Thanks for this brilliant and important essay Jason. 👏 Always nice to see a tip of the hat to the extraordinary Ed Yong.
Your observations of our ecological blindness and tech powers calls up this observation by EO Wilson:
"The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall."
Thank you, Baird. And I'll steal that Wilson quote for future use... In exchange, here's Gregory Bateson in a longer, somewhat related quote:
"If you put God outside and set him vis-a-vis his creation, and if you have the idea that you are created in his image, you will logically and naturally see yourself as outside and against the things around you. And as you arrogate all mind to yourself, you will see the world around you as mindless and therefore not entitled to moral or ethical consideration. The environment will seem to be yours to exploit.
If this is your estimate of your relation to nature and you have an advanced technology, your likelihood of survival will be that of a snowball in hell."
Welcome, Stef, and thank you for the kind words. Let me know if you have a particular topic that interests you, and if I can I'll point you to something in the archive. Otherwise, thanks for being here and I hope to keep offering work that's meaningful to you.
Another excellent article on the consequences of we humans separating ourselves from our natural world. We have instead cocooned ourselves in an artificial world of our design, which we think is an extension of us. But it is not. It is totally and completely artificial.
Nothing in this digital and computer world is real. We need to admit it. Otherwise, we not only fool ourselves, we continue to not notice reality.
If you want real, step outside and take it all in. Listen. See. Feel.
When I watch our avian companions, how they vocalize, how and when they sit still and when they fly off in a hurry I see a species in harmony with Nature. This is so different than us.
Thank you, Perry, for the support, for the insight into our artifices, and for looking after the birds sharing your home landscape. The more of us with that kind of awareness, the better.
A wonderful post,Jason. An intricate combination, part science and part poetry, masterfully written. I am just a reader on Substack, limiting my
subscriptions to only 23. I appreciate the time each person I read takes in working diligently, whether fiction, science, poetry ,or philosophy .Often ,a brilliant combination of all. I never realized just how unique my own life is ,my own footprint in time. Outside my front door is my arena to explore and play. I refuse to sit inside if given the alternative. Here in the beauty of VT, I am fortunate to indulge myself in the playground of the mountains, to the forest floor, and all that lies in between. The older I get ,the closer I look, the more I stop to listen. The more I appreciate my physical capabilities in every season. Your photograph of the welded metal earth shaped fire pit ;while a beautiful piece of sculpture, I could never sit in front of it to enjoy a relaxing evening ,without feeling disturbed by the image of our earth on fire. And boy are we feeling the effects of global warming in our state. It will be interesting to see what our winter will bring.
Thank you, Lor, for another thoughtful comment. Thanks too for being such a deep reader.
I should say that the Earth firepit image isn't mine. I forgot to indicate the source. It's actually on sale at a company that makes other large creative firepits. This one, though, is a doozy. A bit too on the nose in this Pyrocene age.
Yes, other than the dark days, the New England winters are more autumnal than wintry, and the change has been accelerating.
That does sound nicer, though I'm not afraid of irony either. The Earth fire pit might act as a prod to my conscience, though really there are far too many of those already...
Thank you for taking the time to share important information , pertinent links, and your own insights on the Anthropocene and life in general in a detailed and poetic way ~much appreciated. Also, love the photos and video. The video of the waves is a multidimensional artwork in and of itself. Lovely!
Thank you,
Mary
P.S. I recently visited Maine and thanks to your/a previous article that included the history behind Malaga Island, I was able to look at Maine from different perspectives; e.g., what else has been omitted from history? e.g. there were no land acknowledgements by our tour guides -- only mentions of the magnanimous white men who preserved Maine. . . We did try to visit Malaga Island but the Maine Coast Heritage Trust Google directions were a bit spotty, and we, unfortunately, did not have time to pursue. Maine, such a breathtaking landscape with many hidden histories.
Thank you, Mary, for being a close reader of my work. And I'm glad you're tuned into the Malaga story. You might check out the new novel by Pulitzer prize-winning author Paul Harding, This Other Eden, based on the story. (I haven't read it yet, but he writes beautifully.) Sorry you missed the chance to see Malaga. I can give you directions next time...
I love your writing. I am informed, I am taken up and in, to directly experience the transmutation of energy into matter. Your evocations move and inspire me; help me to sense and see differently. They are, for me, a scientific lens through which to see the sacred. Thank you.
Wow, crossed waves. I've never seen them. They are impressive. But that comment about remains aware that ocean waves are energy moving beneath the sea’s skin, that gets me. It seems a metaphor for something just beyond my power to articulate.
That's nicely said, Diane. For me, it serves as a reminder of the forces moving beneath the surface of things more generally. The physics within biology or ecology, say, or just all that we're not equipped to see directly.
