Work/life balance is one part of Utopia that I just wrote about. In Praise of Idleness was a collection of essays published by mathematician and philosopher Bertrand Russell in 1935. In one essay he noted, “Owing to the productivity of machines, much less work than was formerly necessary is now needed to maintain a tolerable […]
Men Like Gods is a 1923 Utopian novel by H. G. Wells, which I was delighted to come across by accident in the library as a teen. An ordinary Englishman is swept up by scientific accident, along with a cleric and other countrymen, to a parallel world where all of our Earthly problems have been […]
I am writing this during the end of year “Season of Giving.” Most of us will ask the same question: What is the most effective giving? How do you decide? There is a difference between feeling good and actually doing good. There is a new movement of “Effective Altruism” led by philosophers including Peter Singer, Toby […]
Is it really a “Big Question” to ask, “What are Turn Signals For?” Yes. This question offers a microcosm of communication and misunderstanding. The California Vehicle Code Section 22107 says: “No person shall turn a vehicle from a direct course or move right or left upon a roadway until such movement can be made with […]
The 2010 midterm election for President Obama brought a devastating change in Congress. But, what did it mean? I happened to be listening to San Francisco talk radio KGO for several hours just before that election. The host asked people to call in, offering this framing of the issue: President Bush made a mess of […]
Some years ago, I helped an engineer friend get a job at our company. Soon after she started, I invited her to attend a Science and Engineering Council meeting with me. I was shocked when she told me she had to miss the meeting because the new owners of the company were requiring her to […]
Do you want to be rich? To live really well? Then you will want to live in a society with high trust. Our World in Data detailed this in an article “Trust” by Esteban Ortiz-Ospina and Max Roser. Much of the data comes from the World Value Survey. The World Value Survey plotted per capita […]
President Franklin Roosevelt (FDR) delivered his famous “Four Freedoms” speech 11 months before Pearl Harbor took us into WWII. These four freedoms? Freedom of speech; Freedom of worship;Freedom from want;Freedom from fear. This mural of the Four Freedoms (pictured) used to be on the County Human Resources Department. Note that the first two are negative […]
Some topics are still taboo to discuss and this may be one. Are you an “animal lover”? What does that mean to you? If you say you don’t like dogs, people are quick to ask if you like cats. Are those the only choices? There are 10-30 million species of animals on Earth. The exact […]
Over 20 years ago I attended a talk on Madagascar at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. It was one long rant about how the ecosystems of Madagascar had been almost totally destroyed. How there were no indigenous organizations for outside conservation groups to work with. And how the Pope had gone there to […]
Last year I lost a dear friend I will call “Susan” when she was on a high-altitude hiking adventure. She had spent most of her life in a fundamentalist Christian religion. But in recent years she had come to realize that religion is “just a bunch of made up stories.” When she died far too […]
It is well known that most industrialized countries have universal healthcare, good public transit, and free public college education. Why doesn’t the U.S. have these things? A hundred years ago socialism was seen positively in much of the world as a way to share in the productivity of modern industrialization. President Franklin Roosevelt and his […]
A recent New York Times Opinion piece claimed that inequality is not as bad as it appears because “spending power” is a more accurate measure than income or wealth. I reached out to author Peter Coy and to Berkeley economist Alan Auerbach who wrote the original paper. I asked Coy if he was familiar with […]
As I discussed in Part 1, The Luck Factor author Dr. Richard Wiseman gleaned Four Principles of Luck. Here are the last two. Principle Three? Expect good fortune! Start by affirming your luck. “I deserve good luck and will receive some today.” Set Lucky Goals. Make lists of short-, medium-, and long-term goals. Be very […]
Dr. Richard Wiseman is a U.K. magician, skeptic, and psychology professor who set out to answer the title question! The result: The Luck Factor book, which I highly recommend! Soon after he began his research, the producer of a popular TV science program asked him to collaborate. They put out a short piece on the […]
Our system of government was deliberately set up to make change and action very difficult. Unfortunately, reality does not care about our inability to govern. Notably, the Climate Crisis marches on, with action urgently needed to avert unprecedented disaster on a global scale. The President, House of Representatives, and Senate are rarely in alignment. And, […]
How do you know you are not dreaming right now? “I had to pinch myself to be sure I was not dreaming” is an expression. But it is mistaken. It is perfectly possible to pinch yourself in a dream and think you are awake. Would you believe that in fact there is no foolproof test […]
“We live in the greatest country on Earth!” So said a caller on Bill Maher’s Real Time on the eve of the unprovoked U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. Maher asked the caller how he knew this. “Because I have lived in the U.S. my entire life.” Maher tried to explain the illogic of this, […]
“When the preferences of economic elites and the stands of organized interest groups are controlled for, the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.” This was the conclusion of a Princeton University study by Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page, “Testing Theories of American Politics: […]
Normalizing Atheism is an active Facebook page I recently joined. It is a surprisingly respectful forum for atheists to “come out” and for religious people to ask questions of atheists. On April 13, someone named Brian C. made this post: “I’ve been pondering something lately: Is it possible to live without meaning or purpose? If […]
