BOOK: Biomimicry

Janine Benyus
Biomimicry

Premise:

1. Nature runs on sunlight.
2. Nature uses only the energy it needs.
3. Nature fits form to function.
4. Nature recycles everything.
5. Nature rewards cooperation.
6. Nature banks on diversity.
7. Nature demands local expertise.
8. Nature curbs excesses from within.
9. Nature taps the power of limits.

If it sounds simple, then you are ahead of the industrial curve. Benyus explores several different fields to which these lessons would be beneficial. Among them are agriculture, energy production, manufacture of goods, medicine, computing, and the market. Benyus comes off as something of a Luddite, and her frequent depictions of the noble savage rankle a bit, but neither stop her from interviewing truly innovative scientists and businesspeople who are working to fully realize this concept of biomimicry. From polyculturalist farmers to industrialists looking to green their business, Benyus points both to existing problems and solutions already in place.

Readers of Cradle to Cradle will recognize a fair bit of prescience in this lesser known or heralded work. While this book could benefit from a second and more recent edition, (for example her "examples" of biomimicry in two businesses who make a portion of their trade in recycling what are probably dangerous petrochemical substances in their apparel), it is a solid and readable bit of inspiration toward a future of working with, rather than against, nature.

Benyus hits on two points that I just can't quite hold truck with. Her first is the oversimplification of "primitive" cultures. While a deep and spiritual connection to the land is admirable, we must not confuse creation myths with ecological wisdom. While Amerindians might have been born conservationists, a little bit of disconnection from the land has allowed us to discover some very important things about what is at stake and how about how to act as individuals. The same is very true about non-renewable resources, something which Benyus holds as a sacred trust for future generations. Provided we don't drown ourselves with their use, better it seems to have burned them all up in the name of progress that they may never need to be used again. I wouldn't trade the things that we humans have gained with them for the world, literally. Now, however, is the point that I am sure Benyus would agree with me on that we must free ourselves from them.

Read it, but with a sharp eye.