Part 1: The Descent into Theory
Moderator: Thank you for coming, I will now reveal to you the topic you will be discussing today. The question is: What is the correct form of architecture?
THE PROPHET: You bring us here today for this? You know that neither of us are architects. Certainly, we’ve seen buildings and lived in them, but this does not give us room to speak on their construction. Our debate will be nonsense.
The Prince: I agree with this fool on little. His petty talk of impossible revolution overturning the reality of power. But I agree with him on this. Architecture is not the issue either of us came to speak on, and we can submit little valid opinion on this.
Moderator: Nevertheless, that is the question it has been decided will be put before you. The one thought to reveal the most about your views on human life.
THE PROPHET: I will speak on any issue to which I am able: politics, morality, economics, or philosophy. But architecture? I would speak of aesthetics, but the technicalities of a building are beyond me. It is foolish to even pursue this topic. I’m afraid, dear Moderator, if this is all you have to offer, then I must be on my way. There are many real issues that require my voice, especially in this world today.
The Prince: and on this I will not be far behind him. You waste our time dear moderator.
The two speakers begin to walk out of the room. The moderator raises a hand and the air quivers. He closes his fist and the doors to the hall slam shut. When he next speaks his voice is layered full of force.
Moderator: return to the podiums. I compel you to speak. What is the correct form of architecture? What are the virtues and purposes of a building?
The Virtues and Purposes of a Building
The Prince: Fine, petty moderator. I will speak as you command if only so you do not see fit to do some violence to my person. I posit the purpose of the building is to be a distinct place in which to conduct human life. It’s virtues include the keeping out of the elements and the wild, the functionality of the space for human purposes and the beauty of the building itself inside and out.
THE PROPHET: Quite humorous that we may indeed have a debate on our hands then. I agree a building must keep off the elements: I would rather not be rained on in my own house. But I disagree that the wilds must be kept off. The building should be in as much harmony with nature as possible. It is a place, but not a distinct one. It is functional and beautiful, but both of these rely on the creation of a bare minimum separation between the house and the world. The function of a house relies on its incorporation of nature, and its beauty is in the way it interacts with the natural world. The only acceptable reason for a house to make a separation from nature is for the purposes of reasonable human comfort, structural integrity, or bare-minimum functionality.
The Prince: look at this hippie. So full of love and affection for trees and squirrels. He would have us practically go out among them and bed in the forest once more. The separation of the house and the world is a monument to human achievement: the first indication that we had risen above. As an extension of this, we clean our homes of dirt. As an extension of this, we organize our spaces exquisitely and take control of them. The house is the antithesis of the old human, the wild human, the one who was killed in the forest by the wolf. The house is the stuff of the human as master, the one who hunts the wolf, the one who has risen above hunting to farming and manufacture. It is righteous to separate ourselves from nature. It is progress. It is the essence of who we are. Through our effort and cunning, the human race has elevated ourselves to godhood in relation to this world, and the house is the perfect representation. It is in the spirit of the house that we battle diseases and aging, that we transform minerals into phones, and that we may bring food to all the hungry.
THE PROPHET: But it is this very spirit of superiority, separation, and godhood-approaching apotheosis that will damn us. We are beings of nature. It is foolish to wish to change that. Tell me you do not feel better walking through a grove than a concrete tunnel? Do you not enjoy a flower as much as great work of art? This whole spirit of dominance leads us to over-infringe on nature, destroying all that was there so that we can build anew unnecessarily. The work of our hands and minds is always inferior to what nature crafts. Flowers are a perfection, but we seek to replace them with sidewalks and ugly rectangular buildings. Trees likewise, we shave and turn into telephone polls. We paint the wood in our houses, hiding its beauty. Firm walls instead of beautiful views. Hard pavement and crops replace grasslands and forest. In fact, it is this way of thinking that is at the heart of that greatest threat: climate change. Since we see nature as having no value we easily destroy it in favor of other values. All the while ignoring its pivotal role in the extension of our lives. This is especially enforced by our desire to shut nature out of our lives and ignore our connection to it, as embodied in the style of architecture that only shows us what is rigid and man made and hides from us all that is natural. Further, this plunder of the natural world destroys the very system that replenishes the raw materials that create the man made, putting us in a situation where our overproduction will one day cost us our whole way of life. If we cannot learn to have harmony with nature through architecture, we will never see the damage we are wreaking in other spheres.
The Prince: Can it really be as bad as all that? To build a wall? To build roads to facilitate our transport? How else would we move? What of our offices and hospitals: buildings of maximal efficiency designed to live out their purpose in the most efficient manner with the least possible amount of space taken up? Surely these classify as reducing our impact on the world. What next? do you deny people their privacy? Do you deny them their houses and crowd them into apartments small as prison cells to avoid waste and environmental impact? We have done much to acknowledge the pleasantness of nature: we build and maintain parks and gardens, lawns and trees. We keep zoos for animals and protect the endangered. Even climate change is a question of emissions, not a question of city design. We must solve it by building better technology, not by fundamentally altering the way we live.
