Fuller Moon
- Jonathan Durkin
- Oct 8
- 2 min read
Fuller Moon is an innovative eight-part blog series that applies Buckminster Fuller's revolutionary systems thinking to lunar development. Created by a research team exploring the Minimum Viable Infrastructure (MVI) for sustainable lunar habitation, the series serves as a philosophical and practical foundation for the forthcoming book "Operating Manual for Spaceship Moon"—a spiritual successor to Fuller's seminal "Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth."
The Series Concept
Each installment builds progressively on Fuller's principles, showing how the lunar environment's unforgiving nature demands a fundamental rethinking of how we design infrastructure, manage resources, and conceptualize wealth. Rather than treating the Moon as a place to export Earth's fragmented approaches, Fuller Moon positions lunar development as a laboratory for comprehensive design—where systems must work synergetically to create regenerative cycles capable of sustaining human life indefinitely.
Part 1: "Thinking Like Nature" – Synergy in Lunar Systems
The inaugural piece establishes why the Moon's harsh environment transforms systems design from an optimization strategy into an existential requirement. Through systematic analysis of twelve interdependent lunar infrastructure systems—from transportation to import/export economics—it demonstrates how each component must serve multiple functions, creating a regenerative whole where "waste" from one system becomes resource for another.
Drawing from Fuller's principles of ephemeralization (doing more with less) and synergetic design, this examination reveals how lunar development forces humanity to prototype closed-loop, zero-waste systems that Earth urgently needs. The Moon isn't portrayed as humanity's escape route but as our laboratory for planetary-scale systems thinking.
Part 2: "Wealth Beyond Tokens" – Metaphysical Capital as Lunar Currency
The second installment redefines wealth in the lunar context, contrasting Earth's speculative economies (symbolized by NFTs and digital assets) with the Moon's stark reality where knowledge directly determines survival. It argues that on the Moon, the most valuable resource isn't what you possess but what you comprehend—your ability to understand and manipulate interconnected systems.
This piece introduces the concept of knowledge infrastructure as critical to lunar development, exploring how digital twins, integrated information systems, and collaborative know-how capture become essential components of lunar architecture. It positions "metaphysical capital"—the accumulated understanding that grows through application—as potentially the Moon's most valuable export back to Earth.
More to Come...
The remaining six installments will continue exploring Fuller's principles through lunar development challenges, building toward a comprehensive framework for sustainable off-world habitation that could ultimately inform better systems design on Earth. Fuller Moon represents not just theoretical musings, but practical philosophy that could guide humanity's next great leap beyond our home planet.
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