Thank you. I agree with a previous comment. Your writing combines poetry with important information. A pleasure to read. As a Canadian I am saddened and perplexed that our politicians cannot show the leadership to tell it like it is. Seth Klein's book, A Good War is worth a read. He's not advocating war as we see it but he's advocating the we treat the climate catastrophe as the existential emergency that it is. Thanks for the video at the end.
Thank you very much, Julie. "Perplexed" is a great word for how we see leadership so blind (willfully or otherwise) to the scale of what must be done. I hope Klein's book finds a broad readership, especially among the policy-makers. And that video was a lucky thing that I just happened to catch on a dark evening right before publishing.
My thoughts are derailed by the bird flu report, which I also saw. Another outlet had a big report on that last year, too. It's really no joke, Did you see Zeynep Tufekci's op-ed in the NYT about bird flu a few months ago? Sobering and worrying.
I just finished the book "Wild Service: Why Nature Needs You," edited by Nick Hayes. I was very uplifted by the collection of essays advocating for commoning and nature relationship for humans -- all of us, not just landowners.
Yes, somehow we're going to be "surprised" by bird flu, and maybe sooner than later. I haven't read enough (like that NYT op-ed) to have a sense of how fast and how bad it might be, but I know that culturally we're becoming less ready. Population uptake of the latest COVID shot is single digits, I think. In my ever-growing list of things I might write about is bird flu, but with a larger focus on just how devastating it's been for wildlife globally.
I like the title/frame of that book of essays. That should be used more often.
yeah, every time I read about bird flu I kind of wish I hadn’t but on the other hand would rather not be in complete ignorance. Really, really don’t like it. And Tufekci’s op-ed was sobering because it was just a practical look at how little oversight there is and what ineffective the reporting mechanisms are, if they even exist. And that’s just in the U.S.
Right, there should be a well-funded global public program of inspection and info-sharing for any and all animal agriculture. Meat consumption is growing alongside our population, and so are the ways in which zoonotic diseases (and those that infect animals alone) spread. One of those things on the underfunded no-brainer list.
You put in words, perfectly, things I've contemplated since I was a teenager. And thank you for the shout-out! I will add that before we were writers, we were storytellers. Like the bees who do their dance in their hives to tell their sisters where to find the best flowers, we must tell our stories to others. Thank you for this piece! It's left me a bit emotional.
Well, being compared to a dancing bee is about as good as praise gets, Amanda. Thanks for that. And as I've said somewhere in these pieces I write here, this big-picture stuff has been on my mind in one form or another since I was young too. There's that feeling of "why isn't anyone else seeing what I'm seeing," right?
Beautiful writing Jason I own two of Yong's books and they are very eye-opening The many ways the species perceive the world will not save them from us. The tragedy of our species is that we evolved very able to address short term problems, less able to address medium term problems, and tending to ignore long term problems. It's not a problem of wit, it's a problem of the way we set priorities. We are clever but not wise.
I feel that since we primates (what an arrogant name) arose from our antecedents, we along with all other life have contended with each other for energy, most of it from the sun, a smaller fraction from our planet's own heat.
Although the amount of solar energy available far exceeds life's needs, the amount of useable land does not, hence the competition. As we are increasingly crowded into the circumpolar regions by the unavoidable hothouse Earth, the competition for energy will become intense. So many species will be lost in the struggle. A fearful future is coming for them and us.
Thank you, Michael. Did you see the quote from E.O. Wilson, offered in a comment above by Baird Brightman? I think you'll like it as much as I do.
As for us being clever but not wise, I think that's a function of scale. Wisdom is common among individuals and small groups, but doesn't seem to scale as the number of people increases. My mother has a sardonic joke about global IQ being steady but population is increasing... Maybe the solution to everything is figuring out how to scale up wisdom, though in an information economy that seems a harder and harder task.
Jason, thank you for bringing Ed along. And how wonderful to lift up Alpha Lo's writing about terpenes. As always, thank you for translating necessary substance for the community table.
You know I consistently tell you there's a secret writer's molecule in the Maine water. More evidence was detected on Tuesday with the release of What If We Get It Right? by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson🌱
Well, I suppose you'll have to move to Maine... Lots of nooks and crannies along the coast here, each full of craftspeople, writers, hermits, and other necessary folks.
That terpene info was entirely new to me. Fascinating. I need to learn more.
Thanks for this brilliant and important essay Jason. 👏 Always nice to see a tip of the hat to the extraordinary Ed Yong.
Your observations of our ecological blindness and tech powers calls up this observation by EO Wilson:
"The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall."
