Our actions have unintended consequences on a collective level.When 300 million people do the same unconscious behavior it can add up to a catastrophic consequence that nobody wanted and nobody intended. Each of us makes daily decisions about what we buy as consumers. We try to envision the world view of our environmental footprint. As we try to decipher the social impact of our daily decisions, the information we have to work with is statistics in the millions, billions and even trillions. There is no meaning in these enormous statistics. What Chris Jordan tries to depict is the one piece of the collective that we are in charge of - our own behavior."Intolerable Beauty" examines the immense scale of the our consumption, "a slow-motion apocalypse in progress": bales of recycled scrap, small cities of shipping containers, endless grids of cell phones, circuit boards, crushed cars and the like."Running the Numbers," examines the statistics of US consumption. Each image represents a statistic, making them more meaningful than the statistic alone. Toothpicks, for examples, depicts one hundred million toothpicks, equal to the number of trees cut in the U.S. yearly to make the paper for junk mail. The number is a vast ocean that stretches beyond our horizon.  "As you walk up close, you can see that the collective is only made up of lots and lots of individuals. There is no bad consumer over there somewhere who needs to be educated. There is no public out there who needs to change. It's each one of us." ~ Chris Jordan on Bill Moyers JournalResources: TED Talks | Chris Jordan: Picturing Excess Chris Jordan PhotographyEnjoy this post? Get more like it. Subscribe in a reader or by Email.

Artist Chris Jordan shows us an arresting view of what Western culture looks like. His supersized images picture some almost unimaginable statistics -- like the astonishing number of paper cups we use every single day.

I love stats - even those that disturb. Watch this video to see how one can visualize some very challenging and important statistics about modern American life.I would like to show this to every student I teach and perhaps present them with, or even better allow them to research, some Australian stats and visually represent these to emphasise the impact on our world.more about "Picture this!", posted with vodpod 

I love stats - even those that disturb. Watch this video to see how one can visualize some very challenging and important statistics about modern American life.

I would like to show this to every student I teach and perhaps present them with, or even better allow them to research, some Australian stats and visually represent these to emphasise the impact on our world.

Here is a tool to get us all thinking and motivated about the impact of our culture of consumption. Chris Jordan is a photographer who has been able to make large numbers real through his artwork. I see good potential for use of this 11 minute video with older students.  In this video he demonstrates his work and gives his motivation for what he does.more about "Chris Jordan pictures some shocking s...", posted with vodpod

more about "Chris Jordan pictures some shocking s...", posted with vodpod

[...Another TED video. Chris Jordan puts our excess into pictures. That's a lot of plastic cups! more ab...]

Another TED video. Chris Jordan puts our excess into pictures. That's a lot of plastic cups!

[...Prima le cose serie, la solita conferenza di Ted: Chris Jordan, fotografo, molto "impressive". poste...]