Donut Economy

& the direction UP

​

Kate Raworth & Barbara Tversky

Essential geometry of the Donut Economy model

(K. Raworth):

2 circles & arrows

​

"Thriving in balance within the boundary

of the planet resources".

(between the 2 circles of Humans & Nature ‘out there’)

2 circles & arrows

UP is good, power, skill, building… (Tversky)

Growth EXpansion is

bad over-shooting (Raworth)

passing limits of resilience,

breaking physical boundaries: health, planet, behaviour.

Endless growth in body = cancer

Endlessly spreading species = invasive pest

Endless economic growth goes with material difficulties for many

in human cultures & mind.

Progress, exponential acceleration, personal development, growing wealth… “The sky is the limit”, building towers/pyramids/ mountains to reach Sky, Heaven, Paradise, Golden Age…

​

The difference a 2D image and an angle or viewpoint can make

Compare:

Undetected by scholars: Physical  Human & Material  Mind are mutually relative re-presentations, and geometrically symmetric frames that also involve an inversion of value (good vs bad). Why? The Rubber Sheet Geometry can make sense of this in the same way as bifurcation & Special Relativity General Relativity.

‘Down’

‘Return’ to nature is good for health & sanity (e.g. camping holiday)

Is human society more primary than nature ?

Presupposition: nature inside the body is bad too (disease)

2 Circles can represent a geometric projection

of a 3D donut onto a 2D surface-plane

(horizontal section, like cutting a seedless olive)

​

2 Circles can also represent a geometric projection

of a 3D sphere onto a 2D plane (cross-section)

with inside & outside surface

The double-surface of outside and inside the sphere is also a ‘thick’ form of the boundary of the sphere-ball:

Both circles represent the 3D spherical ‘boundary’ for the 3D ball

Raworth: "Thriving in balance within the boundary of the planet resources".

WHAT IF… human existence did not have to stay AT Boundary, afraid of not being near enough or too far past it?

​

Hence most theoretical models visualised in the mind are reduced Re-Presentations of the 3D-changing situation

that actually presents to awareness. [Visualisation relies on brain functions relative to sensory vision with eyes, not to body-mind vestibular]

But the situation in process of shaping and its expressions:

• can be seen from a “higher” viewpoint (higher geometric dimension, higher order of logic not more ‘evolved’ mind)
• can be then understood as projections of surfaces, by using the ‘Rubber Sheet Geometry’,
• thus can be understood as relating to surface projections, limits of changing shapes (objects, bodies, worlds, universes…).
• They figure visually an expression, a shape-formation, the ‘SHAPING’ of any situation, object or world
• This is connected to biological sensing of volumes, surfaces, tubes, flows of various kinds… in both body-brain & mind,

and to the shaping or formation of biological shapes of living beings (embryology; computer-micro-modeled by V. Fleury)

– This relates to Boundary behaviour in the shaping of any undifferentiated situation, anywhere, any time –

​

Play Video (18 sec):

Sphere in motion (change)

viewed on the 2D ‘screen of the mind’

Ref: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TI1onWI_IM

Paraphrasing this introduction video:

When the 3D world-in-change (3D+movement) is visualised as models,

the 2D ‘screen of the mind’ (‘FlatLand’) sees only geometric projections & up-down.

​

A single 2D spiral is a projection of a 3D spiral onto a 2D plane

in various ways, more or less exact.

The 2D ‘screen of the mind’

sees geometric projections and

can play with them ad infinitum.

But it has a habit of manifesting its many ‘realities’

in daily life, and cause harm. Example:

Theories in Humanities: DyNamic Balance is good.

Theories in Physical sciences: Unstable Equilibrium is not so good.

(works For A Time, until dis-harmony, “on the edge of the knife”)

For ~3-6000 years it was found not easy to achieve or maintain;

it takes constant effort, is costly, does not always work long.

How long can humanity & planet keep this UP?

