The Beauty of Information + Sustainability (post one of two)

I made a huge mistake when choosing my degree path in university. This is something for me to say, because I have been to 3 universities, began in the sciences, moved over to the social sciences, and ended up in a program that is based on both (Environmental Studies + Political Science at the University of Victoria). In other words, I took my time exploring what university had to offer.

And yet, in the end, after taking my time to explore, I wish I had gone to design school. I didn’t because I didn’t even know such a discipline existed, and there were no designers in my family. This is because I believe that the visualization and design of data, information, and arguments is the key to get us where we need to go as a society. Bear with me here – I will explain.

Design exists in the realm of problem solving. It is an applied discipline that, I believe, has the capability of helping us solve our biggest challenges, climate change being the biggest of all. But let’s start smaller….

Information alone does not lead us to act or change our behaviour. Facts do not win us arguments at the end of the day (witness the Tea Party in the US, or right wing fanatacism and its successful influence on US politics over the last generation. Neither of those things are built on facts.) Emotional connection to ideas and stories, coupled with persuasion is what leads us to act and change.

For example, a well designed presentation can change the world. Take Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth – the mother of all examples here – the presentation not only sparked a movement in terms of on the ground climate educators, it got the world to pay attention to the issue in a way it hadn’t beforehand, as well as completely transform the image and reputation of a politician in a previously unthinkable way.

Information design, done well, can change the way we see the world, and the way we choose to interact with it afterward.

David McCandless, founder of Information is Beautiful (a site I’ve been a fan of for quite some time), is someone who does information design on an exceptional level. Check out his TED talk on “The beauty of data visualization” and we’ll continue this conversation in my next post.

I want to talk about how this links to solving the climate crisis, complex problems in general, and having communities connect to sustainability.

Tagged as: Climate Change, information design, sustainability