THE ENVIRONMENT

 

WHERE WE LIVE

 

 

     One thing I’ve discovered and know for certain …. it’s a wild, wild world we inhabit here on Earth!  Extraordinarily complex, our planet supports a biosphere teeming with living organisms of every imaginable description while all around us powerful chemical reactions churn continuously under the influence of relentless geo-physical forces.  Not only is our environment astoundingly diverse, but it is forever in a state of flux as conditions change from second to second, decade to decade, and eon to eon.  For those of us trying to survive amid this chaos, our habitat is often threatening and at times overwhelming ….. we are extremely exposed and vulnerable to the Elements.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   This insight is nothing new  ….  for thousands of years people have tried to describe and understand these ‘Elements of Nature’ which exert such a profound influence on our existence.  The Greek philosopher Plato organized them into four basic groups which he called Fire, Earth, Water, and Air   ….   simple symbols to represent everything we experience from the environment.  The early Chinese developed their own model of the world using similar imagery, as did the Egyptians, the Incas, the Mayans, the Druids, the Aborigines, and virtually every other indigenous culture.  Most of mythology is infused with embodiments of the Elements, uncontrollable manifestations of the outside environment that are part of our daily lives.  And the same elementary characterizations provide the basis for many of our enduring philosophical and metaphysical systems such as the ‘I Ching’ and ‘Astrology’.  Of course modern science has vastly refined and expanded our knowledge beyond these primitive concepts, but the early depictions still have great symbolic value and inspire an abiding interest.  The image of the Universe divided into four quadrants, each representing one of Plato’s four Elements, has great appeal.  Maintaining an awareness that we are forever immersed in space surrounded by powerful natural forces is essential to our survival and well-being.

 

 

THE CLASSIC ELEMENTS

 

 

      A fifth Element was added to this symbolic order by Aristotle, another Greek philosopher and a student of Plato, which he called the Spirit and placed at the center of the other four.  I believe that Spirit represents the essential life force, the inner Element at the core of our being which keeps us alive and animated.

      The model House we design and build will be the dwelling place of the Spirit    ….   Home will rest at the center of the mandala, surrounded symbolically by the earthly manifestations of Fire, Earth, Water, and Air.  Materially speaking, our House will be constructed as a structural membrane between these external environmental forces and the people living within its walls and under its roof.  Those inside can be threatened by the forces coming from outside but they can also be comforted and nurtured by them.  Conversely, the energy which emanates from within the house, from the Spirit, can move outwardly into the surrounding environment, sometimes destructively and sometimes beneficially.  It’s always a two-way street.    A great 20th- century French architect, LeCorbusier, described the house as a “Machine for Living In”  because it is a mechanism over which we have some control, giving us a means to manage this constant ebb and flow of energy.   The challenge is to build and use our House in ways that are beneficial, both to the people and Spirit within and to the surrounding Neighborhood outside.

 

 

 ENVIRONMENTAL PHENOMENA MANDALA

 

 

   No matter what uses we have in mind for our House, a good design should consider the impact from all of the environmental phenomena depicted in the diagram above.   The most important and influential of these, shown in the outermost sphere of the mandala,  correspond directly to Plato’s fundamental order:   Gravity (Earth),  Rain (Water),  Wind (Air),  and Combustion (Fire).   Powerful, pervasive, and mostly beyond our control, these four primary phenomena have affected virtually every shelter ever constructed and in fact were the basis for the original design standards of our Building Codes, way back in the days of Hammurabi.  Even today, our current building codes and code-compliance reviews begin with the identification of site-specific environmental conditions.  Over time, the interactions between these elemental forces and earthly matter have resulted in a sphere of more-localized Geo-Physical phenomena.  Depending on our particular building site we will need to contend with the following conditions:  Earthquakes,  Settlement,  Erosion,  Groundwater,  Floods,  Snow/Hail/Ice,  Temperature,  Lightning,  and Radiation.   When we add Bio-Chemical forces into the mix,  another sphere of environmental phenomena emerges which includes Varmints, Insects, Disease, Fungus, Corrosion, and Toxins.  And closest to Home, in the Neighborhood we depend on for comfort and support, we find the phenomena which are most a part of our every-day lives:   Fauna (the Animal population), Flora (the Plant population), and Community (our man-made infrastructure and social living network).  What follows is a brief investigation into all of these separate phenomena, from a builder’s perspective, which will provide the background for our decision-making.  Our House will grow from an appreciation of, and a respect for, our place in nature.

 

 

 

SPHERES OF INFLUENCE

 

 

 

     These natural phenomena are not truly separate from one another but exist in a continuum of time and space, they are processes, and there is a great deal of interaction between them.  The diagram above shows conditions in the outer spheres acting directly on the spheres within, which is to be expected, but they don’t necessarily act alone.  Often times the most destructive phenomena are caused by two of the primary elements acting together.  For example, Wind driven Combustion can result in conflagrations that wipe out entire towns in a matter of hours and every year cause many billions of dollars in residential losses.  Gravity acting on our molten pyroclastic planet can unleash enormous amounts of seismic strain energy, leading to epic earthquakes and tidal waves which kill tens of thousands of people.  Hurricane Winds and Atmospheric Rivers can carry so much Rain that entire cities and counties end up submerged with their infrastructures in ruins.  The rivers carving and re-shaping the land surface are simply Rain under the influence of Gravity.  It is worth remembering that nature is highly complex and nothing really happens in isolation.  It is also worth remembering that most of these phenomena can also have a huge impact on the construction process itself, often causing problems even before our house is complete.