Members Rachel Armstrong

10 minutes ago: Future cities will need to have some qualitatively differences to modern cities but change does not mean tearing down what already exists. This is simply silly. In my book I refer to 'extreme recycling' of cities where structural elements such as concrete and steel that mature with age are kept in situ and new kinds of 'skins' that have more biological-like and dynamic materials in them can start to perform some of the kinds of functions that we'd normally attribute to plants. Most of us will not be able to live in Masdar and sustainable enclaves so one of the biggest challenges that I hope that living technologies can address is in our existing building stock. I think that we will firstly experience a series of incremental changes as some of these new technologies can increase the quality of the local environment in physical but also in terms of its psychological impact. We need to make room for nature in our cities. We can be inventive about what this actually means now that we are able to design and engineer with biological systems to the degree that we are currently able. But we also need to respect our environment and also the wishes of communities. Facilitating a transition towards a City 2.0 (as the TED Prize states) has really got to start with a change in mindset as to what is possible, education, addressing infrastructures, meeting the needs of populations and lastly changing the way that our architectures are made. In that order. Also this is just my opinion and I am very keen to hear your views as to how change may be possible - it is so vital for a humane future in cities - and so pressing upon us!

15 minutes ago: I'm going to try to quickly cover the couple of outstanding questions that I promised to address as I am running out of time! I have been reading all the comments and totally welcome them all. I think that the TED Prize City 2.0 is really raising an important question about a 'wish' - in other words trying to locate the point of action, the kind of organisation that we're lacking that may help us address some of these essential yet complex issues in addressing the future for our cities. There is a lot at stake ... I'd call it our humanity ... if we don't change where we're heading - we'll end up where we deserve.

20 minutes ago: Antoine - I agree that measures are being taken to address carbon counts but the big picture is that this kind of legislation is simply buying us time whilst we look for a real paradigm shift in ways of making - that invert the current situation from being damaging or neutral for the environment to being actually beneficial to it. I cover a few of these ideas in my book http://www.ted.com/pages/tedbooks
... which I am referring to for want of time :) However, the conundrum and constantly moving targets are twofold - the obsolescence of buildings - that once they are built are no longer ideally fit for purpose or have already outdated technology/solutions AND the ever changing nature of the public in terms of employment, the use of public space - dynamic things that aren't measurable in carbon credits that have an impact on the experience and design of cites. However, I do concede that making positive efforts to use energy more carefully efficiently and resourcefully is something to be actively celebrated and pursued. It's not not the whole picture of a thriving community or a successful city.

25 minutes ago: Mary, That is indeed totally heartbreaking to hear - there are some very deep issues about value that are so necessary to have when it comes to the nature of our cities. I agree with you in how topsy turvy our environments have become when inert surfaces are considered more desirable than living ones - mainly by property developers rather than civic communities I will also add. After all - we do not live 'in nature' but in architecture - this is our local environment and as Darwin observed, these intimate niches have a real effect on our well being. Again this raises issues about who is planning the long term for our cities. What is the long term vision for the places that we live in and how are we engaging our children and our grandchildren in helping us achieve these long term visions. I simply do not trust the 'market' to make any decisions that have any real impact more than a 3-5 year product cycle away. Leaving everything to the marketplace has simply productised the future - and it's not a real future - it's just a drawn out version of our present.

35 minutes ago: Those contexts are just some very simple rules that it was possible to examine using the living technology that I have been working with since 2009. It has been an amazing experience being able to work with a technology that really does look as if it is alive but since it has no DNA, it is not called 'alive'. However, that this technology breaks a lot of rules that machines obey helped me look again afresh at the way that world appeared to be organised around me and how it might be possible to use the powerful visualisation that the technology offered as a way of re-imagining what may be possible. Take a look for yourself - this is a series of films that were taken of the technology - they are not animation but real footage of simple droplets behaving in a remarkably lifelike way. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFagK5Lshlg [credit Michael Simon Toon]