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Cyanobacterial Photobioreactor
Forms for a new modality of living
Pittsburgh, PA
Marantha Dawkins
Fall 2019
In collaboration with Max Stropkay and Yashwitha Reddy
When we inevitably blow past a 1.5 degree rise in global temperature by 2052 our world will be beyond recovery. The heightened levels of carbon dioxide will cause us to seek alternative ways of survival as the technocratic methods we have long relied upon only further the problem. The climate has shifted too quickly for our agricultural stock to keep up, plant varieties are quickly going extinct as they cannot survive under these novel, harsh conditions. Our resource consumption increases with no end in sight. Earth Overshoot Day becomes just that - a single day into the new year and we have already used up that years worth of regenerative resources.
In this new U Distopia we must seek new methodologies for survival. No human, no animal, can exist on its own. The conventional boundaries of the anthropogenic nuclear family are discarded, and we must seek new ways of coexisting with eachother and with the world.
We must specialize and seek out others who are complimentary. Groups form, collectives who augment each other in order to survive in this cruel atmosphere. Eventually this becomes commonplance, we adapt as we always do. Life goes on, and so does society - but never in the same way. We are now less heartless. It seems innately understood that we cannot survive alone, that we must look out for our fellow man, and our host world and its many other inhabitants.
The roles become classes, and the tools become fashion. Status symbols and character traits represented in physical symbiosis with an organism we have leAarned to treasure and cultivate. Those that are skilled, or birthed with the right predespositions, are able to perform all three roles on their own. Will we shift back to an individualistic society? Hopefully not.
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Marantha Dawkins
Fall 2019
In collaboration with Max Stropkay and Yashwitha Reddy
When we inevitably blow past a 1.5 degree rise in global temperature by 2052 our world will be beyond recovery. The heightened levels of carbon dioxide will cause us to seek alternative ways of survival as the technocratic methods we have long relied upon only further the problem. The climate has shifted too quickly for our agricultural stock to keep up, plant varieties are quickly going extinct as they cannot survive under these novel, harsh conditions. Our resource consumption increases with no end in sight. Earth Overshoot Day becomes just that - a single day into the new year and we have already used up that years worth of regenerative resources.
In this new U Distopia we must seek new methodologies for survival. No human, no animal, can exist on its own. The conventional boundaries of the anthropogenic nuclear family are discarded, and we must seek new ways of coexisting with eachother and with the world.
We must specialize and seek out others who are complimentary. Groups form, collectives who augment each other in order to survive in this cruel atmosphere. Eventually this becomes commonplance, we adapt as we always do. Life goes on, and so does society - but never in the same way. We are now less heartless. It seems innately understood that we cannot survive alone, that we must look out for our fellow man, and our host world and its many other inhabitants.
The roles become classes, and the tools become fashion. Status symbols and character traits represented in physical symbiosis with an organism we have leAarned to treasure and cultivate. Those that are skilled, or birthed with the right predespositions, are able to perform all three roles on their own. Will we shift back to an individualistic society? Hopefully not.
