Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
While I generally hold Deutsche Welle documentaries in high regard, this one falls disappointingly short of its potential. Don’t watch it if you’re looking for an in-depth exploration of cognitive and neurological barriers to climate action.
In this Frankly, Nate explores the concept of Light Triad personalities and their struggle against the Dark Triad forces shaping our social, economic, and ecological landscape.
Either the Trump administration doesn’t understand that making personnel cuts across the U. S. government in this manner will not increase efficiency OR it intends to make government agencies ineffective.
Today, Nate is joined by storyteller and social thinker, Dougald Hine, to explore the importance of narratives in shaping our understanding of the world and how they can help us navigate the complexities of life, especially in the face of ecological crises.
The rise of supermarket chains, the fast food chains, factory farming, food waste, the conversion of landscapes into monocultures, food deserts, obesity, malnutrition, ultra-processed food, you name it –the four mega-drivers have a lot more explanatory power than the prevailing, and infantile, narrative of consumer preferences.
This world is not a billiard ball table where we advance by banging into one another. It is a world of relationships, constantly changing, everything in some way feeding everything else. It is a world of mutuality and reciprocity.
Hyperbole is impossible when discussing the seriousness of what’s happening in Washington. When I speak of a wrecking ball to government, I mean federal agencies usurping the legislative branch’s powers, with a strong possibility of ignoring decisions of the judicial branch.
The combination of the changed societal metabolism and the demographic drag will most likely mean the end of growth, even without the prevailing resource constraints.
Birdsongs have inspired poets and lovers, becoming one of the philosophical focal points in ancient Greece and Rome. They have also led to several long-ago debates about the relationship between birdsong and human language.
Today, Nate is joined by environmental health researchers Leo Trasande and Linda Birnbaum, as well as environmental policy advocate Christina Dixon, to discuss the harmful effects of plastic on human health and the ongoing global policy efforts to regulate the plastic and petrochemical industries.
And so, I plant. I keep pounding the ground, accompanied by several jars of saved seeds… I am lifted from my lethargy by the promise of arugula, endive, radicchio, lettuce, chicory… and resilience.
Words can’t fully express our current predicament. We need other tools and other ways of making sense of the situation we now find ourselves in.