Thank you, Baird. And I'll steal that Wilson quote for future use... In exchange, here's Gregory Bateson in a longer, somewhat related quote:
"If you put God outside and set him vis-a-vis his creation, and if you have the idea that you are created in his image, you will logically and naturally see yourself as outside and against the things around you. And as you arrogate all mind to yourself, you will see the world around you as mindless and therefore not entitled to moral or ethical consideration. The environment will seem to be yours to exploit.
If this is your estimate of your relation to nature and you have an advanced technology, your likelihood of survival will be that of a snowball in hell."
I am new to your Substack. This is the first article of yours that I’ve read, and I am blown away. Thank you so much.
Welcome, Stef, and thank you for the kind words. Let me know if you have a particular topic that interests you, and if I can I'll point you to something in the archive. Otherwise, thanks for being here and I hope to keep offering work that's meaningful to you.
Another excellent article on the consequences of we humans separating ourselves from our natural world. We have instead cocooned ourselves in an artificial world of our design, which we think is an extension of us. But it is not. It is totally and completely artificial.
Nothing in this digital and computer world is real. We need to admit it. Otherwise, we not only fool ourselves, we continue to not notice reality.
If you want real, step outside and take it all in. Listen. See. Feel.
When I watch our avian companions, how they vocalize, how and when they sit still and when they fly off in a hurry I see a species in harmony with Nature. This is so different than us.
Thank you, Perry, for the support, for the insight into our artifices, and for looking after the birds sharing your home landscape. The more of us with that kind of awareness, the better.
A wonderful post,Jason. An intricate combination, part science and part poetry, masterfully written. I am just a reader on Substack, limiting my
subscriptions to only 23. I appreciate the time each person I read takes in working diligently, whether fiction, science, poetry ,or philosophy .Often ,a brilliant combination of all. I never realized just how unique my own life is ,my own footprint in time. Outside my front door is my arena to explore and play. I refuse to sit inside if given the alternative. Here in the beauty of VT, I am fortunate to indulge myself in the playground of the mountains, to the forest floor, and all that lies in between. The older I get ,the closer I look, the more I stop to listen. The more I appreciate my physical capabilities in every season. Your photograph of the welded metal earth shaped fire pit ;while a beautiful piece of sculpture, I could never sit in front of it to enjoy a relaxing evening ,without feeling disturbed by the image of our earth on fire. And boy are we feeling the effects of global warming in our state. It will be interesting to see what our winter will bring.
Thank you, Lor, for another thoughtful comment. Thanks too for being such a deep reader.
I should say that the Earth firepit image isn't mine. I forgot to indicate the source. It's actually on sale at a company that makes other large creative firepits. This one, though, is a doozy. A bit too on the nose in this Pyrocene age.
Yes, other than the dark days, the New England winters are more autumnal than wintry, and the change has been accelerating.
I figured it wasn’t your
‘flaming earth’ fire pit. You need an outdoor earth shaped topiary with living greenery…
That does sound nicer, though I'm not afraid of irony either. The Earth fire pit might act as a prod to my conscience, though really there are far too many of those already...
Dear Jason,
Thank you for taking the time to share important information , pertinent links, and your own insights on the Anthropocene and life in general in a detailed and poetic way ~much appreciated. Also, love the photos and video. The video of the waves is a multidimensional artwork in and of itself. Lovely!
Thank you,
Mary
P.S. I recently visited Maine and thanks to your/a previous article that included the history behind Malaga Island, I was able to look at Maine from different perspectives; e.g., what else has been omitted from history? e.g. there were no land acknowledgements by our tour guides -- only mentions of the magnanimous white men who preserved Maine. . . We did try to visit Malaga Island but the Maine Coast Heritage Trust Google directions were a bit spotty, and we, unfortunately, did not have time to pursue. Maine, such a breathtaking landscape with many hidden histories.
Thank you, Mary, for being a close reader of my work. And I'm glad you're tuned into the Malaga story. You might check out the new novel by Pulitzer prize-winning author Paul Harding, This Other Eden, based on the story. (I haven't read it yet, but he writes beautifully.) Sorry you missed the chance to see Malaga. I can give you directions next time...
I love your writing. I am informed, I am taken up and in, to directly experience the transmutation of energy into matter. Your evocations move and inspire me; help me to sense and see differently. They are, for me, a scientific lens through which to see the sacred. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Lynne. You express well what I hope to do with the writing. So glad to hear it resonates with you.
Wow, crossed waves. I've never seen them. They are impressive. But that comment about remains aware that ocean waves are energy moving beneath the sea’s skin, that gets me. It seems a metaphor for something just beyond my power to articulate.
That's nicely said, Diane. For me, it serves as a reminder of the forces moving beneath the surface of things more generally. The physics within biology or ecology, say, or just all that we're not equipped to see directly.
