Human Nature Odyssey
Human Nature Odyssey
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Astrophysics for a New Stone Age with Tom Murphy
What will happen to our scientific knowledge if civilization collapses? Will astrophysics survive a future stone age?
In this episode, we rest from our journey to talk with astrophysicist Tom Murphy, who’s been on an odyssey of his own-moving from academia to a growing concern about the collapse of civilization, to an ever expanding appreciation of the cosmos.
Together we’ll gaze at the grandeur of the stars and marvel at the complexity of one of our oldest cousins: the amoeba. If you’re seeking a moment to marvel at the interconnectedness of life on Earth and the universe its interwoven with, this is the episode for you.
Tom Murphy is an Emeritus Professor of Physics and Astronomy/Astrophysics at the University of California, San Diego. After a career studying colliding galaxies and testing General Relativity using lasers to the moon, Murphy retired early to shift focus onto Planetary Limits and the intrinsic incompatibility between modernity and ecological longevity. Creator of a textbook on energy, the Do the Math blog, and the Metastatic Modernity video series, his main plea is that you bypass these resources and read the book Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn.

Join us on Patreon and get exclusive access to audio extras, writings, and notes.

More from Tom:
Do the Math blog (dothemath.ucsd.edu/)
Metastatic Modernity (th-cam.com/video/0cHW1EffCQM/w-d-xo.htmlsi=tx94Rd7sveQAQts9)



Music: Celestial Soda Pop
By: Ray Lynch
From the album: Deep Breakfast
Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI
All rights reserved.
1. Amazon: Celestial Soda Pop
amazon.com/music/player/albums/B000QQXURI
2. iTunes:
music.apple.com/us/album/celestial-soda-pop/3242445?i=3242425
3. Spotify:
open.spotify.com/track/2THDVIVytLuGX7S7UghuC1?si=20ea63807bba401f
มุมมอง: 95

