There’s admittedly a certain element of backward-looking nostalgia to much of our Save Our Shrines project: saving dying towns; protecting churches that have lost their congregants; highlighting traditional crafts that can be replaced by modern machine methods.
But we’re also deeply interested in the future, and in particular the future of towns and cities. We believe humans thrive in community. A town designed to facilitate community will therefore create a habitat for humans to thrive.
We also believe that in the long run, beautiful, well-designed places will consistently outperform ugly ones from an economic perspective.
And flowing from that, we feel that much of our current built landscape in the United States is… not conducive to human flourishing.
Silicon Valley prophet Jared Lanier put it well in an interview with Maureen Dowd:
“[The world Silicon Valley has built is] also a physically uglier place than I thought it would be. It’s really a shame. If we’re the new Renaissance, why don’t we make this amazing Tuscany here? We have these gorgeous orchards. Why don’t we do something beautiful here instead of just filling it up with parking lots and horrible buildings?”
Why not “do something beautiful here” indeed?
This newsletter will therefore feature some of the dreamers, thinkers, and doers advocating for more human-centered approach to city and town development and beautification.
In Part I of “Save Our Cities,” we examine two vastly different philosophies that start from very different premises but reach similar conclusions about the need for more human-centered built development.
We fear, however, that the different premises will get in the way of the adherents of these philosophies working together cooperatively, so in Part II we highlight a science-based concept called biophilic design that is “philosophy neutral” and could therefore serve as a common ground for all proponents for more beautiful, human-centered and environmentally conscious art and architecture.
The Philosophers
While there is a wide range of philosophical views on the topic, Part I summarizes the views of an extreme traditionalist outlook and an extreme progressive/socialist perspective, simply to show that despite vastly different premises, even these different philosophies overlap in their assessment that the modern world is not optimized for human flourishing or for conservation of the environment.
One traditionalist/conservative argument could have as its motto Dostoevsky’s quote that “Beauty will save the world.” This line of thought – let’s call it “Traditionalist Catholic” – is seen everywhere from Pope Francis’s Laudato Si encyclical to Dorothy Day’s teachings to the writings of St Francis. It hearkens back to medieval Catholic arguments about the transcendental attributes of the divine which were traditionally listed as Unity, Truth, Goodness, and Beauty.
If Beauty is an attribute of the Divine, some conservatives seem to argue, then the lack of beauty is a sign of godlessness.
If this axiom is accepted as a premise, the conclusions flow naturally – modern rejection of religion and God in the Enlightenment led naturally to a rejection of one of God’s attributes: beauty.
The results of that rejection of beauty are all around us, and therefore a renewal of beauty will first require a renewal of belief in God and perhaps even a renewal of the Christian theology surrounding that belief.
As noted in the Lanier interview – Tuscany and the Italian Renaissance are still modern signifiers for beauty – and some conservatives would argue that a sine qua non of creating modern “Tuscanies” would require acceptance of Catholic political philosophy as exemplified in the Allegory of Good and Bad Government series of frescos in the Siena City Hall.
[It is extremely important to note that this “Catholic” philosophy differs from “far right” celebration of European architecture as somehow superior simply because it is from Europe, i.e. comes from a “white civilization.” Nothing could be more detrimental for the revival of beauty in our culture than to lay claim to beautiful architecture as a specific racial inheritance, as a document circulated by far-right members of the US Congress did when it called for “infrastructure that reflects the architectural, engineering and aesthetic value that befits the progeny of European architecture.” First of all, the word “progeny” makes no sense in that sentence, but more importantly, beauty in the Catholic tradition is by definition a universal attribute, not one confined to one culture or race. OK – rant over.]
Progressives, on the other hand, reject the theological premises listed above, but arrive at some of the same conclusions as do traditionalists.
An excellent overview of progressive socialist critique of the modern built environment is in the February 2016 edition of Yes! Magazine. While building from socialist premises, it reaches conclusions that would not be out of place in many traditionalist wish-lists:
Diversity results in symbiosis, which is necessary for life
Nature has its own design principles which should be followed for human flourishing
Balance is the key to a harmonious ecosystem
Society should be a fractal organization: the small should reflect the large and vice versa
Society should incorporate the life cycle needs of humans and the planet, i.e. not just be focused on youth culture or become a gerontocracy
Subsidiarity means decision-making should occur at the lowest possible levels
Some ideas, like subsidiarity, come straight out of traditional Catholic social doctrine:
Here’s Yes! Magazine: “Governance would be transformed with local, regional, and global decisions made at the levels where their effects are felt most (known as subsidiarity).”
And here’s Pope Pius XI in the papal encyclical Quadragesimo Anno: “a community of a higher order should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions, but rather should support it in case of need and help to co- ordinate its activity with the activities of the rest of society, always with a view to the common good."
Humans being humans, it’s likely that some people will fixate on the premises that divide these philosophies rather than the conclusions that unite them. Which would be unfortunate, because shifting the paradigms of current urban design will require as many allies as possible.
We’ll leave this quote here without showing attribution to either traditionalists or progressives, simply to drive home the point that either group could plausibly have said it:
“Cities would be redesigned with community gardens on every available piece of land, essential services within a 20-minute walk, and cars banned from city centers. The local community would be the basic building block of society, with face-to-face interaction regaining ascendance as a crucial part of human flourishing.”
All that to say: we believe in the end goal of both philosophical traditions – making our towns and cities more conducive to human flourishing. If we can focus on goals and not obsess over philosophical differences, great things are possible.
To that end, we propose some potential common ground in Part II.