Preface
3Exactly five years ago, R. Buckminster Fuller passed on. At that moment, I sat watching the movie Wargames, in which two young people saved our Planet from military annihilation. Although that motion picture was fictitious, it provides a strik-ing analogy for Fuller’s fundamental message. During the majority of his life, the man who preferred to be called Bucky explained that humanity’s primary hope rested not with governments, corporations, religions, or other formalized organizations, but rather with individual human beings. He was particularly resolute in his belief that the single category of individuals which could best create and maintain the success of all humanity was the younger generations.
4 His belief in youth rested primarily upon the fact that young people tend to remain aloof from the traditions of the past, particularly the scar-city mentality which, according to Fuller while justified only decades ago, became obsolete in 1970. He felt that young people who had not yet been indoctrinated into the ‘‘you or me’’ system which has dominated human societies since the dawn of recorded history could facilitate humanity’s entrance into an entirely new era predicated upon a ‘‘you and me’’ context.
5 Fuller himself was bom into a generation in which there were not sufficient resources available to support everyone, and consequently, fighting for one’s own share could be argued as acceptable. Even as a young man, however, Bucky was anticipating future trends and realized that in his lifetime, humanity might reach a point when there would be
6 enough material goods to support all life on Earth. He also understood that if and when such a moment occurred, a new era---unlike what most people could even imagine---would instantly come to fruition. Displaying his characteristic love of unique possibilities and being of service to others, Fuller soon embarked on a lifelong mission of doing whatever he perceived was necessary to support humanity’s attainment of that trans-formational moment as well as its entrance into the new era of prosperity which would follow.
7 While working at that mission, Fuller also earned the longest listing in the history of Who’s Who in America and at various times during his life was classified as an architect, teacher, poet, cartographer, philosopher, scientist, writer, lecturer, businessman, mathematician, guru, futurist, visionary, pilot, inventor, administrator, entrepreneur, designer, cos- mogonist, engineer, artist, and prophet---among other things. Yet, when questioned on his calling, Bucky responded in one of two ways. Either he would describe himself as a ‘‘comprehensive, anticipatory design scien-tist’’ (‘‘comprehensivist’’ for short), or he would portray himself as being akin to part of a ship, the ‘‘trim tab.’’ As he was raised in the seaside Boston suburb of Milton during a period when the majority of global trade depended on maritime transportation, it is not surprising that Fuller often likened his life’s operation to that of a sailing ship.
8 He would explain that the trim tab was the tiny flap on the trailing portion of a ship’s rudder or of an airplane’s wing. Most people who are not familiar with aeronautical operation believe that a ship’s steering is accomplished by the rudder; however, even massive ocean liners are, in fact, maneuvered by the slightest of pressures on the tiny trim tab, which, in turn, moves the rudder. The shift in the rudder then changes the ship’s course.
9 During his twenties, Bucky came to believe that any individual could, by simply exerting the subtlest of pressure in the proper place, become a trim tab for humanity, and he set out to live his life in that manner. Fuller became so adamant about the contribution he could make that in 1927 he actually created an experiment using himself as ‘‘Guinea Pig B’’ (for ‘‘Bucky’’). The specific purpose of his experiment was to determine and document what one individual could accomplish on behalf of all humanity which could not be achieved by any organization, govern-ment, or business, regardless of its size or power. That experiment re-mained a critical element of Fuller’s daily life until his death fifty-six years later. The following pages recount much of Fuller’s experiment, both strengths and weaknesses, critically scrutinizing it as any experiment should be examined.
10 Throughout his life, Buckminster Fuller shared his vision of the impending new era. He spoke of and worked to support a period of global abundance in which every human being living on the Planet he named Spaceship Earth would be provided with the necessities of life. Yet his claim that such an option became a reality in 1970 was no idle boast. Rather, it was the documented contention of a pragmatic engineer and inventor who had inventoried and studied global resources for decades and was certain that there were enough resources to support everyone. How Fuller came to that conclusion is essential to his life, and although that understanding of resources provided the context for his operation, it is only one facet of a man who refused to be categorized and who maintained a childlike interest in nearly everything he encountered.
