Prof. Eliot Jacobson Feb 19, 2025:
Humans, and sadly most other species on the planet, are totally f&%ked.
There. I said it.
@narcchronicles.bsky.social:
Look at the rain bombs and the catastrophic floods that happen now, and how easily they overwhelm drainage infrastructure – imagine how crazy it’s going to be in 5 years, in 10 years. People thinking ‘we have a while yet’ – nope, coming very soon
@mjschwarz.bsky.social:
We had a while 25 years ago…
@pitbullmtkerr.bsky.social:
It’s not fair that other species our doomed too. They did nothing.
@adaut.bsky.social:
Yes, together with the people of the GS and the indigenous, that breaks my heart even more
resilient one
@renee0064.bsky.social:
Mine as well
@doomwatch34.bsky.social:
You’re undoubtedly right.
The question is how do those of us, not yet victimized by the unfolding catastrophe, spend the time we have left?
How can we find joy or meaning in a world that seems to be unraveling around us?
@bakakarasu.bsky.social:
Do what you can to prevent, reduce, or eliminate suffering, that of humans, but also that of all other living things. (Note that the most effective single action a person can take in that regard is to not have kids.)
@harriesthaller.bsky.social:
Thank you VERY much for this Professor Jacobson.
There is NOTHING destroying my moral more than our willful dedication to the BIG LIE.
SRSLY, I’m down with Collapse. I consider it Justice.
Having no Adults to talk to is what’s literally killing me…
Big Fracking Lie poster by Will Koop, BC Tap Water Alliance
The Space Between Collapse and a Future Worth Living: Finding Our Way Back by Art Berman, February 15, 2025
Storytelling isn’t a luxury—it’s how we understand the world and our place in it.
Our ancestors took survival seriously. We don’t. Instead, we’ve built a culture of distraction and excess, severed from traditional knowledge and the natural world. Now, the cost is becoming clear—ecological collapse, social unraveling, and a society drowning in consumption but starving for meaning. That’s Dougald Hines’ message. Restating Ivan Illitch, he notes,
“Industrial modernity has succeeded in producing the most helpless human beings the world has ever seen.”
Hines’ work has always impressed me, but his discussion with Nate Hagens this week brought together ideas in a way I hadn’t expected, leading to new insights
Storytelling helps us make sense of modernity, question growth and the progress narrative, and imagine better ways to live. It offers a way to face crisis with resilience and meaning.
John Vervaeke calls it the meaning crisis—people feel lost. Religion once provided purpose, but secularization and self-deception have taken over. Instead of real connection, wisdom, or transformation, people chase fulfillment through “stuff” and shallow experiences. The result? Emptiness.
“We are trying more and more to get the “being” needs met within the “having” mode. So it’s like eating junk food. We’re not starving calorically, but we’re starving nutritionally. We’re not getting the needs met.”
I stumbled upon Joseph Campbell’s work by accident. Looking for another book decades ago, I picked up The Hero With a Thousand Faces instead. It changed my life.
Campbell was the best storyteller of his time, but the stories weren’t his—they came from mythology. Myths aren’t just stories; they’re instructions for being human—maps for heroism, sacrifice, and renewal that cut across cultures and eras.
Without myth, people lose their sense of purpose, becoming disconnected from community, tradition, and the deeper truths of existence. That’s a perfect description of modernity.
“It would not be too much to say that myth is the secret opening through which the inexhaustible energies of the cosmos pour into human cultural manifestation. Religion, philosophies, arts, the social forms of primitive and historic man, prime discoveries in science and technology, the very dreams that blister sleep, boil up from the basic, magic ring of myth.”
Joseph Campbell
And yet, modern culture treats “myth” as mere fiction or a mistaken belief, as if wisdom has become obsolete.
Humans weren’t always like this. For most of the last 300,000 years, groups had two leaders: the chief and the shaman. John Vervaeke calls shamanism the world’s oldest profession. Civilization changed the titles, but the role of guiding people through uncertainty has only faded in the brief period since the carbon pulse began two centuries ago.
I’m not idealizing the past. Life was short and harsh, but our ancestors didn’t struggle with a crisis of meaning.