วีดีโอ

11 - Capitalism & Monopoly: Why The Best Board Games Make The Worst Reality
มุมมอง 3821 วันที่ผ่านมา
Looking for a game to play over the holidays? Why not try the real world global economy? Too late, you’re already playing it! In this episode, we use Immanuel Wallerstein’s World-Systems Analysis as our instruction manual to the game of colonization and exploitation. We explore how dominant countries rise and fall, the dance between capitalism and the state, and the unexpected truth about what ...
10 - Against Leviathan: An Anarchist Fairytale of the Origin of Civilization
มุมมอง 165หลายเดือนก่อน
Gather around the campfire for a ghost story about the most destructive monster in history: civilization itself. In this episode, we delve into the countercultural writings of Fredy Perlman, whose strange 1983 book “Against His-Story, Against-Leviathan”-riddled with grammatical errors and misspellings-blends myth and history to explore the nature of power, subjugation, and the struggle between ...
6 - A Civilization That Flies
มุมมอง 1142 หลายเดือนก่อน
Is it possible to build a civilization that flies? (metaphorically speaking of course) How did we eventually learn to fly? It wasn’t by defying gravity and disobeying aerodynamics but by learning how to work with them. Daniel Quinn, in his novel Ishmael, argues there are laws of nature that we have to learn to live within, rather than resist, if we are to continue as a society. In this episode ...
9 - Out of Society and Into the Wild: The Legend of Christopher McCandless
มุมมอง 1783 หลายเดือนก่อน
In the spring of 1992, twenty-four-year-old Christopher McCandless left society behind, hitchhiking 3,000 miles into the Alaskan wilderness. Two years earlier, Chris had donated his entire life savings to Oxfam, burned his social security card, and headed west seeking life on his own terms - without telling a soul, particularly his parents. In this episode, we delve into Into the Wild's larger ...
Can We Escape Modern Civilization? A Conversation with the Hosts of Crazy Town
มุมมอง 683 หลายเดือนก่อน
Is it possible to escape industrialism, capitalism, imperialism or are we trapped? Crazy Town podcast hosts Jason Bradford, Rob Dietz, and Asher Miller join us for a wide-ranging discussion of big topics like modern civilization’s converging crises, the concept of 'red pilling', and the 1993 Bill Murray classic film Groundhog Day. With equal parts humor and in-depth analysis, Asher, Rob, and Ja...
4 - Takers and Leavers
มุมมอง 624 หลายเดือนก่อน
In this episode we take a step back from Ishmael to better view the philosophical context it was written in. We explore the history of the terms “civilized” and “primitive” and how their definitions have evolved over time. Topics include: Rome’s influence on Western European colonization, noble savage theory, primitivism, and the rise of the identity “indigenous”. When we say civilization who d...
Death in the Regenerative Garden: Rethinking Food, Farming, and the Cycle of Life
มุมมอง 1694 หลายเดือนก่อน
What death is required for life to grow? In our culture’s resistance to death we seem to have caused so much of it. And what if humans aren't inherently a destructive force on the planet? How might we actually be another symbiotic part of our ecosystems? Jake Marquez and Maren Morgan are the hosts of Death in the Garden (deathinthegarden.substack.com/) , a podcast exploring the complex intersec...
3 - Imaginary Games for Grown Ups
มุมมอง 494 หลายเดือนก่อน
Ishmael theorizes our culture is held captive by a story, a mythology we take for granted, act out every day, and is leading to the destruction of the world. So in this episode we tell this story out loud, from beginning, to middle, to end. Along the way we chat with a 6-year-old animal expert, discuss adult imaginary games, analyze the subliminal cultural messages conveyed in religion and phil...
2 - Your Call To Adventure
มุมมอง 585 หลายเดือนก่อน
Why can’t we seem to stop destroying the world? Like seriously though? Ishmael, the telepathic gorilla from Daniel Quinn’s philosophical novel, suggests we’re captives of a society where our individual society depends on our collective destruction. As we embark on our quest through the landscape of ideas in Quinn’s novel, we’ll travel to a dystopian future where Nazi Germany won the war, meet o...
1 - A Self-Help Guide for Society
มุมมอง 616 หลายเดือนก่อน
We’re all on our own quest to live more meaningful, healthy, and fruitful lives. To more fully understand the situation we’re in, we’re going to have to expand our scope in geography and time. This is a sociological examination of the personal, and a psychological examination of the social. Alex takes you back in time to a fateful childhood summer when the world was a magical place to explore, ...
Worldbuilding and Experience Design for Society with Abraham Burickson
มุมมอง 676 หลายเดือนก่อน
Civilization is an interactive immersive experience. Worldbuilding isn't just for sci-fi and fantasy, but how we can change our society. Abraham Burickson, co-founder of Odyssey Works-an organization dedicated to crafting personalized, immersive experiences-has long been captivated by the transformative power of design. Whether in the structure of a building or the verses of a poem, he explores...
8 - A Conversation with Rennie MacKay Quinn (wife of author Daniel Quinn)
10 หลายเดือนก่อน
In this very special episode, author Daniel Quinn’s wife Rennie Mackay Quinn joins us for her first ever interview: sharing untold stories, new insights, and reflections on her life and journey with her beloved late husband & Daniel Quinn. Rennie tells us about the 15 years it took Daniel to write Ishmael, the childhood dream that sparked it, how the word "hamburger" changed their lives, how th...
7 - After 'Ishmael' by Daniel Quinn
มุมมอง 110 หลายเดือนก่อน
In this climactic culmination of the Ishmael series, we ask the question : how do we transform an entire society? Ishmael doesn’t give us the “10 Simple Steps to Save the World” instead, he offers us a map and compass to navigate our intergenerational civilizational transformation ourselves. Where we go from here is up to us. We’ll meet the fantastical Prince who first concocted the criminal ju...
where did colonizers get the concept of being "civilized" from?
มุมมอง 129ปีที่แล้ว
All roads lead to Rome. And by “all” I mean Western European and by “roads” I mean colonization. #ancienthistory #romanempire #colonization
aldo leopold: we are fellow voyagers in the odyssey of evolution
มุมมอง 40ปีที่แล้ว
aldo leopold: we are fellow voyagers in the odyssey of evolution
taker civilization
มุมมอง 22ปีที่แล้ว
taker civilization
6 - A Civilization That Flies
มุมมอง 821 ชั่วโมงที่ผ่านมา
6 - A Civilization That Flies
imaginary games for grown ups
มุมมอง 20ปีที่แล้ว
imaginary games for grown ups
our culture's mythology
มุมมอง 27ปีที่แล้ว
our culture's mythology
6 year old explains humans
มุมมอง 36ปีที่แล้ว
6 year old explains humans
6 year old explains tigers
มุมมอง 48ปีที่แล้ว
6 year old explains tigers
5 - Adam, Eve, and the Agricultural Revolution
มุมมอง 2721 ชั่วโมงที่ผ่านมา
5 - Adam, Eve, and the Agricultural Revolution
we're alive at a time of great peril
มุมมอง 24ปีที่แล้ว
we're alive at a time of great peril
the story that holds us captive
มุมมอง 28ปีที่แล้ว
the story that holds us captive
how do we escape the bars of our cage?
มุมมอง 76ปีที่แล้ว
how do we escape the bars of our cage?
we are all captives of civilization
มุมมอง 386ปีที่แล้ว
we are all captives of civilization
an earnest desire to save the world
มุมมอง 38ปีที่แล้ว
an earnest desire to save the world
the lenape, the quakers, and the founding of philadelphia
มุมมอง 41ปีที่แล้ว
the lenape, the quakers, and the founding of philadelphia
this is suburbia
มุมมอง 115ปีที่แล้ว
this is suburbia

