While the US Flounders, the Globe Steps Up

“Even now, as we dream of embedding artificial intelligence into every surface of our lives… we’re making a bad copy of the Earth… and destroying the original.”

– Claire Evans in “Beyond Smart Rocks” in Grow

In the 80s, “appropriate technology” was a buzzword. In Africa, I met Canadians who talked about transferring appropriate technology from the first world to the third, but who didn’t seem to be doing it. The good news is that while US technology becomes less and less appropriate to the needs of a living future, other polities are moving forward with problem-solving for restoration. For example, Saudi Arabia and its long-desertified neighbors are developing technologies that appropriately serve humans—rather than the other way around..

Before COVID-19, Permaculture magazine featured the revival of Bedouin terrace-forming with the planting of heat-tolerant trees. In Africa, plans for stemming expansion of the Sahel and Sahara are literally gaining ground for locals via the African Union’s Great Green Wall which Senegal, Burkina Faso, and Niger have been evolving. This raises the possibility that long-dead habitats may bypass the modern race to the bottom—going directly from destructive indigenous care to restorative care. The creation of a new world wonder that contributes to a living future for sapiens can inspire all of us.

In the United Arab Emirates, the appropriate technology of nanoclay has come to market for restoration of sandy soils, after 15 years of development that shows it reducing water use, promoting local customization and production, and potentially transforming depleted soil into farm soil. Other technologies may restore the 20-60% loss of carbon; biochar, the result of ‘burning’ without oxygen, and vermiculite promote water retention with cultivation, while others replenish soils in cemeteries (the Living Cocoon or mushroom death suit).

While Indonesia explores life-positive ways for tropical peatland restoration to “be wet, vegetated, and generate income,” constructive critics of the IT juggernaut that is depleting world sands and minerals apace are recognizing the computing potential of biological systems like slime molds and fungi. Such ingenuity is flourishing at the Unconventional Computing Lab in the west of England, and may avert James Bridle’s scenario of a New Dark Age—if we remember to use knowledge and wisdom, rather than assume that models can lead us to a living future.