Pando Populus: Challenging Industrial Assumptions with Ecological Alternatives

I’m conference-weary… and wary. But I’m not about to miss Pando Populus, June 4-7. Maybe I’ll see you there. First of all there’s the name—Pando Populus! I said, “What?” But when I read about it, I thought, “Very clever! What a wonderful ecological symbol for how our species needs to live!” It was chosen for this conference because it is the oldest (80,000 yrs) and largest (100 acres) living organism on the planet. It appears to be a vast grove of individual aspen trees above ground. But underground it’s a vast, integrated system of life. Get the symbolism? Whereas industrial civilization puts us all into 7 billion separate units, in an ecological way of arranging society we are interconnected with all of Nature like Pando Populus. We’ll rethink how to live from an ecological perspective. And that really excites me!

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