Seeds of Change - Heiner Benking's Blog - quergeist.info
Welcome to the NewsLog or Blog of Heiner Benking. A kaleidoscope of insights and impulses collected first in the DaZiBao (Rio) process Seeds of Change Viewsletter of the Club of Budapest since 1995, continually updated ever since. Now available for broader distribution and comments in this blog - enjoy, and come again !
25 May 2014 @ 09:35
We have Elections in Europe and vote locally, besides, the
Earthship Conference started yesterday [link] - It is about Radically Sustainable Buildings[link] - see also Wikipedia [link] and [link]
https://www.facebook.com/events/1606325562926982/
We continue today in the Baumhaus [link] and facebook: https://www.facebook.com/baumhausberlin
with friends from d.collective - here an event with Peter Jones - the 1st DesignwithDialog and Event No.1 by dpeople. check: [link] see from ENGAGEMENT TO EMPOWERMENT: [link]
check the results about Local Projects: (Tempelhof) and (Oeynhausen in Grunewald) and the Brussels European Parliament election. results in 6 hours or so...
German Foundations:
In the middle of the waters (stream, river, "main"stream!?,...)
and against the "currents" (trends), the others, odds, many,....
Deutsche Stiftungen: Mitten im Fluss und gegen den Strom !!!
I just returned from Hamburg, the Stiftungs Tag 2014 As always a very special, dedicated, "gifted and cultured" crowd, celebrating good work, milestone projects, trailblazing efforts to serve communities and minorities. Again: very well educated, concerned and alive people serving cultural, natural, environmental,... concerns and mandates.
What a theme full of water, flows, streams and (hidden) currents!!! We are here into quality and quantity, isolation or context, integration or segregation !! Or can they be seen as a spectrum? see the example of Big Brother watching... or even "connected 3D-fields", or combined "beyond single boxes/spaces" in a Cognitive Panorama (9D) See revecent publication: "connecting" dots, .... spaces, people? and [link] " id="posts_2x6_000396-000276_outside_link" target="_blank">"connecting ... minds..." see Democracy in [R]evolution:
Full of metaphors, images, allegories, ... with presentations full of meanings and co-notations, assumptions and expectations.
I really like the reflections and "Stolpersteine" and spaces between words, lines, and meanings, how to "juggle" with them for making us aware of "others" and surprise - and their variety of interpretations, and their mindbugs and groupthink or spreadthinks we so often ignore/neglect. I talked with many at the symposium about the "normal" ways to express, present, communicate, display, model, ..... that we need to go beyond words, metaphors, images, stories, ... Well some of you know my passions about other forms and formats of representation and presentation, maybe check here **** or what I mean by supersigns and superstructures description in the sense of Ban Ki-Moon requesting "revolutionary" thinking, concepts and approaches, new "solution spaces" in view of exploding problem spaces. description. More later... meanwhile check As the luminaries and keynoters where full of praise about words, images, stories,... and may be ready for a second look or step, and try the sharing, combining, caring, daring... see Connecting Dots and Spaces and Eyes & Mind-Sets... (DRAFT Translation - Original published in German: Mit anderen Augen sehen.
20 May 2014 @ 16:56
Tomorrow are negotiation about TTIP in Brussels
Today we met all day to discuss the impacts and how to understand the Futures of Cultures in Germany and Europe. I know how difficult it is as when we use the Word KULTUR - Culture in English you should translate it with the term Civcilization. And when we say in German Zivilisation (Civilization) it should be translated as Culture into English. As you see, we are here on tricky terrain.
But in times of Elections for the European Parliament and negotiation reaching very basic formulations - which are unfortunately not public, this is an important issue. So let me alert you about the event today in Berlin, in workshops by the KULTURRAT, and now in the Academy of the Arts in a public evening discussion, aired on Friday in Deutschland Radio Kultur: *****
Here some background in English: Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-focus/ttip/
Latest tweet on TTIP Public consultation on investor protection in TTIP European Commission launches public online consultation on investor protection in TTIP - available in all official EU languages (click on the menu top right) How do the EU and the US regulate? A new independent study offers a unique comparison of the EU and the US regulatory and legislative systems. About TTIP
check it out ! and maybe also:https://www.campact.de/ttip/appell/english-version/
It all about what we mean and how we regulate. You see some very very basic questions. I recommend: How do the EU and the US regulate? New study to feed the EU-US trade negotiations[link]
I spoke in the evening from the floor about the meaning of Culture and Civilization. All is recorded, but maybe check in and with the words of Kim Veltman: [link]
(17) My colleague Heiner Benking has kindly drawn my attention to a rather dramatic example of this difference between languages. A book by Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996 has recently been translated into German as Krieg der Kulturen. On this subject see also Roman Herzog, Amitai Etzioni and Henrik Schmiegelow, Preventing the Clash of Civilizations: A Strategy for Peace for the Twenty-First Century, 1999.
check also: [link]
Here some links in German: 54. Akademie-Gespräch. Verteidigt die Kultur! Das Freihandelsabkommen - [link] http://www.adk.de/de/aktuell/veranstaltungen/index.htm?we_objectID=33253
[link]More >
500+ young people from all around Europe with an interest in history, futures, politics,... make us aware of very unusual references to historical and current topics. They party and negortiate and worked hard for days in a high spirit. I enjoyed hanging around, lurking and dancing a little ... Check out the whole programme, outcomes, documentation, a sign of hope towards living in Europe and the World.
