100 Minda

Dari seluruh dunia

Arlene Blum

Executive Director,
Green Science Policy Institute

Berkeley, United States

One hundred years in the future, our world would at last follow the Buddhist mantra “to live our lives to increase the happiness and decrease the suffering of all sentient beings.”

I imagine a vibrant world where business decisions are made with consideration of our health and environment as well as the bottom line. New and innovative technologies allow for interconnected teams working together virtually without the necessity of being in an office. Work is balanced with life and integrated with family time and outdoor recreation.

As a mountain climber who loves the outdoors, I can imagine people working in beautiful settings in the high mountains, in meadows with colorful wild flowers, or on tranquil beaches as well as harmonious indoor environments. Teams of colleagues find inspiration in their surroundings and make their decisions with creativity, consensus, and mutual respect.

Formal work environments would contain healthy products manufactured from renewable resources. In selecting the materials for products, manufacturers would consider their health and environmental impacts, as well as their cost and utility.

Chemicals, all tested for their impacts on living systems before being used, would increase the quality of human life without causing harm to human or animal health or our environment. The prevention of health problems such as cancer, autism, and infertility through better regulation of chemicals would prove to be much more cost-effective and humane than trying to cure these illnesses. Public and environmental health would be considered in all policy decisions.

The enormous resources wasted in the current conflict between the chemical industry and advocates for our health and environment would instead go into the development of healthy green chemicals to provide the functionality needed without the threat of harm.

There would be communication and collaboration among the scientists studying the impacts of chemicals, the industries using them, and the policymakers regulating them. With scientific research brought directly to policymakers, we would have better policies that consider health and environmental impacts of chemicals prior to their use.

In summary, one hundred years in the future, our world would at last follow the ancient Buddhist mantra “to live our lives to increase the happiness and decrease the suffering of all sentient beings.”

Arlene Blum Bio:

Arlene Blum PhD, biophysical chemist, author, and mountaineer is a Visiting Scholar in Chemistry U.C. Berkeley and also Executive Director of the Green Science Policy Institute. The Institute brings government, industry, scientists and citizens' groups together worldwide to support chemical policies to protect human health and the global environment.

Her current "mountain," which she considers her life’s most challenging and important, is to change policy to reduce the use of harmful chemicals in consumer products. Blum’s research and policy work has contributed to stopping the use toxic flame retardants in children's sleepwear and other products globally. She currently teaches a class on chemistry and policy at U. C. Berkeley and has taught at Stanford University and Wellesley College.

Blum led the first American—and all-women’s—ascent of Annapurna I, considered one of the world’s most dangerous and difficult mountains, completed the Great Himalayan Traverse across the mountain regions of Bhutan, Nepal, and India, and hiked the length of the European Alps with her baby daughter on her back.

She is the author of Annapurna: A Woman’s Place and Breaking Trail: A Climbing Life. Blum’s awards include selection by the UK Guardian as one of the World’s 100 Most Inspiring Women in 2011 and National Women’s History Project selection as one of "100 Women Taking the Lead to Save Our Planet.”