11 But this book is not so much about Fuller’s life as it is about the principles which guided him and which can provide inspiration and insight to those who attain an understanding of them. In the future, someone may well write a complete biography of Buckminster Fuller, filled with all the quirks of his personal life. This is not that book. Rather, it is a translation of Fuller’s own ideas and the principles he discovered from the generally convoluted style dubbed Fullerese into a language which can be under-stood by almost anyone. Readers seeking additional biographical and historical information may refer to the chronology in the back of this book.
12 I have endeavored to intersperse those ideas and principles within a biographical context to provide the reader with a sense of how an under-sized, nearsighted boy bom prior to the invention of most of the conve-niences we now take for granted could, like Leonardo da Vinci, develop innovations and ideas which may not be practically employed for decades. Using Fuller’s life as the continuity for presenting the principles he dis-covered and lived by also provides some sense of how a single committed individual can make such an enormous contribution to so many others.
13 I do not want to imply that Fuller was, by any stretch of the imagina-tion, a saint. On the contrary, he was, as he frequently explained to his audiences, simply a normal human being who responded to circum-stances. The magnitude of the circumstances he noticed and responded to was, however, much larger and more encompassing than most of us ever notice, much less consider doing something about. It was his vision of the comprehensive nature of human beings and all Universe to which Fuller responded and which he discussed with audiences throughout his life.
14 By speaking about his vision rather than himself, he created a per-sona far different from the personality who loved fast cars and sailing ships as well as the companionship he found in drinking and partying for so many years. In attempting to provide the most significant elements of Fuller’s work, I have chosen, as Bucky did, not to focus on his person-ality. Like Fuller, I have not attempted to hide the truly human charac-teristics which establish his human frailty, but rather, to concentrate on the elements of his philosophy which supported his successful contribu-tions to so many others.
15 When this project began over four years ago, I had no intention of writing a book. At the time, I was presenting educational programs about Fuller and his work, and I was constantly asked a question which stumped me: What book would I recommend for those who wanted to leam more about Fuller?
16 Having spent years reading and studying the books by and about Fuller, I could not, in good conscience, recommend any of them. It was not that other books could not provide the information people sought, but that, to some extent, each of them reflected Bucky’s style of communica-tion. Thus, books by and about Fuller tend to be filled with sentences akin to paragraphs and contrived words which Bucky would create when he could not find a precise word which expressed his thought.
17 After years of reading and listening to his style of communication, I had become accustomed to it and understood it fairly well. However, I also realized that most people picking up Synergetics, Critical Path, or any of Fuller’s other books are generally confused and frustrated by his style within a few pages. Fuller’s genius was as a master thinker, not a communicator. In this book, I have endeavored to break his code and translate his most significant thoughts into accessible language.
18 To remain in accord with Fuller’s essential ideas and intent, I have capitalized certain key words which are not usually written in this manner. Items such as Nature,’ Greater Intellect, Planet, Earth, and World are proper names and should, in my opinion, be capitalized. As Fuller stated in a 1977 preface for the book American Space Photography,
1920As I write the introduction to this truly fascinating book, I find its author and its publishers spelling our planet’s name with a small ‘‘e,’’ even though its 7,926-mile diameter is larger than the mile diameters of Venus’s 7,620, Mars’s 4,220, Pluto’s 3,600 or Mercury’s 3,010. The first letter of all the other planets’ names we honor with capital letters. I am confident that those who spell Earth with a small ‘‘e’’ are not yet ‘‘seeing ourselves as others can see us’’ from elsewhere than aboard our cosmically minuscule planet.
21 I have also chosen to omit, as Fuller did, the commonly used article the in front of the word Universe. Fuller felt that there was but a single Universe, of which he and everyone else was a part, and he was not willing to separate himself from Universe or relegate it to a less significant status by the article the, which implies that others also exist.
22 He defined Universe as ‘‘the aggregate of all humanity’s consciously apprehended and communicated nonsimultaneous and only partially over-lapping experiences.’’ Because Fuller perceived everything as being com-posed of energy experiences, his definition of Universe is all inclusive.
23 This is but one example of Fuller’s comprehensive character. The difficulty for both scholars and individuals from all walks of life has always been categorizing Fuller’s inclusiveness for easy comprehension. This book does not attempt any such classification. Instead, it presents the significant underlying principles which guided Bucky in being able to successfully operate in so many areas. By documenting those principles as well as presenting examples of how he utilized them, I hope to share some portion of the understanding and the essence of his wisdom which Bucky has so graciously contributed to my life.
24 Lloyd Steven Sieden
25 July 1, 1989