While this article by Rachel Handforth is not strictly on this subject, there are some very helpful insights and though this is mostly about PhDs and how people think of advanced research in the UK, it feels very close to home here in the US. Handforth writes, A 2025 report on public attitudes to science…
Category
Degrowth
Note on a Completed Project: Science Fiction and Charles W. Mills’s Critique of “Ideal Theory” (Parts I-III)
I recently completed a three-part series over at scifi.global on Charles W. Mills’s Critique of “Ideal Theory”. It is completely based on a single paper that he wrote. I have read two or three of Mills’s books in the past. I considered reading his book with Carole Pateman, Contract & Domination, before writing this series,…
Note: The Separation of Spirituality and Civility (We are on our own)
The damage people do the ecosystem cannot be corrected with prayer. It does not matter what god one prays to. It does not matter how important the cause that led to the contribution to climate change. No prayer can be so sophisticated to undo such damages. There is no perfection of mysticism that will correct…
Memo: “Degrowth needs more strategic planning.” – Dr. Federico Savini
From “Degrowth, legitimacy, and the foundational economy,” a Response to Yvonne Rydin common published in Planning Theory (2024) If we accept the scientific evidence that decoupling is not occurring at the speed and scale required to meet critical climate and ecological targets, then we need to talk about lowering the amount of production and consumption….
From Morality-Tale Science Fiction to Fantasy-Infused Settler Colonialism
In the Star Trek: Enterprise episode, “Strange New World,” (2001) T’Pol attempts to caution Captain Archer and his crew about visiting the uninhabited planet they discover. She wants to take a number of days, just over a week, to complete scans from orbit and with probes. The lone Vulcan on the ship, T’Pol, will later…
The Personal is Political, Even in Simple Matters, with Degrowth
A few months back I was criticized in a degrowth focused email list for discussing the need for communities to learn how to make care products, soap, shampoo, etc, which are life necessities. I was essentially told that had nothing to do with degrowth, most ardently. With degrowth the personal is indeed political. Communities need…
Flamm et al. on De-orbiting and the Environment and Arnaud on Degrowth and Low Earth Orbit
I recently read Flamm et al.’s paper, “Space sustainability through atmosphere pollution? De-orbiting atmosphere-blindness and planetary environmental justice” (The Anthropocene Review, 2024). There are some important points worth highlighting. I have been monitoring regional and localized light pollution ordinances and some legislation for a while. What I can say is that light pollution is a…
A Note: Lose Your Career Building Skills as a Practice of Degrowth
Degrowth has blossomed into a lively topic. Depending on where you are hearing about it, you may or may not be influenced in positive ways. Well, this post is not an introduction to degrowth. Nor is it apologetics. This is intended to reach those already practicing, thinking about, researching, and applying degrowth to their lives…
Memo: Rethinking Degrowth as Resistance to Capitalism
I have had some time to rethink what Koch & Elmore wrote about Baudrillard’s elaboration on Marxist ideas and the pervasiveness of capitalism. I have two or three Baudrillard texts, but it has been so long since I have read them, I could not tell you if they discussed these issues, so keep in mind…
Degrowth as Resistance, Despite Baudrillard’s Networking of Fetishism
Koch & Elmore (2006) argue that contrary to popular opinion Baudrillard’s later work did not abandon Marxist theory. He elaborated on it. Baudrillard expanded on the “macro-molecular code” of Marxist thought (see 561). Baudrillard showed that the sign and the signifier, the code and representation, didn’t puff out Marx’s ideas with the failure of the…