
know that that it was really share kind

01:31:38.189 --> 01:31:44.017
of imagination power that they imposed
on us and now it is up to our share

01:31:44.050 --> 01:31:49.796
imagination power ingenious to turn
around again the scene and again as I

01:31:49.829 --> 01:31:55.506
said, Tree start treating ourselves as
we ought to be. Not as we are.

01:31:55.539 --> 01:32:03.539
Let's go and gaze at the stars.

01:32:04.760 --> 01:32:10.237
Yeah, yeah. I didn't know that master
salary was here. Otherwise I would

01:32:10.270 --> 01:32:18.137
not have finished without asking him
to say the final word, basically

01:32:18.170 --> 01:32:23.560
the syndrome of the decade,
civilization being busy. Okay.