Solarpunk

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vibe.

wait solar punk yeah it's just like futuristic like black afrofuturism no it's it's it's really heavy on environmentalism and just greenery everywhere but futuristic

oh

give me is there something that exists um i'd say the closest thing is like the singapore airport have you seen that well

Yes.

Okay, perfect.

All of them need to be reborn.

I love what you're saying about like what i believe the bridge is is how do we bridge innovation and technology and future with with the the ancient way with the natural way and it feels so cool being at the crossroads of that point and that's why i didn't know we were going to talk about this but i'm super excited to talk about something that i've maybe only brought up once or twice on the podcast which is the concept of solar punk, which is happening all over the world right now.

And I believe in my heart is the future.

And I want to put my own stake in the ground on what that would look like.

And it always kind of generates some really great discussions too.

And I think the whole premise of Solarpunk is really refreshing to read after Cyberpunk.

So it envisions kind of this more optimistic world.

We have this world that's powered by renewable and sustainable energy and one which is based on collaboration and reciprocity rather than sabotaging your divisions.

But today's TED-Ed lesson offers a third vision, one that feels radical, precisely because it's beautiful.

It's called Solarpunk, and it's a movement that imagines futures where nature and technology don't compete.

They collaborate.

I'm Sherelle Dorsey, and this is TED Tech, a podcast from TED.

Today's lesson isn't just about energy.

It's about imagination.

Solarpunk envisions a world where nature, technology, art, and social justice coexist to create equitable systems that serve us all.

It challenges the idea that hope is naive and instead suggests that optimism, when grounded in science and community, might be the most powerful technology we have.

We have to ensure we have the mystery and wonder present to make the new world attractive and an adventure that you get to star in.

And for that, we have Solar Punk.

Solarpunk is hopeful, optimistic, inclusive, and self-aware.

It knows that utopian outcomes are hard to reach, but it reaches towards them anyway because we are just quote-unquote too good at imagining bad futures to the point where, when the world starts to look like the future, with AI robots coming online soon, with rockets to other places attempting their climb, where interstellar life and travel is being workshopped, what future are we approaching, and have we really spent time imagining a good one? That brainwork is necessary.

We now have the choice to create a planet that we can all be proud of, the perfect home for ourselves and the rest of life on Earth.

Hello and welcome to the first edition of this Solarpunk podcast.

I'm your host, Pampin, and because this is the first episode, let me quickly explain how things go here.

First of all, those are podcast form edits of my YouTube videos.

Yes.

um so yeah i didn't realize that i'm much more interested in that game um it's it's you know kind of work with creatures and farming on top of the big beast um uh and they call the terror beast but the fact that they were handcrafted clay models and then digitized wow that's awesome um so i'm i'm actually intrigued now um let's see uh solar punk that's kind of it looks like no man's sky it's the farming you create a base you use solar and wind energy i don't have much for this one guys that's our um tales of seikyu um i'm we but not we've enough to pronounce japanese things yeah

i think it's seikyu

yeah um it's the yokai we babe um so we all know i'm all in um Uh, but also I didn't realize, I mean, I should have expected, but I didn't realize it.

So we'll let Kim go last.

Um, I have been playing Solar Punk, which is kind of a cozy little, um, Minecraft-y kind of game.

It's not, it's not got all the voxels and everything like you would, like you would in Minecraft.

It, but it's very similar kind of survival.

And that science fictional aesthetic is staying kind of like that.

Although in one of the futures in the book, Solarpunk, which is a little bit sci-fi, that is one of the attempts to kind of modernize that aesthetic or evolve that aesthetic and make futuristic look new.

But generally, there is a feeling that aesthetics are not changing.

They're not moving on.

And those to me are different things.

And so I don't think any of the futures in this book in their purest form are new in any way.

Solarpunk is the only one that kind of presents itself as new because as a manufactured future, it appeared this century.

And I think it's the only complete futures vision that has emerged this century.