Non-appropriable forms still grow despite techno-determinism’s crush

Evidence

Against the odds and the crush of techno-determinism, things keep growing that “small crack in the continuum of catastrophe.” Nature and culture still abound with forms that, like Zhuang Zhou’s useless tree, resist appropriation while sheltering the life beneath them. The newly planted alder trees are growing along Sausal Creek. Mak-‘amham, the Ohlone food pop-up, opened a permanent café this year, and the line spilled out the door on opening day. The migrating birds return each year, for now anyway, and I have not yet been reduced to an algorithm. — Jenny Odell, How to Do Nothing, 673

Categorization

• SEED: The final line ‘have not yet been reduced to an algorithm’ is a strong epigraph for an essay on resisting totalizing frameworks.