Thank you. I agree with a previous comment. Your writing combines poetry with important information. A pleasure to read. As a Canadian I am saddened and perplexed that our politicians cannot show the leadership to tell it like it is. Seth Klein's book, A Good War is worth a read. He's not advocating war as we see it but he's advocating the we treat the climate catastrophe as the existential emergency that it is. Thanks for the video at the end.
Thank you very much, Julie. "Perplexed" is a great word for how we see leadership so blind (willfully or otherwise) to the scale of what must be done. I hope Klein's book finds a broad readership, especially among the policy-makers. And that video was a lucky thing that I just happened to catch on a dark evening right before publishing.
My thoughts are derailed by the bird flu report, which I also saw. Another outlet had a big report on that last year, too. It's really no joke, Did you see Zeynep Tufekci's op-ed in the NYT about bird flu a few months ago? Sobering and worrying.
I just finished the book "Wild Service: Why Nature Needs You," edited by Nick Hayes. I was very uplifted by the collection of essays advocating for commoning and nature relationship for humans -- all of us, not just landowners.
Yes, somehow we're going to be "surprised" by bird flu, and maybe sooner than later. I haven't read enough (like that NYT op-ed) to have a sense of how fast and how bad it might be, but I know that culturally we're becoming less ready. Population uptake of the latest COVID shot is single digits, I think. In my ever-growing list of things I might write about is bird flu, but with a larger focus on just how devastating it's been for wildlife globally.
I like the title/frame of that book of essays. That should be used more often.
yeah, every time I read about bird flu I kind of wish I hadn’t but on the other hand would rather not be in complete ignorance. Really, really don’t like it. And Tufekci’s op-ed was sobering because it was just a practical look at how little oversight there is and what ineffective the reporting mechanisms are, if they even exist. And that’s just in the U.S.
Right, there should be a well-funded global public program of inspection and info-sharing for any and all animal agriculture. Meat consumption is growing alongside our population, and so are the ways in which zoonotic diseases (and those that infect animals alone) spread. One of those things on the underfunded no-brainer list.
I like seeing the otherwise unseen through your eyes and ideas and prose, Jason. Thanks.
Nice article. We are a contradiction, clever and blind at the same time. Indigenous people had a far wiser way of living when we landed on the shores of America. https://geoffreydeihl.substack.com/p/imagine-an-earth-first-policy
You put in words, perfectly, things I've contemplated since I was a teenager. And thank you for the shout-out! I will add that before we were writers, we were storytellers. Like the bees who do their dance in their hives to tell their sisters where to find the best flowers, we must tell our stories to others. Thank you for this piece! It's left me a bit emotional.
Well, being compared to a dancing bee is about as good as praise gets, Amanda. Thanks for that. And as I've said somewhere in these pieces I write here, this big-picture stuff has been on my mind in one form or another since I was young too. There's that feeling of "why isn't anyone else seeing what I'm seeing," right?
Beautiful writing Jason I own two of Yong's books and they are very eye-opening The many ways the species perceive the world will not save them from us. The tragedy of our species is that we evolved very able to address short term problems, less able to address medium term problems, and tending to ignore long term problems. It's not a problem of wit, it's a problem of the way we set priorities. We are clever but not wise.
I feel that since we primates (what an arrogant name) arose from our antecedents, we along with all other life have contended with each other for energy, most of it from the sun, a smaller fraction from our planet's own heat.
Although the amount of solar energy available far exceeds life's needs, the amount of useable land does not, hence the competition. As we are increasingly crowded into the circumpolar regions by the unavoidable hothouse Earth, the competition for energy will become intense. So many species will be lost in the struggle. A fearful future is coming for them and us.
Thank you, Michael. Did you see the quote from E.O. Wilson, offered in a comment above by Baird Brightman? I think you'll like it as much as I do.
As for us being clever but not wise, I think that's a function of scale. Wisdom is common among individuals and small groups, but doesn't seem to scale as the number of people increases. My mother has a sardonic joke about global IQ being steady but population is increasing... Maybe the solution to everything is figuring out how to scale up wisdom, though in an information economy that seems a harder and harder task.
Jason, thank you for bringing Ed along. And how wonderful to lift up Alpha Lo's writing about terpenes. As always, thank you for translating necessary substance for the community table.
You know I consistently tell you there's a secret writer's molecule in the Maine water. More evidence was detected on Tuesday with the release of What If We Get It Right? by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson🌱
Well, I suppose you'll have to move to Maine... Lots of nooks and crannies along the coast here, each full of craftspeople, writers, hermits, and other necessary folks.
That terpene info was entirely new to me. Fascinating. I need to learn more.