What did they want to know? The first line of The Odyssey says it all: “Tell me about a complicated man.” Our ancestors weren’t looking for facts. They wanted to understand struggle, survival, and the journey through hardship.
Ancient Greeks didn’t listen to the story of Odysseus to relive past glories. “Now goddess, child of Zeus, tell the old story for our modern times. Find the beginning.”
Technology is modernity’s drug of choice, but the crash isn’t worth the rush. Every advance demands more energy, complexity, and upkeep while delivering less. Wind, solar, and EVs aren’t turning the tide—climate change is still winning. The more we build, the faster we burn through resources.
The push for endless technological expansion isn’t saving the world—it’s pushing it closer to collapse.
But what if some problems don’t have solutions?
Maybe the real challenge isn’t fixing everything, but learning how to live with what we can’t change—by fixing ourselves.
Myth: The Original Survival Manual
Myth isn’t escapism—it’s a way to face reality head-on. It distills the hard-earned lessons of human history into symbols and stories that help people break through personal limits and see the world for what it is.
Campbell’s hero’s journey isn’t a fairy tale—it’s a blueprint for transformation. We start trapped in childhood conditioning, afraid to step beyond what’s familiar. Myth reminds us that growth means entering unknown territory, where both treasure and danger exist. It’s painful, but standing still is worse.
Myth doesn’t deal in easy answers or false hope. It doesn’t “cure” by offering comforting illusions—it dismantles them.
Happy endings aren’t about escaping suffering—they’re about facing it and emerging changed. The warrior’s path is saying “yes” to life—not just when it’s easy, but when it’s brutal.
Myth teaches us that life isn’t something to be repaired—it’s something to participate in.
Clinging to external solutions—whether gods, ideology, or technology—only keeps us trapped.
The breakthrough is when the mind sees beyond its own illusions.
The Reckoning is Coming
Dougald Hine points out that being a grown-up in the world we’ve built isn’t easy.
“The lives of our ancestors were hard in ways we do not like to think about. For this reason, they could not afford the kind of carelessness to which we have been accustomed.
“Cushioned on millions of years of fossil energy, veiled by the impersonal logic of commodity exchange and the emerald city magic of the shop window display, [we feel a false] detachment from consequences.”
We’re not the first to face collapse—just the first to pretend it isn’t happening. Hine’s message is clear but unsentimental: the question isn’t how to solve everything, but how to live through what’s coming.
I don’t believe humans (and many other species) will survive what our pollution, greed, laziness, selfishness, arrogance, frac’ing, insatiable lust to exploit and rape earth and others, and toxic chemicals rage upon us. Nothing spiritual will change the evil beast of human nature; religions will prevent that.
For Hine, the end of the world as we’ve known it isn’t the end of the world. The work lies in the space between collapse and a future worth living in.In my experience of life, too many humans want much more from life than earth is able to give. Would anything ever change that? I don’t think so; I used to. The evil beast of human nature changed my mind.We have to decide what’s worth keeping. It won’t be easy. We’ll be shaken by it but that’s the road ahead.
I see more than just survival—I see the potential for renewal, maybe even a renaissance. It will take a different kind of leadership, one rooted in spiritual principles—the kind that reshaped civilizations in the time of Confucius, Buddha, and Jesus. They didn’t offer quick answers. They reshaped how people understood the world and their place in it—the essence of mythology. Their work wasn’t political or economic—it was psychological.
Modernity has pushed spiritual foundations aside, mistaking them for relics instead of essential tools for navigating upheaval. But the wisdom of our ancestors still exists in myth—not as fantasy, but as a survival manual. Instead of dismissing it, we should return to it as we would a lost treasure.
The Odyssey doesn’t start with an answer—it starts with a request: “Tell me about a complicated man.” That’s where we need to begin.
The real frontier isn’t space or technology—it’s the inner world we’ve ignored. The way forward isn’t just about building something new. It’s about rediscovering what we lost—the way back to ourselves.I love that last sentence. It’s also, important in my view, to find and then relish and nurture contentment, which Palestinians excel at:
Photograph: Hatem Khaled/Reuters in The Guardian
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