This was the cover of yesterday’s USAToday:
As you can see, the urban practice of micro-living, a practice that’s more and more becoming a part of Seattle’s ethical life, has entered the mainstream. But what do I mean by ethical life? My meaning is drawn directly from Hegel’s use of sittlichkiet, which means an ethical life. Furthermore, to practice this form of ethical life is to participate in what I call stadtgeist, the spirit of the city. And, yes, I draw this expression from Hegel’s volksgeist; but the spirit of a nation is about marches, speeches, major political parties, the movement of history, war, territory, securing borders, pride during the Olympics—these kinds of feelings. The spirit of the city is much more a performance that connects with other like performances. Together, these performances (the ethical life of recycling, buying used things, walking or cycling to work, living in small spaces, eating less meat, using less energy) become the spirit of the city. The avenues, monuments, skyscrapers, stadiums, or the skyline have nothing to do with the stadtgeist. They are only the stage on which the ethical performance of the city is spiritualized. And this spiritualization, this acitivity, cools over time (in the way the universe cooled into stars, planets, gas clouds, and galaxies) into a substanz—substance in a metaphysical sense.
