How to use this Book
Unlike other books or guides, this book does not have a specific order
that one must follow or an official conclusion. There are eight sections,
each having broad headings which encompass many different subcategories
called lenses. Lenses inspire you to look at something in a different
way.
Years ago, in a remote and rural village, a discovery was made which would change the way in which inhabitants viewed their world. As dictated by human nature, people always strive for improvement to their lives and worlds, and this village was no exception. However, the demands of day-to-day survival left little time for exploration into realistic opportunities. Unbeknownst to the residents, a non-edible oil seed-bearing plant which was relatively abundant in the area, housing ingredients critical to Western soap-makers. Even without a shortage of supply of this ingredient, direct harvest from the natural crop offered easy access and little bureaucracy for interested parties, and once the goldmine of opportunity was exposed for what it was, everyone involved benefited. Often times, the solutions to the greatest quandaries of life lie right before our eyes, just waiting to be discovered.
With the introduction of the Botanical Discovery Guide, we hope to merely provide a glimpse through new eyes to parties interested in discovering potential opportunities afforded to them by their local fauna. Not only are outside applications of plant life by-products not known to rural denizens, but these foreign applications may apply to processes, products and usages which are completely unknown to locals - so understandably, it can be very difficult for people like our friends from the village to identify easily utilized opportunities which might be right before their eyes. Inspired by success stories like that of the aforementioned village, Professor Ken Ludwig's Fall 2005 senior design team set out to design a tool which would lay the foundation for exposure of natural and cultural resource discovery to the world at large.
View the Botanical Discovery Guide (PDF)
The Decision Tree was created to help identify the range of issues faced by people who want to identify and solve development problems. It often happens that what one person, or an entire community, sees as a problem is only a symptom of a different problem altogether or a limited view of the problem. Often a too rapid problem definition ignores collateral issues that can cause unintended, sometimes catastrophic, consequences. This tool was created to address these issues and to cause problems to be better defined through a deeper and broader awareness of the conditions surrounding the issue. Unfortunately the Decision Tree is not yet easy to use. The Decision Tree, as it stands, would greatly benefit from a designer's perspective to allow it to be easily downloaded and used under field conditions. What form should it take? How can it be divided into related but smaller parts? What other media can it be used in (print, audio, video, paper. . . ) and how? What can you do to make the Decision Tree better and more widely useful and available?
Download the Decision Tree (Visio)