My name is Phoenix Godwin, I'm 21 years old. I currently live and have grown up in North America in Savannah, Georgia. After one year of high school I left the school system and started to become self-taught- returning only to take the GED and SAT tests. I've grown up with a passion for reading and writing, and have also developed a strong passion for philosophy, existentialism, and a little politics as well. Though I try to keep from getting too emotionally involved in the political landscape, I see it as necessary sometimes in order to create societal progress. My largest personal accomplishment in that front (and probably to date) was founding the Savannah chapter of the worldwide 'Occupy' movement.

In my personal existential journey I have come to recognize many things I feel to be very important, most of all the intrinsic quality of nature. In that I've come to learn how totalitarian agriculture (monoculture) has since it's inception been shaping the path for the majority of the human race in ways that are both ultimately destructive and unsustainable. I am sometimes disappointed in my fellow man for not recognizing this in itself, but mostly I've just developed a resolve to do everything I can to come up with a viable solution. I see permaculture as that solution.

The human culture (aside from the few surviving indigenous cultures that remain unassimilated) suffers from a vicious cycle. Most people don't recognize this cycle, and if they do they don't see it as bad because it has almost single handedly been responsible for creating the conquered world we live in today. But as we use totalitarian agriculture and monoculture, we do and always have been since it's initial use created a surplus of food. Simply put, any biological species that has a constant surplus of food will gain an increased population to match. It's only a matter of time before our exponential population increase reaches a critical mass. Obviously creating more food won't solve this problem. And even if it's the smart thing to do, our society will not stop increasing our food production either, due to the fact that the population is increasing and there are starving people who still are neglected food. It's my belief that the solution calls for the redistribution of agriculture itself. I believe that if worldwide communities and homesteads learned to be self-sustaining in their food production through the use of permaculture, it would halt our exponential cycle and ultimately stabilize the population explosion- with the added perk of choking out the monocultural industry that produces such ecological damage as the work of companies like Monsanto. This is why it has become my goal to learn as much about permaculture as possible. I want to learn all there is to know of the established science and do everything I can to innovate it and bring it closer to the forefront of mainstream society- for the sake of the human condition, and the condition of the planet itself.

(2-27-2012)