Are we in the midst of a creativity crisis? How can we reclaim our Imaginative capacities? Could better care and feeding of our hippocampus help us move forward?
In this episode Designers of Paradise host Erik van Lennep talks with his long-time colleague, social entrepreneur and author, Rob Hopkins. Rob is founder of both Transition Town Totnes and Transition Network. He’s also working on a book about society’s need to pump up our imagination.
Although we are immersed in a veritable soup of tools and strategies for Regenerating both land and community, and even though social and even political discourse increasingly speaks of the need to find new ways forward, the very technologies enabling our connections with each other and which promise so much regenerative activity may be robbing us of our ability to imagine better planetary futures.
Erik and Rob talk about the importance of story – how a low-carbon economy is going to be a better place, the modern “creativity crisis”, the difference between innovation and imagination, our collective failure of imagination and, of course, how care of your hippocampus may improve imagination.
Rob argues that movements are successful to the extent they can propose a viable alternative so we need “what if” spaces. He also posits that it isn’t about individual genius, but rather the “scenes” individuals put themselves in.
All in all, a stimulating discussion you are sure to enjoy!
Links to Rob’s work:
References discussed include:
- Bill Mollison
- The Creativity Crisis, Newsweek, July 10, 2010
- The Creativity Crisis: The Decrease in Creative Thinking Scores on the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking, Kyung Hee Kim
- Lise van Susteren and pre-traumatic stress
- Drew Dellinger and collective rebuilding of the imagination
- Art of Hosting
- Henry Giroux, Trump disimagination machine
- Liege Belgium’s liege food belt
- Mexico City’s laboratory for the city
- The film ‘Demain’ (Tomorrow) – trailer
- Review of ‘Exit West‘ by Moshin Hamid
Designers of Paradise is made possible, in part, by Mind & Media. Over the last quarter century, the writers, producers, storytellers and media specialists at Mind & Media have spearheaded a multitude of engaging and complex communication campaigns.
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