Learning from Living Systems
Natural principles are a core part of regenerative practices. They are seen in permaculture, biomimicry, biophilic design, systems-thinking, regenerative leadership, regenerative economics, ancient and indigenous wisdom.
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Rebuilding Tulsa With or Without Reparations
The whole tapestry of Black Wall Street, with all its complexities, deserves the spotlight, even as the fight for concrete compensation in the form of reparations continues.
Review: The Burning World by J. G. Ballard
For all its bleakness, The Burning World offers a more hopeful outlook on humanity’s future than does The Drowned World. While the latter leaves no room for hope that human extinction can be averted, the former hints at the possibility of recovery and renewal for humanity.
“Where California Goes, There Goes the Nation”
If residential solar has succeeded exceptionally well and has so much possibility, why are we intent on destroying desert ecology with massive, industrial-scale solar farms? The answer in Gavin Newsom’s California has much more to do with politics and corporate avarice than with mitigating climate change.
A Trophic Perspective on Fossil Fuels
Will we stay under the sway of the illusion of limitless growth, till no body of water or plot of land or lungful of air is left untouched by our profligate economic system? Or will we choose the steady-state path, gently tapering off our steroid supply through intentional government policies and adjustments to our way of life? Only our actions will tell.
The Volunteers: Excerpt
Wassailing is an old pagan tradition: villagers would visit the orchards on Twelfth Night to drive out the devil by creating a bit of a din and to appease good spirits by making offerings to the tree to ensure a good harvest. The word “wassail” is thought to be old English for good health.
What Might a Post-Growth Olympics Look Like?
Processing these simultaneous truths — inspiration on the one hand, and systemic injustice on the other — feels like a microcosm for our wider dilemma. As we co-create a new/old system, a pluriverse of alternatives, what do we want to keep — and what will we leave behind? What might a post-growth Olympic Games look like?
From growth fetish to post-growth
It’s time for something better. To me, that something better is post-growth, where society focuses major policy interventions on growing the activities that benefit people, place, and planet and on shrinking those things that do the opposite and, all the while, not pausing to worry about GDP.
What Could A Climate Corps Do? Part 2
Living machines are essentially intensive, indoor artificial wetlands. Technical names for living machines include “advanced ecologically engineered systems” and “fixed-film ecology wastewater treatment systems.” What they entail is mimicking natural processes of biological decomposition in a constructed aquatic environment.
Off-grid: further thoughts on the failing renewables transition
There’s nothing wrong with propounding for renewables. What’s problematic is propounding for a like-for-like transition of the existing fossil-based global growth economy to a future renewables-based one. A renewables-based transition to a lower-energy, more equitable, local and agrarian economy could be a wonderful thing.
This is what collapse looks like
This is not a heroic tale. There are no handsome protagonists bringing salvation at the end of the flood. There are only fleeting rainbows. And the miraculous thing is that this is enough.
On a rural Hawaiian island, solar provides a path to energy sovereignty
Fueled by grit, aloha ‘aina, and a quest for sovereignty, Molokaʻi’s path to energy independence stands as an illuminating model of community-driven change, especially for other remote and rural locales.
