Draft: fabfoundation.org/global-community/
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Helping Nature Heal
Read free. “Righting wrongs is inherently ennobling, and in the process, these restorationists are discovering how to live lives that are more connected and rewarding. Their stories display the sense of accomplishment that can come when we align our actions with forces larger than ourselves. I hope their examples serve as an invitation for you to join in and get your own hands dirty.”
Sustainability through Natural Cooling
“Traditional buildings were designed according to the microclimate of the specific region because heat and cold control the thermal comfort in the houses and this different from one place to another. The natural technologies applied in these buildings have sustained human life for many decades and are purely for heating or cooling purpose. Examples of these techniques are fire chimneys, courtyards, wind towers and mashrabiya (Noble, 2007). In hot-dry and warm humid zones such as Middle East and North Africa where cooling is more important than heating, ventilation tunnel, wind tower, wind catcher, wind sail, maziara and courtyard are used to achieve thermal comfort.”
Soft-Tech
Read free. “As for the book’s title, ‘Soft Tech’ is a term we’ve used and defended since the late sixties. It first emerged in Great Britain but then dropped out of fashion to be replaced by Alternative Technology (AT) and Appropriate Technology (AT)…. ‘Soft’ signifies that something is alive, resilient, adaptive, maybe even lovable….”
10 Years of CoEvolution Quarterly
Read free. “…[T]hemes got early notice in CQ before becoming prominent elsewhere. The Gaia hypothesis. Voluntary simplicity. Arguments against metric conversion. Personal computers. The resurgence of the antiwar movement. The flat tax. Critical evaluation of magazines. The effects of chemicals on the human gene pool. Most importantly, COEVOLUTION published a lot of material—essays, reporting, and story-telling—that will endure as “news that stays news,” to quote Ezra Pound’s definition of literature. Hence this book—a collection, in one place, of what we think is the most lasting work COEVOLUTION published.”
Whole Earth Catalog
Read free. “We are as gods and might as well get used to it. So far, remotely done power and glory-as via government, big business, formal education, church has succeeded to the point where gross obscure actual gains. In response to this dilemma and to these gains a realm of intimate, personal power is developing-power of the individual to conduct his own education, find his own inspiration, shape his own environment, and share his adventure with whoever is interested. Tools that aid this process are sought and promoted by the WHOLE EARTH CATALOG.”
Big Rock Candy Mountain
Read free. “A Learning to Learn Catalog… Everything we learn is only real to the degree that it contributes to what we are. Direct knowledge of ourselves, the reality of the world we live in, and the facilitation of our inner growth and change are the ultimate goals of education.”
The Complete Book of Self-Sufficiency
Read free. “Self-sufficiency does not mean “going back” to the acceptance of a lower standard of living. On the contrary, it is the striving for a higher standard of living, for food which is fresh and organically-grown and good, for the good life in pleasant surroundings, for the health of body and peace of mind which come with hard varied work in the open air, and for the satisfaction that comes from doing difficult and intricate jobs well and successfully.”
Future Is Now
Read free. “What do the facts of precognition mean? Do they point to any particular view regarding the nature of the universe? How can the Future exist Now? In the light of these facts, how must we regard the law of cause and effect? What significance has precognition for living? Are our lives predestined or free? These and many other questions crowd upon the mind, for it is clear that we are face to face with data of crucial importance. I have tried not to shirk the issues, and have drawn certain conclusions regarding the nature of Reality and what they involve for our personal daily living.”
How to Build Healthy Community Economies
Read free. This guide explores strategies to create resilient, self-directed local economies. Greco challenges the centralized, debt-based monetary system and promotes community-controlled alternatives such as mutual credit systems and local currencies.
Instead of Education
Read free. “This is a book about people doing things, and doing them better; about the conditions under which we may be able to do things better; about some of the ways in which, given those conditions, other people may be able to help us (or we them) to do things better; and about the reasons why these conditions do not exist and cannot be made to exist within compulsory, coercive, competitive schools.”
Where There Is No Dentist
Read free. “Where There Is No Dentist is a book about what people can do for themselves and each other to care for their gums and teeth. Just as with the rest of health care, there is a strong need to ‘deprofessionalize’ dentistry—to provide ordinary people and community workers with more skills to prevent and cure problems in the mouth.”
Community Building
Read free. “Conditions for Establishing Interpersonal Relationship that Builds Up Community: To build up a community one must be (1) sensitive, (2) open, (3) sharing (receiving and giving), (4) one must call others into existence, and (5) love, (6) in an atmosphere of freedom, confidence and understanding.”
A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction
Read free. “In this book, we present one possible pattern language, of the kind called for in The Timeless Way. This language is extremely practical. It is a language that we have distilled from our own building and planning efforts over the last eight years. You can use it to work with your neighbors, to improve your town and neighborhood. You can use it to design a house for yourself, with your family; or to work with other people to design an office or a workshop or a public building like a school. And you can use it to guide you in the actual process of construction.”
Environmental Design Science Primer
Read free. Environmental Design Science Primer, by Howard Brown, Robert Cook, and Medard Gabel, undated. From the Foreword: “In order to have a significant effect on vital environmental and social issues, people need to acquire the skills that will allow them to act as planners and participants, rather than as spectators in the defining and solving of problems….”
Designing Earth Anew Together
Read free. Designing Earth Anew Together is a proposal for creating large-scale social and ecological change through collaborative global planning. Jan Hearthstone argues that humanity must move beyond isolated efforts and develop tools for co-designing solutions to today’s crises — including climate change, war, inequality, and environmental degradation.
Farmers of Forty Centuries
Read free. Farmers of Forty Centuries; or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea, and Japan is an early 20th-century work by American agronomist F.H. King. It documents his 1909 journey through East Asia, where he studied how densely populated nations managed to sustain agricultural fertility for over 4,000 years.