The Earth has been severely degraded, to the point that it will no longer support our population. You and your team must design a spaceship capable of making a 6,000 year voyage, carrying everyone that you care about, and bringing their descendants back to Earth safe and happy. Propulsion and construction are already taken care of, so you don’t have to figure out how to move the vessel or construct the hull. What you do have to deal with are the life support systems (including oxygen, food, water, energy and waste) and the social systems (including governance, recreation and entertainment). The ship can be as large as you want. The only thing you can take is sunlight and the only thing you can exhaust is heat. Everything must be done using existing technology – no assuming the development of cryogenics, cold fusion or dylithium crystals.

If we recognise not only the problems, but also the solutions, why don’t we create a just, secure and sustainable world?

Let’s blame someone else Government Corporations Political, Structural, Economic Roadblocks BUT …..

Real Roadblocks …. Mental Cultural Educational Belief underlies behaviour and all of the things we do or don’t are shaped by the ideas we hold about the world works - by our world view.

Dominant Worldview Constant and unlimited growth is not only possible, but essential Humans have dominion over the Earth Nature is income – resources are free because we ‘found them’ If we destroy our environment, we can simply move west or invent some new technology to save us We can understand the natural world through reductionism, by breaking it down into small parts

This is an open-system view - A world without limits: Unlimited land, unlimited resources, unlimited human knowledge and wisdom The only biological model for unlimited growth is a cancer cell

What can we do? “We can’t solve our problems by using the same level of thinking we used to create them.” »Albert Einstein

Thinking in Systems A system is a collection of parts that interact to function as a whole and continually affect each other over time. Systems are not only interconnected, they are coherently organised around some purpose.

Three Blind Men and the Elephant

Three Blind Men and an Elephant

Examples of Systems Heating System Political System Monetary System Legal System Circulatory System Life-support System Rugby Team Ecosystem

Systems also have emergent properties not found in their separate parts. When the parts are organised into a system, they create new properties, characteristics and behaviours.

* Mechanistic Thinking sees - Parts Objects Events Isolation Specificity Statics Simplicity Systems Thinking sees - Wholes Relationships Structures Interdependence Generality Dynamics Complexity

System An assemblage of parts or components connected together in an organised way »J. Bieshon (1971). Systems, Open University An assemblage of parts and their relationship forming a functioning entirety or whole. »IB Environmental Systems Subject Guide