ABSTRACT
White embodies everything—the abstraction of environmentalism as much as its green practicality. Ecology is the study of relationships–of how things affect one another through interactive processes and how they transmute or evolve as a result. How people interact or view the natural world, and what changes arise from this becomes, therefore, central to any ecological discourse. An ecological ethic, requires an "open canvas" approach to design, one in which a site's compossible context must be discovered, examined, qualified, and in some instances tested without pre-conception for possible integration with a development program. If a "unity of the arts" is to be achieved in the interest of ecological sustainability, it will have to be driven by an internal, profession-driven adoption of ecology as a compossible-based design ethic. Dean Almy's statement elegantly calls for a "unity of the arts," in as much as the foci of the referenced disciplines–plus others–must merge to effectively address the quality and form of cities.
