Blog
We are the book we’re talking about
And we are what’s at stake in truth-telling. If the interlocutor opposes me because of who I am, will they be impressed that I read a book? No. Even if it is a book they have heard of? No.
Humility: A needed balance
On early modern philosophers and online trolls. In Lewis Carroll’s ‘You Are Old, Father William,’ a young person asks: ‘You balanced an eel on the end of your nose - / What made you so awfully clever?’
What is human dignity?
Where does it come from? How do we know it exists? Does dignity need to be pinned to God, or can it have secular grounding? Is it about humility, pride, or both? What does interdependence have to do with it?
Earthpocalypse isn’t a ‘marginal’ cost (despite what economists say)
A couple observations from ‘El Planeta, Nuestro Cuerpo’. There aren’t ‘better’ ways to buy and sell nature, and GDP can measure poverty as much as profit. The absurdity reveals itself. Let’s choose more wisely.
One billion crabs have had it
Alaska’s snow crabs said: ‘You can’t fire me because I quit’. What happens to animals involves plants, bacteria, landscapes, water, air. Everything is connected. How do the snow crabs feel? When can we ask them?
‘Atlas of a Changing Climate’ shows warming in images
Fundamentals and details explained in Brian Buma’s 2021 book. ‘The Atlas of a Changing Climate’ explains the science in a “relatable and understandable” way, admitting that readers may react with “wonder” or “despair.”
War may change how we rely on big oil
Energy companies’ reactions to Russia’s war on Ukraine. Often, a catastrophe forces a business to change by hitting it in its wallet. This is an ethical crisis too. Businesses have to change. Today.
What we can’t conquer, we destroy and deny
A mindset that rejects wilderness will also reject people. Wilderness is the unknown. Much in the human is unknown too. A mindset that rejects wilderness will also reject humans who don’t fit social norms.
Talking to climate skeptics
Reflecting on ‘How Culture Shapes the Climate Change Debate’ (2015). Most USAmericans are scientifically illiterate. It’s not that they don’t memorize scientific facts; they don’t even know how scientific reasoning works.