THE PROPHET: climate change is everything relating man and nature. The seas and rivers clog with plastic, and the sun scorches this land, but we worry only about emissions and the changing temperatures: the bare minimum commitment for our survival. We worry not about extinctions, over-fishing, or the depleting of fresh water. Only the most existential things draw our attention. Yet we ignore that all of this comes from the same source: a human culture that has pitted itself against nature and seeks only for its own fulfillment no matter the cost. I deny people nothing, but I ask that they change their way of looking at the world. I do not force them, but instead I seek for them to want what is best of their own accord. For really there is only one thing that is best, and it is simply a process of realization that I may aid but not create.
Do not even start me on the blight to our world that is transportation. Under the yoke of the car, every building—even those you claim to be so efficient—must submit to its footprint expanding many times over due to vast and useless parking lots. It is such a blight that you can no longer walk anywhere outside of a city: the distances are too expansive. Our spaces also clog with moving cars, a menace to all. They fill our streets, pushing real humans to the side in favor of empty space and metal. They are also the cause of numerous accidents that kill thousands every year. Truly, the car is a senseless invention that not only harms us and our world, but is ultimately unnecessary. Behold the wonder that is public transportation: safer, more efficient, and even faster when properly executed. A single engine carries fifty people, instead of lugging one and several tons of useless metal. Trained drivers and rails mean less accidents: not every idiot is given a several ton weapon. It is only because car manufacturers are intent on gutting public transportation for their own gain that it remains lackluster in many places; car users are apathetic. A bus that comes every hour is not the wonder of public transportation, neither is a stymied railcar or an incomplete subway. Much like the car, resources must be invested for it to have a chance to be worthwhile, but be assured that unlike the car, public transportation is thoroughly worthwhile once invested in. Outside of rural life, the automobile simply holds us back.
Finally, let me admonish an overdependence on technology. Do not sit and magically hope that technology will bring a way out of our predicament. Carbon capture, clean energy, and the reduction of emissions may be able to save us from climate change. If luck and genius is thoroughly on our side. But know that you may not like the world that these technologies bring: the social fabric they construct will not be predictable, nor will it be of your making. Technology will force changes upon us before we have any opportunity to make them. Seeking to change our lifestyle itself is a way of escaping this potential oppression, and of assuring our freedom and agency. If we can evaluate and change our lifestyle to push the world towards a better future, we maintain our agency in deciding what the fabric our lives looks like. In this way, a critical approach to change can be a form of conservativism, whereas a desperate fear of social upheaval combined with a faith that technology can save us from both climate change and social change will only lead to an unpredictable future where nothing is guaranteed to be conserved.
Moderator: I believe we have strayed: may I remind you of the question: “what are the virtues and the purposes of a building?”
The Prince: of course. Tell, me prophet, if you are so intent, what does a good building look like in your eyes?
THE PROPHET: The primary virtue of a building is its harmony with the landscape and with its occupants. In its harmony with the landscape, the building is one with the environment. From this follows all its exterior virtues: its beauty is the beauty of the landscape. It’s attitude towards the world is the same as the rock: it is intrinsically a part of it and does not stand in opposition. By this it is asked to have all the environmentally friendly virtues: it will be best built from local materials, it will run on sustainable energy, it will incorporate plants and local wildlife, and will have as little impact on the landscape as possible. Its interior virtues, on the other hand are assured by its harmony with its occupants. The building is at the same time as being in harmony with the landscape, totally suited to the needs of its residents. It will have the rooms they require, suiting their purposes, and will protect them from the elements.
By chasing these two goals, human life and nature will naturally blend. It is a design philosophy that can push our culture closer to nature and away from combat with our environment.
The Prince: Prophet, I always took you as an advocate of the poor, downtrodden. Yet it is for them that ugly houses are built, as they could never afford to live in what you propose.
THE PROPHET: Do not mistake me: this house I describe is an ideal fiction. I know that necessity requires us so often to settle for the bare minimum required to sustain life. But that there is a whole class of people pinned to this necessity and unable to access even a fraction of this ideal, that is in general the doing of your philosophy. We should not be asking why we are longing for things that most cannot afford, but asking why they cannot afford in the first place. we live in a world of plenty, with productivity far beyond anything that has ever been known. So why can we not raise our standard of living in this direction? Why must we always make nature our sacrifice? Why, instead of raising the standard of living of all do we have so much wealth in the hands of a few? We can build buildings like this. We can even house large amounts of our population in them, it is just that we refuse to, for many reasons I frequently discuss.
The Prince: You have a very optimistic view, I will say. For you seek human solidarity to overturn the never-yielding force that is power. But know that power cannot be overturned. Humanity is not a network of solidarity: humanity is the unabridged solipsism written again and again, always yielding always tending towards two perfect futures: absolute sameness or the violent ripping apart of all over their natural disagreements.
Moderator: come now, the two of you, we are descending into the depths of theory. Let us talk of real buildings and real places.
