Seth Godin suggests that this may be the way of the future.
The NoImpact Man is a resident of New York who lives with his wife, daughter and a dog and is trying to live a no-impact life. He is chronicling his journey on his blog.
What is the philosophy behind this concept?
None of the practical questions about no impact living would be relevant if my wife Michelle, my daughter Isabella, our dog Frankie and I intended to approach the challenge by becoming ascetics. Until now, we have been your typical convenience-addicted, New York City take-out slaves. Asceticism is not a realistic way forward, not for my family and not for the world.
Saving this planet depends on finding a middle path that is neither unconsciously consumerist nor self-consciously anti-materialist. The idea for No Impact Man is not to be anorexic but to be abundant, not to be eco-efficient but “eco-effective,” in the words of the environmental scientists William McDonough and Michael Braungart.
The No Impact Man has a year long plan which is being implemented in stages. The interesting part of the discussion is what he means by no-impact. The laws of thermodynamics clearly show that you cannot have zero impact on the earth. If you consume you have an impact.
No Impact Man is my experiment with researching, developing and adopting a way of life for me and my little family—one wife, one toddler, one dog—to live in the heart of New York City while causing no net environmental impact. To do this, we will decrease the things we do that hurt the earth—make trash, cause carbon dioxide emissions, for example—and increase the things we do that help the earth—clean up the banks of the Hudson River, give money to charity, rescue sea birds, say.
In mathematical terms, in case you are an engineer or just a geek who likes math, we are trying to achieve an equilibrium that looks something like this:
Negative Impact + Positive Impact = Zero.
No net impact. Get it?
He understands that humans will live more in the cities than the rural areas. It is time for us to figure out how we can live Sustainably in the cities. This is a blog which needs to be followed.
Most importantly, this is the kind of thinking which individuals and organizations (corporate, government or not-for-profits) need to apply to create a sustainable world.
