Some of the first things that come to mind when the word “design” is mentioned is architecture, engineering, fashion design, interior design, auto design, concept design, graphic design, web design, government design or business design. These designs are processes used by designers to plan for construction of an object or system.
Design is an integral part of everything, whether created by people or as it exists in nature. It is nature’s design’s that are far and away the most the most efficient, most sustainable, most perfected, and as proof, have withstood the test of time.
Biomimicry, as defined by the Biomimicry Institute, “is a new discipline that studies nature’s best ideas and then imitates these designs and processes to solve human problems. The core Idea is that nature, imaginative by necessity, has already solved many of the problems we are grappling with. Animals, plants and microbes are the consummate engineers. They have found what works, what is appropriate, and most important, what lasts on Earth. This is the real news of biomimicry: After 3.8 billion years of research and development, failures are fossils, and what surrounds us is the secret to survival.”
Design flaws can have disastrous results to products, projects, systems, economies, and organizations like businesses and governments. With the tremendous unrest we are currently experiencing world-wide, with economies, suffering of people from poverty, hunger, sickness, disease, unemployment, homelessness, wars and terrorism, inequality of wealth, it begs the question; “how much of this is due to flaws in design?”
If we as citizens of the United States, or whatever country you reside in, as members of the world human community, are serious about solving these problems, it imperative that we identify any “design flaws,” that currently exist, and fix them, so they work as they were intended to – “for the people.” If we already have successful patterns to follow that have worked for billions of years in the design process, this should give us a pretty good shot at getting it right or at least aiming at the right direction which will come in focus as we stay on target.