COUNT THE COWS - THERE WERE 17 AT THE TIME
THIS PHOTO WAS TAKEN
Farmers have made a living raising cattle for more that 5 millenia. That's long time. My very own ancestors raised cattle for over one thousand years in the hills of Devonshire, England. Many of my cousins are raising cattle now. So raising cattle is not essentially wrong, but raising a vastly scaled up number of cattle in an unsuitable environment just may be.
The same is true of architecture and designs of human habitats. I enjoy visits to Prince Charle's project in Poundbury in Dorset, near where Thomas Hardy wrote situated his Mayor of Casterbridge, the world's most depressing book. Don't read it. You will be depressed for years, if you don't commit suicide earlier! Nevertheless, there is something very positive about Poundbury and the wonderful variety of homes to be found there.
However, when I looked more closely at the building of the homes, I was somewhat disappointed. You have to go and look for yourself. Architects can get away with inferior work if they are not kept on their toes, even at the Royal Dutchy.
Paola Antonelli, featured in SEED magazine's April 2008, edition, is a reader of fractal architecture. Wow! An observation of Mandelbrot, also featured in the magazine, is that most of modern architecture is cheap with buildings that are absolutely abominable. Hear! Hear!
In fact, my observation, be it very humble, is that the addiction of much architecture to Roman design is at the source of Western Civilizations direction towards total annihilation of the human race. Yes, the Romans planted seed in the Western mind that are leading it to self destruct and carry the world down with it. OK! Enough! My mind is built to see long term trends and tendencies in history, and my emotions sense something is very wrong with linear architecture. That is why I think fresh minds such as those of Paola Antonelli are a wonderful gift to global creation of a better environment. Is she the Buckminster Fuller of the modern age? I don't know. But, she is very refreshing. Now if she and Charles Windsor could get together and help old Poundbury out, what a wonderful range of possibilities could follow!
If you want to see a real village as it could be then visit Maiden Castle nearby and study the local hill forts and round home non-linear communities that existed in 50 AD, the period of my Wuh Lax book series. We still have a lot to learn from my early British ancestors who lived before the arrival of those damn Roman conquerors.
