Curiosity and Gardens will Save the World

It can be pretty difficult to sum up a political philosophy into something that will fit on a sign, but "Curiosity and Gardens will save save the world" hits all the major points of what Type 1 or Bust is trying to express. The basic idea is we need to redesign our political and economic structure to encourage people to be curious and to plant gardens. Here is why:

Curiosity

Curiosity is like the opposite of ignorance. In a way, it is also like the opposite of fear, because people fear what they don't understand. If people were more curious, they would pay attention to things more closely, investigate, and gather knowledge to themselves. Having an educated and informed populace capable of critical thinking would go a long way toward stabilizing the planet and sorting out all the smaller details how we help each other fix this mess. On top of that, curious people are open minded, and much less likely to discriminate against others. The best way to encourage curiosity in people is to change the way schools and education work in our world. Reading, writing, and arithmetic should mostly stay they way they are because they are language based, and if you don't follow the rules no one will understand you. However, other topics, like science, history, art, physical education, and the more advanced sides of reading writing and arithmetic like classical literature and calculus, should be much more flexible. The idea is to let people's own curiosity guide them to knowledge, not expect everyone of a certain age to know certain things. The Montessori style of teaching is just one of many well known methods that have been proven effective, however, the looser structure makes it difficult to test. To remedy this, testing could be done more like martial arts, where a student would demonstrate their knowledge and rank up in a subject accordingly. Online programs like Khan Academy have already made steps in this direction, and it isn't hard to imagine similar programs for other subjects. With so much information freely available online, classrooms would be more useful as a place to get hands on experience and skills rather than a place to absorb facts. Learning is a lifelong process, but without curiosity it feels like a tedious chore rather than a cornerstone of modern society.

Gardens

Gardens are useful in multiple ways. For one, they increase the food supply while at the same time keeping it local. If everyone had a garden, even if it was just a few tomato plants, it would have a big impact on the supply and demand of food, which would hopefully make it easier to send surplus food to places that don't have the proper soil to grow their own. Growing more food on a local level would also support the sustainability and resilience of the community it was grown in. Another useful thing about gardens is they encourage people to get some exercise and eat fruits and vegetables, and that will help clear up many of the health problems in the modern world. And finally, growing a garden helps people to slow down and pay attention to nature, which also helps them understand the bigger picture like seasons and climate. Nature is the greatest teacher, and you can learn a lot just by sticking some seeds in the ground and taking care of them.