Branding Tradition: A Bittersweet Tale of Capitalism at Work
The image on a gallon of maple syrup reflects a way of life – slower and less high-tech, more localized and neighborly – that many people rightly yearn for.
Steven Gorelick
The Physics of Energy and the Economy
I approach the subject of the physics of energy and the economy with some trepidation. An economy seems to be a dissipative system, but what does this really mean?
Does your City have a Future?
In the past, as in the future, local ecosystem resources were the key to the economies of cities.
Democratic Energy and Climate Change
The environmental crisis, provoked by human activity, is of much bigger magnitude than any of the other crises we have known up till now.
Retrotopia: Lines of Separation
Our narrator returns from his trip to a tier one county full of doubts about the Lakeland Republic’s prospects, and has those at once challenged and sharpened by a conversation at the local Atheist Assembly…
Review: The Schizophrenic Society by Roger Boyd
The society being referred to as “schizophrenic” here is industrial society.
Can we Afford the Energy Demands of “the Fourth Industrial Revolution”? Don’t Ask.
The founder of the World Economic Forum wrote The Fourth Industrial Revolution to spur discussion at this year’s Davos gathering.
Why oil under $30 per barrel is a major problem
A person often reads that low oil prices–for example, $30 per barrel oil prices–will stimulate the economy, and the economy will soon bounce back. What is wrong with this story? A lot of things, as I see it…
Donald Trump and the Politics of Resentment
Of all the predictions I made for the new year in my post two weeks ago, the one that seems to have stirred up the most distress and derision is my suggestion that the most likely person to be standing up there with his hand on a Bible next January, taking the oath of office as the next president of the United States, is Donald Trump.
What I Learned from my 2015 Garden
With most of the results now in, it’s time to find out what my garden told me in 2015.
China’s One Child Policy: Overwhelmed By Increased Affluence
China’s one child policy is an excellent example of how the main determinant of furure sustainability will be the limitation of increases in consumption per capital, rather than the limitation of absolute population.
Retrotopia: Learning Lessons
Our narrator finishes up his trip to a tier one county, and starts to notice ways in which the Lakeland Republic has gone neither forwards nor backwards, but off on an angle all its own…
