Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
What made Europeans so successful in the task of conquering the world? My interpretation is that it was the result of periodic “Seneca Collapses” of the European population which made it possible to accumulate resources that would then be available to propel the European expansion. It is an effect that may be called the”Seneca Rebound” that makes growth faster after a collapse.
In principle, churches and congregations are hubs where people gather organically. Being places where people gather organically, faith communities are existing hubs where folks can be more naturally inspired to collaborate toward bigger goals that escape the short reach of individuals.
The crisis in democracy is much discussed these days, but almost entirely in political terms that ignore its deeper causes.
How would you describe the process in which a small country builds a 35,000 kilometer network of fully separated bike infrastructure – and traffic-calms 75 per cent of their urban streets to a speeds of 30 km/h (19 mph) or less?
But we can—we really can imagine and live with fewer “conveniences”—and even like it. At the risk of being an outlier today, I’ll continue to take the long way, the inconvenient way, for you, Julia—and for your generation.
On the 157th anniversary of the Great Beaufort Skedaddle, it’s worth remembering that sometimes doubling down on one’s way of life brings about catastrophe from which there is no recovery.
In the 158th year of the American civil war, also known as 2018, the Confederacy continues its recent resurgence. Its victims include black people, of course, but also immigrants, Jews, Muslims, Latinos, trans people, gay people and women who want to exercise jurisdiction over their bodies.
The 2018 midterm elections will be memorialized as among the most contentious in modern history. Charges and counter-charges of racism, lies, corruption, and sexual predation are not all the lead up to November’s balloting will be remembered for, however. The 2018 elections are also proving to be the most expensive midterms to date.
All of this commotion we call industrial civilization understandably looks like progress to those living through it and fortunate enough to die before the decline begins.
When social reformers fail to make good on their promises, it is of little surprise that they get punished. Any legitimate State or ruling body needs to maintain the trust of its citizens in order to function. When trust is lost, the vacuum is created for the “strong man” to walk in.
At some point you realise it’s not about belonging, it’s about being at home in your own skin, on this Earth, wherever you land, and deciding to pay the debt, your family’s debt, your culture’s debt, stretching back through the centuries. The buck stops here, you say. I’m not going anywhere.
All alarms have gone off in Latin America’s democracies. Bolsonaro’s triumph in Brazil is the consolidation of an emerging global trend which uses social aversion to politics to establish authoritarian and often openly anti-democratic alternatives.
