Re: RFI: Acropolis City/State Concept

From: Anders Sandberg (asa@nada.kth.se)
Date: Tue Sep 15 1998 - 14:19:35 MDT


"Bryan Moss" <bryan.moss@dial.pipex.com> writes:

> Anders Sandberg wrote:
>
> > Arcology is a termed coined by Italian architect
> > Paolo Soleri in 1959 to describe the concept of
> > Architecture and Ecology working as an integral
> > system.
>
> Is it me or is Mr. Soleri a certified "nut"?

Who is accredited to certify nuts? And are nuts ISO 14000 compliant? :-)

Soleri's writings strike me as rather typical of architects: lots of
vague, artsy neologisms, with some quite realistic ideas mixed in with
social speculations. Hardly enough to put him in the nut category. One
might disagree with his ideas, but they are not entirely out of the
window.

> And,
> if not, could someone explain to me what religion
> and "Omega seeds" have to do with Architecture.

I have the impression that Soleri is 1) very interested in creating
working, sustainable communities, and this is of course related to
religion in the sense of community-building. He seems to quite happily
borrow useful ideas from religion, such as how to make austerity into
something positive. 2) he is in some sense a follower of Teilhard de
Chardin (and maybe Tipler, even if I don't know if he have read him)
in the sense that he thinks life will evolve to higher stages, and
that space colonization is something ethically good and necessary.

I would put him on the mystical side of transhumanism; not quite a
transhumanist, but with several points in common.

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Anders Sandberg                                      Towards Ascension!
asa@nada.kth.se                            http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/
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