Beliefs or images of reality, as distinct from reality
Such simple words, Freedom and Necessity. What do they mean? Their meanings seem obvious, right? Well, not quite. Freedom to what? Freedom from what? What is necessary, really? Are there conditions or limitations? Read the fine print, there are always conditions. Freedom We could go back to the various origins of the idea of freedom, … More On Freedom and Necessity: A Reality Check
It was 100ᴼ Fahrenheit in Santa Fe over the weekend. Okay, no big deal compared to Phoenix at, what was it? 114ᴼF? Of course, the waters around the tip of the Florida Peninsula this week hit near hot-tub levels of around 97ᴼ F. I could cite many other examples from all over the world, of … More Everything Everywhere Coming at Us from All Directions
When Senator Markey and Representative Ocasio Cortez first introduced their resolution calling on the U.S. to pass a “Green New Deal” (GND), I was enthused to realize that two members of the legislature could actually call upon their colleagues to take the nation in a whole new direction by directly confronting the growing climate crisis … More How Green is the New “Green New Deal”?
I ran across a fascinating and very important article the other day on LinkedIn, thanks to Erica Gies, author of Water Always Wins, who reposted it from Charles Eisenstein’s Substack.com platform. The importance of Eisenstein’s essay is that it clarifies the often-blurred line between the ideal and the real in what many loosely call ‘climate … More Carbon vs. Conservation: On the Necessary Maturing of the ‘Environmental Movement’
Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) is at the center of current buzz among techies, business people, and economists these days. Why? Well, recently developed AI software appears to be able to generate increasingly human-like ‘intelligence,’ at least on the surface. Vastly improved voice recognition software allows human language to be processed by AI software in order … More The Buzz on ChatGPT vs the Original A.I.
I guess ‘atmospheric rivers’ have been a thing with climate researchers for a while now. Despite closely following the news in climate science for a couple of decades, I had not heard of them. Then, suddenly California was hit by a series of severe storms that they are calling an “atmospheric river.” The L.A. Times … More Wait, What? Atmospheric Rivers and Us.
I have thought about the implications of the wisdom of indigenous cultures for industrial-consumer culture for quite a while now. The dominant worldview of industrial civilization, despite its power to control some elements of Nature, for a while, is so clearly out of step with the fundamental principles of both science and indigenous wisdom in … More Indigenous and Dominant Worldviews: Realism vs. Illusion
COP27 did not disappoint. Disappointment implies that one had expected something positive. After decades of dodging the action question of the necessity of major reductions in carbon emissions and therefore producing and using fossil fuels, there had been (and still is) NO indication that any nation would commit to action. Thus, they did not disappoint. … More The Legacy of COP27: COP28 and Chronic Failure
The “deep state” has gotten a lot of press lately, mostly bad since it is deemed anti-democratic. Why is nobody talking about the “shallow state”? I’ll define what I mean by that in a minute. But first, let’s be clear about what the ‘deep state’ really is. Recently the radical right weaponized the concept of … More The Deep State or The Shallow State: Is That the Question?
Because a few weeks have passed since the Uvalde, Texas school massacre, one might think that the dust has settled and whatever policy measures are needed have been implemented or ignored. End of story? No. Barely the beginning. We have not even begun to address the deep chasm in our understanding of law enforcement, community, … More The Incredible Darkness of Being a Fake Cop: Illusions of Law Enforcement as Civic Culture Decays
Robert MacNeil Christie, Author 