ความคิดเห็น

  • @tellyvisionwatcher8617
    @tellyvisionwatcher8617 22 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Not a terrible video, but I could have done without the youth pastor vibes

  • @obsoleteoptics
    @obsoleteoptics 23 วันที่ผ่านมา

    The best board game that represents capitalism isn't Monopoly, it's actually Jenga. Each party takes turns to make the current situation more precarious until a total collapse where only the last person to fuck up takes any blame while everyone else is declared the winner.

  • @WalkingtubeMr
    @WalkingtubeMr 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    First podcast I ever subscribed to on TH-cam.

  • @WalkingtubeMr
    @WalkingtubeMr 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    Have you met Daniel or Renee Quinn?

    • @HumanNatureOdyssey
      @HumanNatureOdyssey 10 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Yes I actually got to speak with her for her first ever interview in Episode 8 - make sure to check it out!

  • @WalkingtubeMr
    @WalkingtubeMr 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    Have you read The Holy by DQ? Opening quote from the actual bible: Deuteronomy (quoting from memory): Having conquered these nations you must utterly destroy all the sanctuaries where they honor their gods. On the mountain hights, on the hills and under every leafy tree. Toppel their alters, smash their pillars and burn down their sacred groves...and thus blot out all memory of them from these places.

  • @WalkingtubeMr
    @WalkingtubeMr 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    kale, lettuce and basil!!!!

  • @WalkingtubeMr
    @WalkingtubeMr 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    One of my user names is Walkingbc. I only mention because you are a fan of Ishmael. Walkingbc. Aka., Walking Beyond Civilization.

  • @WalkingtubeMr
    @WalkingtubeMr 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    I heard a request for comments on Patreon. If I don't see a response here in a few days or so I will comment there. Unfortunately, I am not in a position to support monetarily. I am however a man of many talents. Maybe some of them can help to further both our goals. I hope you respond.

  • @WalkingtubeMr
    @WalkingtubeMr 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

    Hello again. Wade here. I left some comments for you personally over at Crazy Town. I lived in Cheltenham and I'm an original fan of Ishmael. Please, check those out. About this episode: I think it's your best yet. I really like how you present the paradox of being 'gifted' the rule of the world and yet we fail because of our tragic flaw of being flawed. "Two sides of the same coin." Excellent!! Also, you may want to clean up the ending. It drops without a real ending. Cheers, Wade

  • @MariaSilva-kj8nv
    @MariaSilva-kj8nv 6 หลายเดือนก่อน

    I love hearing you, it's so good for my learning inglish. Tks

  • @obsoleteoptics
    @obsoleteoptics 6 หลายเดือนก่อน

    Missed you, Alex! Glad you're back!

  • @SlidesMcGee
    @SlidesMcGee ปีที่แล้ว

    Just stopping by to say that I'm really enjoying the podcast. Looking forward to the next episode.

  • @buddypalomo
    @buddypalomo ปีที่แล้ว

    Are you B? Thanks for your podcast!!!

  • @obsoleteoptics
    @obsoleteoptics ปีที่แล้ว

    Love the podcast 👌 🙌 😍 👏 ❤️ 👍 keep up the good work 👏 🙌 👍 👌 😀 💪

  • @obsoleteoptics
    @obsoleteoptics ปีที่แล้ว

    "You are captives of a civilizational system that more or less compels you to go on destroying the world in order to live." - Ishmael

    • @HumanNatureOdyssey
      @HumanNatureOdyssey ปีที่แล้ว

      I always found this to be one of the most important ideas in Ishmael. Rather than blame our inherent human nature, this reminds us not all cultures participate in the destruction of the world, and that our doing so isn't coming from a place of maliciousness but that we live in a society where our individual survival depends on our collective suicide.