I asked if someone has heard about the SYNCHRONOPTIC WORLD HISTORY by Arno Peters and shared this link to this EARTH FOCUS FOUNDATION event in 2011: See Digital Peters some were also interested in Alexander von Humboldt and Carl Ritter when I showed them the Picture of Alexander von Humboldt and Simon Bolivar when we moved over to the "Cum Laude" Restaurant outside in the Humboldt University. Highly recommended ! to walk around a little outside the MAXIM GORKI Theater.
Before I forgot. This was the highlight, an interesting announcement !! Check FRIDAY IN VENICE - A Transmedia Speculation about a Possible Europe as initiated by Michael Schindhelm and a group of European artists unfolding the story of the fictional traveller Friday exploring the continent from the pre-election Strasbourg to the Venice of the Architectural Biennale. Check the deabates and later the forthcomming book.
An on this very special celebration day for Europe [link] as a kick-off for the European Elections on Mai 25, we have the PARIS PLACE, close to the Brandenburg Gate, filled with Booths about Europe. EuroboXX - see also below - is visited by many many people, below later some more pictures. Here you can find the Press Release.
The BoXX is moving on the LONG NIGHT of SCIENCES tomorrow. We have just moved the EuroboXX to Dahlem to the Free Univeristy. Institute Future [link] and Environmental Eduaction. Check UNESCO and DESD
See the picture and come back later ! as I am around this for maybe 10 years or so. I will add links form below, like 5 years DESD and what we do in Toronto, Hawaii and elsewhere... More >
8 May 2014 @ 15:57
Beside Re:publica, EUROPA TraumWirklichkeit DreamReality, FONAs Sustainability in Sciences is "on" today. www.fona.de/de/16932 Great Documentation and and - but unfortunately not translated.
All posters an extended documentation will be on the internet.
Here is the programme: www.fona.de/sisi/2014/programm.php see also below last years FONA and come back !
Rushing.... HEiner
7 May 2014 @ 14:19
Tn the Academy of Sciences of Berlin Brandenburg we gather for a day around research, participation, Citizen Sciences. A project in cooperation with the FSG (German VDW) The Federation of German Scientists: See the website, unfortunately is concept of the event is not available in English. Forschungswende: [link] I also recommend teh BERLINER ERKLÄRUNG, For Democracy in the Digital World: [link] See last year's symposium in this blog: [link]
5 May 2014 @ 11:54
Here you find impression of the EuroboXX in the making. Pictures are from the GARAGE-SHOP of INBAK where the EuroboXX's was painted by vocational training students and Joy Lohmann, a designer/artist/activist from Hanover. [link] Joy is co-founder of Positive Nett-Works e.V. in Hanover and Berlin. [link]
The EuroboXX will be introduced to the public at the Pariser Platz / Brandenburg Gate, May 9th at the EUROPA DAY. SEE Box, ready for the road: [link] For more and also check the NEW RUNDSCHAU: and the official sites: [link]
This Vocational Training and artistic spray-painting exercise is not only to address social, educational, environmental, cultural, economic aspects, but look into health and how live together, share, care and dare. Last week discussed broad issues about youth and health, drop-out rates in schools, and how we survive the impact of new media and the rapid change the new generations face in modern times. See my presentation last week on NEGATIVE BODY IMAGE and how bring community centres, health and social matters into new project designs and the public.
[link] Rushing ... maybe see above in this blog.
3 May 2014 @ 07:22
what a great and important and group, all dedicated, responsible and caring partners in our research effort about Negative Body Images !
I learned about this only 3 month ago and decided only last week to come to Starvanger to represent INBAK. Here is my introduction "pitch" Pls. request more and see our EuroboXX next week.
come back as I feel this is important for not only yound people and general Health, Happiness and Serenity, but Survival of Societies !
by the way ! I met that guy in the street ! frightening - I will report more about this extrordinary trip as it was soo long that I did not make it to Norway, and by-the-way I like the boats and the Sea !
This is Heiner Benking's News Log, a private-public diary presenting events, symposia and happenings in Berlin and elsewhere - my farings, foci, issues and concerns.
PLEASE CONSIDER THIS PERSONAL BLOG an ARTISTIC and PERFORMATIVE MEDIA INTERVENTION !
The Log links to my work and interests and presents issues and special concern of maybe a very small group of "concerned, engaged generalist" - a Global Interest Group (GIG). This needs to be seen in contrast to the ubiquitous Specialized Interest Groups (SIGs), the "scientific" approach to organize subject areas and specialization and standardization and harmonization! of means, nomenclatures, and modes of thinking. My favorite stories in the WHOLENESS SEMINAR include:
BELA BANATHY: "GENESIS
OF GENERAL SYSTEMS THEORY" and "IVAN HAVEL: Longing for Unified Knowledge" where a "specialist" runs into the founding session of the early foundations General Systems, mumbling "this is not my field" or where Ivan M. Havel expresses his search for other kinds of knowledge.
As a starter I also recommend to check my MINDPRINT site, where we add the need for HANDPRINTS and MINDPRINTS, as FOOTPRINTS are good to visualize and communicate numbers, densities or consumption per area, but are not sufficient to negotiate and "harmonize" across domains and communicate gains in different cultures, technologies, times,... in short: incompatible but relevant information and our work on dialog, peace, policy-making, and multi-modal, faceted issues and consequences.
What am I? This is a "well-packed" question for which I have not the or a single answer. Some called me an in-betweener, go-getter, facilitator, hub, marvel-hero, trim-tab, bricoleur, bricoleers??? - career designeer, .... Some even "hank" which I disliked or Story which I liked very much !!
I have no single answer as I feel we need to walk the talk and sing and dance Life ! in spectra and fields in multiple embodied spaces.
To nebulous an answer? I am sorry but I do not go for overclaims and oversimplifications, under-complex and over-simplistic approaches with clan-think mindsets about real issues in clear contexts!