A Double-Spiral 2D represents the 2 directions Left-Right or In-Out of the spiraling: expanding and shrinking. This is a representation of the notions of Wind-Up & Wind-Down: ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in different contexts. 3D shows that it is also possible to Un-Wind the spiral (get out of the unstable equilibrium of spiraling at boundary).

2D representation on the ‘screen of the mind’:

a construction

3D representation (sphere) on a computer:

further construction

Or Up & Down

Cognitive analysis of image & angle or viewpoint

3D-moving intuition: Spiraling “within boundary’

justified by cultural spirals

"Thriving in balance within the boundary of the planet resources".

Where is the ‘middle’?

​

How to ‘balance’ up-down?

In the Rubber Sheet Geometry, boundary is

neither ‘physical’ nor ‘human’ but topologic.

This figures a new option:

not orienting to boundary and

Un-Winding the spiraling. View below video Unwinding Spiral animation.mp4

The ‘Rubber Sheet Geometry’ figures another option:

Un-Winding the spiraling at topologic boundary (undo it completely)

Not orienting to topologic Boundary (neither Up nor Down)

to not breach or even reach limits (maxima & minima) Physical or Human

​

Many human societies control nature,

regulating it with too much disturbance

and deformation, and ‘go too far’.

[Generalised] Culture-Civilisation-Society

must ‘reground’ collectively.

This is interpreted in terms of

Nature (physical or material),

Human (or mind), and growth.

‘Growth’, ‘Too Far’ [Ex- or Up-] and

‘re-ground’ are more easily

understood as topologic,

in geometric terms.

Yet, some individuals thrive at limits,

this should not be denied to them,

even if they participate in Ex-/Up.

However, others have a daily life crucial

Need for ‘re-grounding’ to avoid crises.

They have access to a co-regulating process

of human behaviour by nature.

This can be used to un-wind the ‘whole’.

Play Video (18 sec): Unwinding Spiral animation.mp4

See more on the geometry in the presentation:

Cultural & Cognitive Animated Geometry.pptx

The Rubber Sheet Geometry view:

Un-winding the spiraling to help Economy, Planet, People, without loosing access to advancements or having to return to the past

​

Unwinding the spiraling to limits permits to ‘re-ground’.

‘Grounding’ (topologically) is a daily life necessity for some humans who need nature and for humanity as a whole, but not for everyone. Human beings exits in different states of ‘topologic orienting’ or deployment of survival mechanisms.

Re-grounding, however, is what Culture –Civilisation -Society must do collectively, as a ‘System’ of existence on this planet, if we are to not exhaust both planet resources for BioLife and people resourcefulness for resilience and their viability. This System of existence is auto-reinforcing and has become self-serving for abstract ‘legal persons’ rather than serving people. The option shown by the Rubber Sheet Geometry is auto-limiting and is complementary to the large-numbers System, which is auto-reinforcing. This re-grounding must occur in the theories and practices, as it has had to do in distant pasts, and in a global-local way. This means that not every person has to unwind and reground. Society could reduce the efforts and costs of change:

• by allowing those who do have this ongoing life-need to meet that need, and still be ‘included’ in society (not by normalising ‘social integration’, which they cannot physiologically operate without access to supportive human and material environment), building respect and collaboration on this basis, without imposing either ways of existence, and
• by enabling rather than preventing this individual change, including interactions even if someone does not ‘belong’ to groups, organizations, institutions....

The benefit is that the Rubber Sheet Geometry and the re-grounding in nature for its co-regulating role on human behaviour, can help “us” collectively learn ways to ‘work with nature rather than against it’ (D. Attenborough), with less disturbance & deformation (e.g. not destroying completely land to re-build, not imposing lifestyles and ways to contribute).

Here is one research project that could initiate exploring all this.

Listen to this colloquial audio summary for Foraging Station Experiment.mp3 (8mn)

�Thank you

​

��

Topologic Ecology of Health

drmbouchon@gmail.com

Nexial-Topology Situation Modelling:

Health Ecology And

Other General Perspectives

Bouchon (2008) Ph.D. thesis