Conversation Earth

The author of Recovering the Sacred tells us we need a society that is “respectful, resilient, and ecologically and socially responsible.” Instead, “we have a society based on conquest, on consuming more than it needs.” We emphasize “quarterly profits over intergenerational responsibility.”

This is an encore from Season One. We're taking a break after two enlightening seasons of Conversation Earth. Please vote for another season, at http://tinyurl.com/ceseason3

“Gross Domestic Product has now become a fetish,” according to economist Raj Patel. Many undesirable things end up adding to GDP: wars, disease, and environmental destruction, for example. And GDP fails to measure many desirable indicators of community health. It has led us to live in an ecologically and socially unsustainable fashion.

“No one wants to live in the Stone Age, no one wants to live in a time with bad medical care, no one wants to live in a time of poverty and wide-spread illness and disease, but what I'm suggesting is that there are other ways in which we can get to that world, and other ways in which we can track our progress other than the fetish of Gross Domestic Product.”

Raj Patel offers observations of what is and isn't working our current, unsustainable system. He believes better ways of organizing our economy are being developed and demonstrated today; we just need to open our eyes.

We're re-sharing the best episodes of our first season while we prepare for season 3. If you want to continue tapping the brightest minds on the planet, see our story at http://tinyurl.com/ceseason3 and pitch in a little to help fund another season!

Photo Credit: Sheila Menezes

Our 41st episode is a retrospective of Seasons 1 and 2 of Conversation Earth. In this episode we turn the table, as co-producer Kaitlyn Hickmann interviews host/creator Dave Gardner. The two share highlights from previous episodes and discuss the joys and challenges of producing the series. This episode serves as a great sampler, giving you a taste of the variety of subjects and the caliber of the guests.

Do you want to hear a Season 3? You can make that happen at http://tinyurl.com/ceseason3. We've just launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise funds to produce Season 3. Visit http://tinyurl.com/ceseason3 to learn more about the podcast, meet Dave and Kaitlyn up close and personal, and make a tax-deductible contribution to keep the conversation going.

Frustrated at the abysmal rate of adoption when seatbelts were introduced into cars in the 1960s, Jack Alpert quit his job as an automotive engineer to study human decision-making. In this episode he sheds interesting light on how we gather and process information to predict future outcomes and make related decisions.

Would you be surprised to learn that human beings today have an impairment that prevents most of us from making the wisest decisions that affect our future?

Jack founded the Stanford Knowledge Integration Laboratory while doing post graduate work at Stanford University in 1978. Today the lab is an independent non-profit research foundation. Aside from his automotive engineering and cognitive science work, Jack was on three early tech start-up teams – Bananafish software, Conductus and Cisco Systems.

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Are we all “bystanders” when it comes to responding rationally to the serious environmental crises faced by our civilization? How is our behavior shaped by that of those around us?

We’ve all heard of “the bystander effect” in which a large number of people stand by and do nothing to help someone in trouble. According to social norms theory, misperceptions of the attitudes or behaviors of our peers can cause the expression of problem behavior and the inhibition of healthy action.

In this episode, psychologist Dr. Alan Berkowitz shares the latest thinking about how the presence of other people affects our behavior, including our denial about critical threats to human civilization. Berkowitz founded and edited The Report on Social Norms. He authored RESPONSE ABILITY: A Complete Guide to Bystander Intervention in 2009.

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Human civilization can thrive while living within sensible limits imposed by a finite system. “Renegade economist” Kate Raworth manages to tell the truth about what we’re getting wrong in economics, while at the same time inspiring activism and optimism. In this conclusion of a two-part interview, Kate finishes her list of seven fundamentals to achieving a healthy 21st century economy.

Her recently published book, Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist, was called “brilliant, thrilling and revolutionary” by columnist George Monbiot. This conversation includes some of Raworth’s ideas about how we can put into practice what she is preaching.

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No civilization should head out into the world without “Doughnut Economics” in its survival kit. With her modernized thinking, economist Kate Raworth is, in her words, “flipping economics on its head.” UK Guardian columnist George Monbiot calls her new book, Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist, “brilliant, thrilling and revolutionary.”

In this first of a two-part conversation, Raworth explains why it’s way past time to update the approach to economics that’s been taught for over a century. She outlines seven fundamentals to achieving a healthy 21st century economy. Kate advocates painting a new mural over the “intellectual graffiti” keeping us locked into outdated economic thinking.

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Award-winning scientist Dr. Guy McPherson has concluded that for human civilization, the end is near. He advises the rate of change of our climate is increasing far more rapidly than we are being told, and this puts us on his endangered species list.

In this 2017 interview, McPherson reveals why the International Panel on Climate Change, and even many individual scientists, understate the problem. He critiques our modern “living arrangement,” and the lies our culture promulgates to avoid admitting, “We are trashing this planet at an astonishing rate of speed.” He also shares his thinking about a “sane” living arrangement. You might be surprised – both at how soon he expects we’ll be extinct, and at his positive advice about how to respond to this news.

Links and more information at http://www.conversationearth.org

Re-establishing our personal relationship with food and ending our role as commodity “consumers” is part of a healing, regenerative process. It’s a part of our natural evolution, according to Michael Brownlee, author of The Local Food Revolution: How Humanity Will Feed Itself in Uncertain Times. In this conclusion of a two-part conversation, Brownlee shares why food is sacred, and what is needed to accelerate relocalization of our food supply. He also explains what we’ve lost in the commoditization of food, and what we can gain as we relocalize.

Since 2005, Michael Brownlee and Lynette Marie Hanthorn have shepherded grassroots relocalization efforts in Boulder, Colorado. Their efforts have included the founding of Boulder Valley Relocalization, Boulder County Going Local, Transition Boulder County, Transition Colorado, Local Food Shift Group, and – most recently Local Food Catalysts. The pair are producing and co-hosting the first national Local Food Summit for ten days this summer.

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A scaled-up local food system may be the only way we can feed ourselves as we weather the storm of climate change. Until now, CSAs, urban gardens and farmer’s markets have been the face of the local food movement. But Michael Brownlee, author of The Local Food Revolution: How Humanity Will Feed Itself in Uncertain Times, tells us this is not nearly enough. In this episode, the first of a two-part conversation, Brownlee shares how global industrial agriculture is failing us, and can’t adapt to the coming climate changes. He advocates relocalizing our food supply chain in order to adapt and survive.

Since 2005, Michael Brownlee and Lynette Marie Hanthorn have shepherded grassroots relocalization efforts in Boulder, Colorado. Their efforts have included the founding of Boulder Valley Relocalization, Boulder County Going Local, Transition Boulder County, Transition Colorado, Local Food Shift Group, and – most recently Local Food Catalysts. The pair are producing and co-hosting the first national Local Food Summit for ten days this summer. For information visit https://www.thelocalfoodsummit.com/summit/?orid=3782&opid=1

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