Dr. Joe Layng gave two talks at this year’s Art and Science of Animal Training conference. The first talk was on degrees of freedom. He followed that up with an expansion of the concept that was profoundly disturbing, horrifying and hopeful all at once. He basically explained how someone becomes a terrorist. After the talks, I asked him if would be willing to share these presentations with the “Horses for Future” audience.

If you want to expand a field, you don’t do it from within. You do it by bringing in ideas from the outside. I want to expand our thinking around climate change and how we can work with one another to come up with solutions. That’s why I want to share Joe’s talk on degrees of freedom.

As you listen to the podcast, you may be thinking: “This is fascinating, but I don’t understand the connection to climate change.” Be patient. Joe will get us there in Part 2, and it will be well worth the journey.

I’m publishing this at a time when everything is being shut down because of the corona virus. We are living the experience of having our degrees of freedom reduced. Let’s hope by summer, this crisis will have passed, and we will be returning to a more stable normal. But let’s also hope we learn from this experience because it is just a preview of what may happen as the effects of climate change become more pronounced. The concepts Joe is sharing with us become all the more relevant as climate change adds more pressure to our lives.