Ecological Building Network - The Art and Science of Building Well

There aren't many people who've worked as long and hard in green building as Alex Wilson, and we are all the beneficiaries of his efforts: the BuildingGreen suite of web products, and Environmental Building News magazine, are absolutely the best places to learn about products and issues in green building from a well-informed, impartial source. Alex came across some startling new information recently about foam insulations; have a look:

> Read "Avoiding the Global Warming Impact of Insulation" on Buildinggreen.com.

Did you ever pause to watch a flock of blackbirds in flight? Their lovely swirling and shifting is endlessly fresh and new, a presentation that no human artist could ever match.  Mathematicians figured out that they manage this by each bird following three simple rules of flight:

1. avoid crowding neighbors
2. steer towards average heading of neighbors, and
3. steer towards average position of neighbors

That’s it.  Out of such simplicity—a bunch of birds following extremely simple rules—we get beauty, delight, and, for the birds, biological functionality.