Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Ishmael characterizes the young people’s efforts in the sixties as trying to escape from captivity, but failing to do so “because they were unable to find the bars of the cage.” People of our culture would be relieved to escape captivity, and to simultaneously release Earth from its dire path toward collapse—except we can’t identify the bars.
A DeSmog dispatch from Prince Rupert, which could be ground zero for Canada’s next big oil export fight.
The Filière Nantaise stands as a model of how such policy ambitions can be put into practice on the ground. It is proving that small-scale, local, and rare can also mean ambitious, forward-thinking, and economically viable.
Already a land of rapid climatological change, Greenland could soon grow richer — and more powerful on the world stage. Ton by ton, its disappearing ice will reveal more of the mineral solutions to the world’s woes.
In this Frankly, Nate unpacks the influence of beliefs on our feelings, and how it ultimately affects our actions. As global risks and complexity intensify and those with political power accelerate deeper divides, adopting an integrative perspective will become essential for fostering connection, cooperation, and civility.
Honest gardening requires that we take stock of and work within existing conditions, that we don’t try to make the garden something that it isn’t or couldn’t be. Honest gardening is a kind of truth telling, the way art or literature can be.
The economy is not a force of Nature or an act of God. It is a set of human-made systems that we tweak and change all the time. Humans invented the economy, which means we could re-invent it.
In artist Toshie Takeuchi’s work, she travels from Belgian archives to Congolese mines to expose the long durée trail of destruction that the powerful uranium leaves behind in the imperial — British, American, French, Belgian, German — drive for wealth and power.
The moral of this story is not to stop being activists. There’s already enough passivity on Capitol Hill. The message is straightforward — careful because the administration could come after you from many directions. So, be prepared.
Have I mentioned how important I think Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael is? I reread it recently for the first time in a while, and was again impressed with how many important modernity-challenging ideas are packed into one novel.
So learn where your water is flowing from and where it is flowing to. How do you affect groundwater viability when you turn on the tap?
In this discussion, Nate is joined by Art Berman, Michael Every, and Izabella Kaminska for a broad exploration of the complex relationship between energy, geopolitics, and economic strategy.
