"One of Fuller's most popular works, Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth, is a brilliant synthesis of his world view. In this very accessible volume, Fuller investigates the great challenges facing humanity. How will humanity survive? How does automation influence individualization? How can we utilize our resources more effectively to realize our potential to end poverty in this generation? He questions the concept of specialization, calls for a design revolution of innovation, and offers advice on how to guide "spaceship earth" toward a sustainable future."--Jacket

Those involved in urban neighborhood and community research with an applied focus will find in this volume a number of useful and practical examples of how to do it. . . . The modesty with which some of the results is presented is refreshing, and the candor with which the authors treat their shortcomings is commendable. Several authors make it quite clear that good research does not necessarily produce the best information for those working to improve the social fabric of urban communities. On the other hand, there is a certain amount of optimism in these essays for those who want to see their research produce positive results in the communities they study. . . . [The] essays are clear and the points are well made and carefully documented. An excellent source of information, research findings, and policy recommendations. Choice

Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) was an architect, engineer, geometrician, cartographer, philosopher, futurist, inventor of the famous geodesic dome, and one of the most brilliant thinkers of his time. For more than five decades, he set forth his comprehensive perspective on the world's problems in numerous essays, which offer an illuminating insight into the intellectual universe of this renaissance man. These texts remain surprisingly topical even today, decades after their initial publication. While Fuller wrote the works in the 1960's and 1970's, they could not be more timely: like desperately needed time-capsules of wisdom for the critical moment he foresaw, and in which we find ourselves. Long out of print, they are now being published again, together with commentary by Jaime Snyder, the grandson of Buckminster Fuller. Designed for a new generation of readers, Snyder prepared these editions with supplementary material providing background on the texts, factual updates, and interpretation of his visionary ideas. Initially published in 1969, and one of Fuller's most popular works, Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth is a brilliant synthesis of his world view. In this very accessible volume, Fuller investigates the great challenges facing humanity, and the principles for avoiding extinction and "exercising our option to make it." How will humanity survive? How does automation influence individualization? How can we utilize our resources more effectively to realize our potential to end poverty in this generation? He questions the concept of specialization, calls for a design revolution of innovation, and offers advice on how to guide "spaceship earth" toward a sustainable future. And it Came to Pass - Not to Stay brings together Buckminster Fuller's lyrical and philosophical best, including seven "essays" in a form he called his "ventilated prose", and as always addressing the current global crisis and his predictions for the future. These essays, including "How Little I Know", "What I am Trying to Do", "Soft Revolution", and "Ethics", put the task of ushering in a new era of humanity in the context of "always starting with the universe." In rare form, Fuller elegantly weaves the personal, the playful, the simple, and the profound. Utopia or Oblivion is a provocative blueprint for the future. This comprehensive volume is composed of essays derived from the lectures he gave all over the world during the 1960's. Fuller's thesis is that humanity - for the first time in its history - has the opportunity to create a world where the needs of 100% of humanity are met. This is Fuller in his prime, relaying his urgent message for earthians' critical moment and presenting pioneering solutions which reflect his commitment to the potential of innovative design to create technology that does "more with less" and thereby improves human lives . . . "This is what man tends to call utopia. It's a fairly small word, but inadequate to describe the extraordinary new freedom of man in a new relationship to universe - the alternative of which is oblivion." Buckminster Fuller.

An essay on the world's future based on a study of history, science, and technology.

In this essay on man Mr. Fuller expresses what may well be his penultimate view of the human condition. Here, in a mood at once philosophical and involved, Mr. Fuller traces man s intellectual evolution and weighs his capability for survival on this magnificent craft, this Spaceship Earth, this superbly designed sphere of almost negligible dimension in the great vastness of space.Mr. Fuller is optimistic that man will survive and, through research and development and increased industrialization, generate wealth so rapidly that he can do very great things. But, he notes, there must be an enormous educational task successfully accomplished right now to convert man s tendency toward oblivion into a realization of his potential, to a universe-exploring advantage from this Spaceship Earth.It has been noted that Mr. Fuller spins ideas in clusters, and clusters of his ideas generate still other clusters. The concept spaceship earth is Mr. Fuller s, and though used by Barbara Ward as the title of a work of her own the idea was acknowledged by her there as deriving from Mr. Fuller. The brilliant syntheses of some fundamental Fuller principles given here makes of this book a microcosm of the Fuller system."

R. Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) fut architecte, ingA(c)nieur, cartographe, philosophe, la (TM)inventeur des cA(c)lA]bres coupoles gA(c)odA(c)siques et la (TM)un des plus gA(c)niaux thA(c)oriciens de son temps. Pendant plus de cinquante ans, il a publiA(c) de nombreux essais dans lesquels il a exposA(c) ses vastes thA(c)ories sur les problA]mes de notre planA]te. Ces textes offrent des A(c)clairages instructifs sur son univers de savant universel. Plusieurs dA(c)cennies aprA]s leur premiA]re publication, ils restent da (TM)une A(c)tonnante actualitA(c). Manuel da (TM)instruction pour le vaisseau spatial A Terre A a A(c)tA(c) publiA(c) pour la premiA]re fois en anglais en 1969. La premiA]re A(c)dition en franAais date quant A elle de 1980. Ca (TM)est une brillante synthA]se de sa conception du monde et A ce titre, la (TM)un de ses ouvrages les plus cA(c)lA]bres. Dans ce texte da (TM)une grande limpiditA(c), Fuller A(c)tudie les grands dA(c)fis auxquels la (TM)humanitA(c) est confrontA(c)e. Comment la (TM)humanitA(c) survivra-t-elle ? Quels sont les effets de la (TM)automatisation sur la (TM)individualisation ? Comment utiliser plus efficacement nos ressources pour mettre fin A la pauvretA(c) de cette gA(c)nA(c)ration ? Il remet en question le concept de spA(c)cialisation, appelle de ses vAux une rA(c)volution du design avec de nouvelles dA(c)couvertes, et indique des moyens pour conduire le vaisseau spatial A Terre A vers un avenir durable. Jaime Snyder, petit-fils de Buckminster Fuller, a dirigA(c) cette A(c)dition rA(c)visA(c)e de la traduction franAaise. Dans son introduction et ses commentaires, il nous donne accA]s au contexte dans lequel Fuller a A(c)crit son ouvrage, et il complA]te ses visions en les actualisant et en les interprA(c)tant concrA]tement.

Bibliogr. und Literaturverz. S. 307 - 315