I want to continue my review of the book Humankind, which I started in my previous article. Author Rutger Bregman showed that many of the best and worst aspects of human behavior stem from a common desire to be “helpful.” Just as wolves domesticated themselves to be able to live among humans, humans domesticated themselves […]
Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is the latest situation that might lead us to think that people under the surface are evil and only a thin veneer of civilization protects us. My college lady friend recently introduced me to the book Humankind that takes this on. Many issues are raised, and this will be the first […]
“Who are you going to believe, me, or your lying eyes?” Variations of this quote date back to Chico Marx in Duck Soup and earlier. Psychologist Elizabeth Loftus has testified in criminal trials that eyewitness testimony is not as trustworthy as it seems. Loftus has shown that it is easy to implant false memories of […]
Do you know how much private motor vehicle use is subsidized in the U.S.? Here are examples of motor vehicle expenses not paid adequately by user fees: “Free” parking. Climate impacts. Land used for roads. Road maintenance. Pollution deaths and illness. “Barrier effect” of blocking access to pedestrians and bicyclists. Military expenses to maintain global […]
With Putin’s attack on Ukraine, many of us wrote to President Biden to ask him to cut off Russian oil imports, even if it meant a rise in prices and/or rationing. In my message I called on him to speak to the American people to sacrifice for a greater good. I talked of how my […]
As I write this, Putin is brutally attacking Ukraine. Do these things really still happen in the 21st century? Is it finally time to put an end to such unilateral behavior with a world government? The idea goes back to ancient times, when it was largely promoted by powerful emperors who wanted to expand their […]
I have friends who proudly say they shut out following the news. They find it depressing. I have another friend who is on top of everything in the news. Why should we follow the news? Democracy requires participation. And participation requires informed understanding. My friend who is on top of the news does not attend […]
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids all men to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets and to steal bread – the rich as well as the poor.” So wrote Anatole France in The Red Lily (1894). It is difficult to express the injustice of the legal system better than that one brilliant […]
Christianity is all about forgiveness and I am writing this during the Christmas season. Could a society function with nothing but forgiveness as an ethical code? Astronomer and 1981 Humanist of the Year Carl Sagan wrote a brilliant essay about this for Parade Magazine in 1993. Here is a link to a copy: https://swt.org/sagan. It […]
Since I was a child, I have asked big questions about life, the universe, and everything (credit to Douglas Adams for that expression). I was fortunate to have a scientist father and a psychologist/philosopher mother to offer helpful answers. Out in the real world I discovered that people will often offer “helpful” answers that are […]
My last article talked about the climate crisis as an example of market failure. “Free” markets in fact require a vast government infrastructure: Laws, enforcement, courts, established financial systems. And a system to rebalance extreme wealth inequalities. Homelessness results from a lack of the latter mechanism. Wealth begets wealth. This can happen directly as wealth […]
As I write this, countries from around the world are convening in Glasgow for COP26 to solve the climate crisis. It is 26 because for 26 years these meetings have been going on and the threat keeps getting worse. I first began talking about the climate crisis in 1981 when it was called Global Warming […]
The recent ban on abortions in Texas is just the latest round in this endless culture war. I had thought nothing new could be said on the topic. But an article in Free Inquiry magazine about a dozen years ago raised a new point for me. The point? That a human life is not the […]
A horrific attack by fanatical Muslim Americans in San Bernardino in December 2015 raised concerns that there would be counterattacks against innocent Muslims. In typical Santa Barbara fashion, we had a solidarity rally to show support for Muslims. Local Imam Yama Niazi welcomed people, noting the presence of Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, and many Christian denominations. […]
How many of these claims about Monsanto and/or GMOs have you heard? Monsanto sues farmers for having GMO crops on their land due to wind-blown pollen? Monsanto uses a terminator gene to make their seeds infertile? Monsanto’s policies in poor countries are causing widespread suicide of farmers? GMOs favor large agribusiness over small farmers? GMOs […]
Some things really are taboo, and I want to write more about that in the future. I recently posted a cartoon on Facebook that showed a guy saying, “Having a dog has convinced me that animals have souls. And that is why I became a vegetarian.” The other person says, “Yet you feed your dog […]
Lions and tigers and bears, oh, my! As expressed so well by Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, these are the things we evolved to fear. Unfortunately, in the modern world, these are not the things that really matter. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) just released its latest report emphasizing the urgency of […]
When you hear the word “infrastructure” do your eyes glaze over? As I write this, Congress is debating an infrastructure bill that is on the order of a trillion dollars. Is that a lot or a little? Almost by definition, infrastructure is all the boring stuff that enables all the cool things in society to […]
The 1960s TV show Get Smart often offered deep insights cloaked in humor. In the episode, “Do I Hear a Vaults?” the Chief gets locked in a bank vault with agent Larrabee. There is only enough air to last 24 hours and it is on a time lock that won’t open until the end of […]
“186,000 Miles Per Second. It’s Not Just a Good Idea. It’s The Law.” A friend in grad school at UCSB Physics had this sign on his desk. Why is this funny? Because we confuse two kinds of laws. Everyday laws are the ones we should not break. Or else we may get a ticket or […]