Hovdetoppen som Påskeøya

Hvem i all verden er disse menneskene som har kvalt Gjøviks siste grønne lunge? De tilhører i alle fall ikke min stamme. Mest av alt går tankene til Påskeøya, beboerne der var også ivrige etter å hogge trær, og nå har de høvlet ned trærne på bytoppen vår, som om den var en bortgjemt skogsteig i Vardal. Politikerne gjemmer seg bak prosedyrene, det er ingen grunn til å tro at ikke prosedyrene er fulgt, hevder de. Men de som hogde det siste treet på Påskeøya fulgte sikkert også prosedyrene. Og her har de hogget ned bysentrums siste villmarkslunge.

Denne grønne moseøya er å finne på kjellergulvet i Hovdetoppen ruiner. Dette er kun et av flere budskap jeg har funnet her oppe. I morgen ser det ut til å kunne bli noen solgløtt, så da får jeg prøve å ta en tur opp dit igjen, for å se om der kan være flere budskap til oss?

Uansett ser jeg ingen grunn til å bli i Gjøvik lenger etter denne udåden. Byen er verre enn Sodoma. Heldigvis ble vi løftet ut av byen før denne ugjerningen, i likhet med Abraham av Sodoma. Enten angrer de sine synder og går igang med å hele Hovdetoppen igjen, ellers er de under den Allmektiges dom.

Hovdetoppen var rett og slett et helende element i bybildet, som vi ikke hadde råd til å miste. Og som INGEN hadde lov til å ta fra oss!!!!

-Flickr.

Har Gjøvik blitt en psykopatisk by? Ja, jeg begynner sannelig å lure.

The crux of the biophilic effect in the artificial environment is that science has discovered and demonstrated patterns in building that either objectively contribute to, or detract from our psychological and spiritual wellbeing. Current Western-inspired architecture not only lacks such patterns; it teaches architects and planners to build in such a way that the biophilic patterns aren’t present. The irony is that we worship an image of science that is not scientifically credible. To make that point clear, we need to set the stage for a change in consciousness in the reader.

The new scientific discipline of Biophilia describes how we connect in an essential manner to living organisms. Introduced by the American biologist Edward O. Wilson, biophilic effects are increasingly well documented, and these include faster postoperative healing rates and lower use of pain-suppressing medicines when patients are in close contact with nature (Salingaros and Masden, 2008). Biophilia includes the therapeutic effect of contact with domestic animals. Explanations of the biophilic effect are still being developed, yet what is incontrovertible so far is that the very special geometry of natural and living structures exerts a positive effect on human wellbeing. It could be that Biophilia is a largely mathematical effect, in which our perceptual system recognizes and processes special types of structures more easily than others.

The most basic component of Biophilia is the human response to natural environments, and surroundings that contain a high degree of living matter. Since we evolved in living environments, we process that information in an especially easy manner, and even crave it whenever it is absent from artificial environments that we ourselves build. Hence the primordial human desire for a garden, or an excursion to the countryside to restore our internal equilibrium.

Hvorfor i all verden slapp de dette trespisende monsteret opp på bytoppen vår?

-Wikimedia.

Quality of life comes through the nurturing environment. Five points for regeneration

Several factors contribute to a positive quality of life for human beings. I am going to focus on those factors that are related to the immediate environment (and thus relevant to architecture and urbanism) and ignore all the others. Let me list some of the necessary points here:

1) Access to clean air, water, shelter, and living space.
2) Access to biophilic information in the natural environment: plants, trees, and animals.
3) Access to biophilic information in the built environment: texture, color, ornament, and art.
4) Access to other human beings within an anxiety-free environment: public urban space, open-access residential and commercial spaces.
5) Protection from anxiety-inducing objects: high-speed traffic, large vehicles, threatening human beings, cantilevered and overhanging structures.

I clearly distinguish between nourishing and anxiety-inducing environmental information. Although this distinction is fundamental, events in the art world have confused our natural instincts with fashions (but discussing this issue generates controversy). It just so happens that much contemporary art avoids connecting positively to a viewer via visceral physiological responses. Regardless of how this type of Art may be valued in the art-gallery circuit, appraised on the art market, and promoted in the press, it is not healing. Any doubt is resolved by referring to Biophilia. Healing emotions include a set of physiological responses that reduce distress and empower the body’s natural defenses to work so as to maintain a healthy steady state. Art that generates healing emotions uses our neurophysiology to induce positive neurological, hormonal, and other responses within our body, but Art is not healing if it generates the opposite feelings of alarm and anxiety.

From gallery-type art — objects, sculptures, installations, etc. — we move into public art such as urban installations in public places: large sculptures, fountains, monuments, benches, tree planters in plazas, etc. For the past several decades, such public art objects have also been representative of geometries that are not biophilic. Those objects tend to range from non-healing (neutral) to anxiety-inducing (negative) provocations and therefore directly influence the quality of the urban space in which they are placed. For stylistic reasons, very little biophilic structure is now being erected in the public realm. And yet, our experience of a public space is determined to a large extent by its public art installations. Worst of all, architects are being commissioned to “upgrade” an older public space by inserting non-healing objects, and by so doing destroy the space’s useful biophilic function.

Every human being responds physiologically in the same manner, and thus is able to judge viscerally whether a work of art or architecture is providing emotional nourishment, or its opposite. This is really a key point. In my description above of what healing emotions entail I assume that psychological conditioning cannot alter our biology, and our instinctive reaction is the one we need to pay most attention to. It matters very little to the user’s physical experience if a non-biophilic object or building is praised in the press and by newspaper and magazine critics. Whenever persons face such a deep contradiction between emotions and bodily responses that are antithetical to the authority of experts, the individual goes into cognitive dissonance and is confused. A person can either remain in cognitive dissonance indefinitely (itself a state of high emotional and physical stress), or eventually come out of it by deciding to trust his/her own bodily responses. The anxiety-inducing objects are supported by an ideology or selfish agenda.

Återhentingsglentan på Hovdetoppen, slik Maria Westerberg uttrykker seg, var magisk😰

-Wikimedia.

Point 2 addresses our contact with nature. It is possible to achieve a balance with the natural environment such as occurs in traditional villages and cities that are not too poor. Even in slums, if vegetation is abundant, the residents profit by having intimate contact with nature. Nevertheless, there are examples of the degeneration of the natural environment in informal settlements that ranges from dwellings built among vegetation towards the other extreme of a city built from junk without any trace of plant life. The need to use wood for heating and cooking can soon destroy the biophilic component of an informal settlement. On the other hand, the wealthiest Western societies habitually cut down trees to build suburban sprawl, and replace the native vegetation with lawn. The grass that makes up a lawn is a monoculture plant that is non-native to the majority of sprawling suburbs. A lawn is thus a reduction of nature and a cruel joke on people who buy those suburban houses.

Urbanists after World War II created a city fit only for the car, applying a fundamentally reductive conception of nature. “Green” in the city or suburbs is substituted by its superficial appearance from afar, thus lawn glimpsed as one drives by is judged to be enough for a contact with nature. But this is a deception: the biophilic effect depends upon close and intimate contact with nature, and definitely increases as the complexity of the natural environment increases. Human beings experience its healing effects from having contact with a fairly complex natural ecosystem, even if that only means a tree with some bushes, but not from just looking at lawn. Biophilic interventions in hospitals create small complex gardens inside hospital public spaces, and interweave complex gardens with the fabric of the hospital wall so that patients can experience the plant life at an immediate distance.

- LIFE AND THE GEOMETRY OF THE ENVIRONMENT

Adjø, bytoppen min! Du var dypt elsket💘

-Flickr.