Buckminster Fuller (Bucky) 1895 - 1983


The ideas of this brilliant inventor continue to inspire engineers, architects, designers and philosophers today. The numerous ideas he generated over the course of his lifetime were and continue to be exciting and influential. He envisioned a world doing more with less. Working with nature’s designs and systems to create Synergy for Spaceship Earth, Bucky’s ideas are here to serve humanity.

Bucky developed numerous inventions, mainly architectural designs, and popularized the widely known geodesic dome. Coining or popularizing such terms as “Spaceship Earth”, “Dymaxion” (e.g., Dymaxion house, Dymaxion car, Dymaxion map), “ephemeralization”, “synergetics”, and “tensegrity”. Carbon molecules known as fullerenes were later named by scientists for their structural and mathematical resemblance to geodesic spheres.

He hoped for an age of “omni-successful education and sustenance of all humanity”. Fuller referred to himself as “the property of the universe” and during one radio interview he gave, declared himself and his work “the property of all humanity”. For his lifetime of work, the American Humanist Association named him the 1969 Humanist of the Year.

In the 1960s, Fuller developed the World Game, a collaborative simulation game played on a 70-by-35-foot Dymaxion map, in which players attempt to solve world problems. The object of the simulation game is, in Fuller’s words, to “make the world work, for 100% of humanity, in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation, without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone”.

-A world that can work for everyone

TIMELINE FOR CHANGE

In the past, when apparent change was needed, leaders would rise, and lives would be lost. To be a radical and start a revolution meant putting your life on the line. This slowed movements down. Today, for the most part, we do not have to sacrifice our very lives to talk about what we believe in. To elicit change, we must put our energy of thoughts into words and share those words with those around us. If you committed to doing one thing each day, an action such as sharing an article or website, opening up about your dream for the future, studying the subject, or even just writing in your journal, the world may respond.