Meanwhile, how I am trying to think.

# 4071

The podcast by David Borlace ( Let's Have a Think.) Borlace has half a million followers. But for all his breadth do not take on the social issues of social organization, taxes, religion, values, etc. I have been reading for years, but I too have not made use of this literature (except Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and Toynbee's The Study of History). There are many other references over the years but no attempt to follow up on core issues of society and climate, such as Borlace, Schmachtenbeger, or what Nate Hagens has done with energy. For starts look at the very comprehensive blog, Daniel Little's Understanding Society

https://understandingsociety.blogspot.com/2022/11/fifteen-years-of-understanding-society.html

So while I am I am exploring how to take on the social side of climate change (and necessarily related issues.), I will be posting news items and leads but not as logically connected as I would like. I may take off in some new directions (anthropology, psychoanalysis. (Erikson's Childhood and Society), and philosophy. One book missed by almost everyone is Vollmann’s two volumes. Here from Amazon.

No Immediate Danger: Carbon Ideologies, Volume one

William T. Vollmann (Author),

Book 1 of 2: Carbon Ideologies

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In his nonfiction, William T. Vollmann has won acclaim as a singular voice tackling some of the most important issues of our age. Now, Vollmann turns to a topic that will define the generations to come - the factors and human actions that have led to global warming.

Vollmann begins No Immediate Danger, the first volume of Carbon Ideologies, by examining and quantifying the many causes of climate change, from industrial manufacturing and agricultural practices to fossil fuel extraction, economic demand for electric power, and the justifiable yearning of people all over the world to live in comfort.

Turning to nuclear power first, Vollmann then recounts multiple visits that he made at significant personal risk over the course of seven years to the contaminated no-go zones and sad ghost towns of Fukushima, Japan, beginning shortly after the tsunami and reactor meltdowns of 2011. Equipped first only with a dosimeter and then with a scintillation counter, he measured radiation and interviewed tsunami victims, nuclear evacuees, anti-nuclear organizers, and pro-nuclear utility workers.

Featuring Vollmann's signature wide learning, sardonic wit, and encyclopedic research, No Immediate Danger builds up a powerful, sobering picture of the ongoing nightmare of Fukushima.