Crazy Town

Douglas Rushkoff is a prolific author, documentarian, and podcaster with a delightful sense of humor. He joins the gang in Crazy Town to ponder paradoxical questions such as: Why would homes on Miami Beach be selling for millions of dollars if that property were really going to be underwater in a decade? Why would so much of the world be business-as-usual if climate change were real? Why is the stock market going up during a global plague? Coping in a world that no longer makes sense requires finding community in the real world and getting comfortable with uncertainty and cognitive dissonance. Find more from Douglas on his podcast Team Human.

Sylvia Earle is a legend in ocean exploration and conservation. She comes ashore in Crazy Town to discuss some of her experiences in the depths, the state of the world's oceans and marine biodiversity, the limits to growth, the wonders and disappointments of technology, and her belief in the accumulation of knowledge as a pathway for change. Sylvia's new book is called Ocean: A Global Odyssey.

What happens when two equal and opposite forces collide? It's a tag-team match of empathy and optimism versus existential crisis and poop jokes! In this mashup of Crazy Town and our sister podcast, What Could Possibly Go Right?, we collaborate with Vicki Robin to cover some heavy stuff, including climate change, the stages of grief, and collapse. You'll get your daily dose of doom and gloom (or as we like to call it, your reality check), but there's also plenty of inspiring ideas about how to navigate today's challenges and prepare for the future.

Take it from astrophysicist Tom Murphy. Sure, lightsabers, dilithium crystal warp drives, and Mars colonies are a lot of fun to consider. But a physics-based perspective on energy tells us that we need to accept the limits to growth, stop chasing  sci-fi fantasies, and get to work building a steady-state economy that works for people and the planet. Instead of focusing on growth, maybe we should focus on growing up.

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Peter Kalmus is a climate scientist, activist, and author. He has some gnarly things to say about climate change, extreme weather, and the myth of progress. But Peter gets past the doom and gloom to make positive recommendations for changing behavior and policy. Please check out his book Being the Change: Live Well and Spark a Climate Revolution.

It's the end of the world as we know it. OK, maybe not just yet, but it is the end of Crazy Town's third season. If you've been able to look past some of the more absurd parts of the podcast, perhaps you've noticed a pattern. In examining hidden drivers behind humanity's sustainability predicament, we grouped the drivers into three categories: human behavior, social constructs, and features of biophysical reality. Given our penchant for covering anxiety-inducing topics, we take you on a sobering tour through these categories. But we also offer a sweet suite of pro-social, environmentally sound ideas to help keep your amygdala happy. For best results, start thinking in systems, and listen to this episode in the shade of a leafy tree. When you finish, feel free to give that tree a hug -- it could probably use one right about now.

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The "maximum power principle" may sound like the doctrine of an evil supervillain, but it actually applies to all living creatures. The principle states that biological systems organize to increase power whenever constraints allow. Given the way humans adhere to this principle, especially by overexploiting fossil fuels, we often do behave like supervillains, wielding power in wildly irresponsible ways and triggering climate change, biodiversity loss, and other aspects of our sustainability predicament. Sometimes it seems like we're using a backhoe to dig our own grave. Fortunately, once you understand efficiency and its different flavors, you can see opportunities to optimize power rather than maximize it. While considering the outlook for humanity, the Crazy Townies ponder a weird question: are we smarter than reindeer? Richard Heinberg, author of Power: Limits and Prospects for Human Survival, joins the team to share his research on how people can optimize power.

Did you ever think a baseball melee could effectively explain nuanced topics like cybernetics and systems dynamics? This episode examines the fascinating world of positive feedback loops, which play an outsized role in the not-so-positive phenomena of climate change, biodiversity loss, and political polarization. In addition to basebrawls, you’ll hear how these feedback loops produce a variety of outcomes, from the mundane (e.g., restaurant acoustics and family squabbles) to the horrendous (e.g., ecosystem annihilation and nuclear meltdowns). To ensure safety, none of the podcast hosts were allowed to bring baseball bats into the recording studio. Beth Sawin, co-founder and co-director of Climate Interactive, joins the program to explain how reinforcing feedback loops can catalyze social and environmental transformations.

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All of humanity's feats, whether a record-setting deadlift by the world's strongest man or the construction of a gleaming city by a technologically advanced economy, originate from a single hidden source: positive net energy. Having surplus energy in the form of thirteen pounds of food per day enables a very big man, Hafthor Bjornsson, to lift very big objects. Similarly, having surplus energy in the form of fossil fuel enables very big societies to build and trade very big piles of stuff. Maybe Hafthor has a rock-solid plan for keeping his dinner plate well stocked, but no society seems ready to have a mature conversation about how our sprawling cities and nations will manage as net energy declines. Calling our conversation "mature" might be a stretch, but at least we're willing to address climate change, sustainability, and the rest of the net energy conundrum head on. Alice Friedemann, author of Life after Fossil Fuels, joins the conversation.

Imagine a factory assembly line running at full steam, but instead of spitting out car parts or plastic trinkets, the conveyor belt is loaded down with Jeff Bezos wannabes. That's a disconcerting image, but an accurate picture of what's happening: society is producing too many elite people, and their decisions are causing extreme inequality, which is one of the key components of today's sustainability crisis. Join Asher, Rob, and Jason as they struggle with elite words and phrases (who's up for some cliodynamics?) and try to exorcise the demons of their own elitism. You'll also hear how elites may have formulated the plot of the next Spike Lee movie, "Do the Wrong Thing." Chuck Collins, author of The Wealth Hoarders, provides additional insights on how we can work toward a more equitable society.

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