“Most people are convinced that as long as they are not overtly forced to do something by an outside power, their decisions are theirs, and that if they want something, it is they who want it. But this is one of the great illusions we have about ourselves. A great Read more…
I talk a lot about how our socio-cultural conditioning has created the myriad global problems we suffer from today. While I think I have been clear about this, recently, I got a question from a friend to explain more what I mean by this conditioning. Look at the image on Read more…
“The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it and ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is” Winston Churchill. I have been told by a couple of close friends that if they ever saw fairies at the bottom of their garden, I would be the first person Read more…
“The proper way to fix the world isn’t to fix the world. There’s no reason to assume that you are even up to such a task. But you can fix yourself. You’ll do no one any harm by doing so, and in that manner at least, you will make the Read more…
Today’s post is from a set of ideas and musings I have stored up. Still pertinent to the Espe stories I have been posting this last six months. A couple of friends who read my blog comment that I don’t say enough about the sustainable technologies. Yes, there are a Read more…
I recently had a friend ask why I am talking about propaganda instead of giving more direct insights about sustainability. The reason, as regular readers of the blog will already know, is simple; our modern world is a result of how we live destructively to the planet because of the Read more…
“Propaganda works best when those who are being exposed are confident that they are acting on their own free will” Joseph Goebbels. I watched the historic series The Last Kingdom and what struck me was the way that it was all about the fight for power. That is the power Read more…
“The point of modern propaganda isn’t only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth” Garry Kasparov A revisiting to explain more why I spend time talking about propaganda and personal sovereignty in connection to Sustainability. Years ago, when I was an Read more…
I often talk about potential ideas for creating a sustainable human culture on this planet. Technological sustainability is an exciting field with amazing innovation and potential. Yet, even 50 years after international recognition of our ecological problems (UNCHE, 1972 and 30 years since UNCED (Rio, 1992), all we have had Read more…
In the last post I overviewed stupidity that causes socio-cultural harm and if left unchecked can lead to totalitarian systems of manipulation and control. According to the Cipolla quadrant scheme, I interpret the world being run by a small group of the Bandits with lots of stupid people supporting them. Read more…
“Wisdom and knowledge is everywhere, but so is stupidity” Trudi Canavan Strange times we live in. Someone I know well recently called me stupid because I disagreed with her (she ardently trusts the MSM). I was merely asking her to consider a different perspective that countered her well entrenched beliefs. Read more…
Years ago, when I first started teaching environmental science, it seemed a lot simpler (although anything environmental has always been an uphill struggle) with mainly a push for non-polluting green technology, trying to get business to adopt a better set of practices (e.g., Triple Bottom Line), and a need to Read more…
Throughout the Earth’s long history of life, there have been 5 mass extinctions due to cataclysmic conditions. (A mass extinction is usually defined as a loss of about three quarters of all species in existence across the entire Earth over a “short” geological period of time. Given the vast amount Read more…
I was again looking over The Patterning Instinct by Jeremy Lent who really does have fascinating insights into how humanity has historically created our worldviews and the cultural norms we take for granted (see earlier post Cultivating a Flourishing Future 3 – Manifested New Perspectives {November 2018}). Lent shines a Read more…
Back during the Roman times, soldiers were often paid in ‘Salt’ (it is the Latin origin of the word salary), which they could barter for other goods they wanted. Salt has an intrinsic value and has multiple uses besides spicing up your food – one of its primary uses for Read more…
When we watch movies about wizards and witches, they are always making things happen by casting ‘spells’ using strange ancient magical words in arcane languages. Yet, the reality is that all Words, in whatever language, have power. All of us wield this power every day with impunity not recognizing the Read more…
“We must be careful not to believe things simply because we want them to be true. No one can fool you as easily as you can fool yourself.” Richard Feynman. A question I have asked often of my readers is, “do you want to thrive or simply survive?” And if Read more…
“You are not responsible for the programming you received in childhood. But as an adult, you are 100% responsible for fixing it.” Tiny Buddha.com Laying down new neural pathways is a key to reprogramming our brains (see previous post VISION – How we focus on what we really Want 4). Read more…
Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom. Viktor E Frankl In psychology it is said that the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior, which is because of the Read more…
The greatest threat to our planet is the [disempowering] belief that someone else will save it. Earth Guardians I have talked with people about why we seem to have so little faith in our own better angels. Experiences with greed and the lack of community seem to be the main Read more…
“Unlimited power in the hands of limited people always leads to cruelty.” David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas One of the biggest problems we have is not all the chaos we see in the world, it is how we live with each other. We live in a never ending drama of our own creation. Read more…
When I moved away from being a research biochemist, I found myself exploring and researching about beliefs. What intrigued me was why they were barriers to environmental changes that I perceived should be a no brainer to make for a better world for everyone. In my dissertation I had a Read more…
I was asked to expand on the idea of chaos that I brought up in the last post. A universal principle is that de-construction occurs before re-construction. Whether it be a supernova or collapse and rebuilding of a ‘civilization, the old always de-constructs before the new re-constructs. It doesn’t have Read more…
“Time and Space are modes by which we think, and not conditions by which we live.” Albert Einstein We exist within a field, and this field responds to our thinking, our consciousness. All limitations in our life exist because we have created them at the deepest level of our psyche. Read more…
In much earlier posts (Health – Sickcare 1 & 2) I have talked about the Microbiome and its importance to our personal health. There is much news about more natural health care, but then there is also the response from the science and medical community that automatically debunks such options. Read more…
When I was still teaching about sustainability, I sometimes used the simulation program Sim City. The first time I used this program was back in the early 1990s. (SimCity is a city-building and urban planning simulation game.) What becomes clear from doing this kind of simulation is that there are Read more…
I was able to do a lot of reading over the holiday period. As we begin a new year, a little backtrack to emphasize much of what we all seem to keep forgetting. All of the ideas I express in this post I will cover in more depth in the Read more…
Psycho-neuro immunology – How people think affects not only how they feel but also the neurotransmitter systems in the body – so how you think really does affect your well-being and your health in a direct physical way. Stress from fear and anxiety has been shown to compromise the immune Read more…
I had prepared three more posts when computers being what they are I somehow managed to lose the file as it was backing up. Despite spending two hours trying to locate a previous version, I have given up. So, today’s, blog is an overview of where we are to date Read more…
In the last post I commented on negativity when talking about problems and issues and also the use of interpretive techniques to get people to listen more attentively rather than just tuning out. The mass media has done a wonderful job in scaring us about a multitude of issues and Read more…