Reversal

The map is not the territory. In 1933, Alfred Korzybski, a Polish-North American philosopher, attempted to describe the gulf between human perception and the reality in which we live in Science and Sanity. We mistake our model of the world, "the map", for the world itself, "the territory". But his referent for reality was itself a human construct. The territory is not the land, the lakes, the streams and rivers, the moors and mountains and the life providing cycles of water and carbon that permeate over and through it regardless of notional territorial boundaries. Even concepts such as self, hide our constant metabolism of elements from our environment. Without our engagement in the water cycle, absorbing and evaporating it continually, our biology breaks down in a matter of days.

Before we established boundaries in space around which we have fought increasingly sophisticated and brutal wars, we developed a shared understanding of boundaries in time. We roamed the land and coastal margins following the seasonal patterns of plant growth and animal migration. We hunted and gathered our way across the land. We collaborated within and across our emerging kinship groups, defending against much more powerful predators, sharing resources to establish peaceful coexistence. A reproductive strategy was established by females that synchronised with the lunar cycle. Not only does the size to distance ratio of the moon and sun just happen to be such that perfect solar eclipses periodically occur, but the human female menstrual cycle also perfectly matches the phases of the moon. No other primate shares this cycle or has developed a semantic language that humans acquired in a cultural explosion that set us apart from the other species, despite sharing the same vocal physiology. This emergence from limited vocal signalling into a virtual reality of symbolic culture, myth and taboo, was organised by women, who by coalition and solidarity developed the first word; no.. The self interested males were denied access to the newly reproductive females by females establishing a collective concealment ritual around the full moon when nocturnal light reflected by the moon provided the optimal conditions for hunting. Males understood this signal and joined the cycle, sharing the meat they hunted and participating in the reproduction and rearing of the group's young. How else could a mother both defend her dependent offspring and acquire the necessary resources to nourish herself and her child, in the presence of predation both within and outside the species?

By the time land grabbers started putting up fences and establishing farming as a competing strategy to the seasonal migrations of hunting and gathering, we were already fully human in the modern sense. We had developed a language that maps a semantic virtual reality onto the world. We developed mimicry of the vocal signals of our prey to improve our hunting efficiency, and whilst gathering fruits and other nutrition in our child rearing collectives we developed choral song to confuse our predators. This polyphonic vocal music is still practised by hunter gatherer groups such as the Baka in Central Africa.

Eventually, the competing strategy of the settled farmers, imposing their boundaries in space, accumulating their resource surplus over an annual cycle rather than the 13 lunar cycles in the year led to conflict with the female led society of the hunter gatherers, described by Engels as "primitive communists". A patriarchal priesthood appropriated the first human culture of language, myth and taboo and inverted it into a defended culture of bounded land to be fought for. An updated virtual reality was imposed that privileged the superior 'civilisation' of the farmers over the primitive 'tribes' of the first humans.

A species of seven billion mostly urban living humans is unlikely to move forward into free roaming communist peace loving groups, though we see many population reduction projects laid out before us, and our species has thrived in the face of existential challenge. However we still live in the first human virtual reality. Our cultural and linguistic diversity share many congruences of myth and social practice and unites us across notional boundaries in space that now serve the wealth acquisition of the Imperial military industrial complexes. We became human in a synchronised ritual of resistance. Radical Anthropologist, Chris Knight presents his theory of the female led Human Revolution that gave rise to language and culture in Blood Relations: Menstruation and the origins of Culture. He counters the orthodox view that projects our current societies’ catastrophically warring drive to dominance as the result of unexplained qualities of Man the Hunter that leave the question unanswered of why, of all the primates, Homo Sapiens emerged from the animal world, left our ancestral home in Africa and flourished for possibly 300 000 years before the Patriarchal priesthood began our descent into the major existential threats of War, Genocides and Ecological breakdown 10 000 years ago. A second Human Revolution is our only hope for averting the sixth mass extinction of the only known life in our Universe.

The current war-monging elites are whipping us into a mass psychosis of fear of the propagandised evil intentions of the illusory other. They are persuading us that diverting resources from our social reproduction into their military budget is necessary. The new head of Mi6, the Imperial West's most psychopathic and democratically detached armed force roaming freely around all the current zones of conflict, recently introduced herself to the nation by declaring "We are operating between a space of peace and war".. Yes Ms, Metreweli, grand daughter of Constantine Dobrowolski, a Nazi collaborator during World War II, known for his role as a chief informant for the Nazis in Ukraine, referred to as "The Butcher" due to his involvement in the extermination of Jews and other war crimes, that clearly is the "Space" you and your colleagues are operating in. But have you noticed your farmers are resisting? Where are you planning to have lunch in that liminal space you are creating? And when?

In 1994 The Spikey Things With Curves was an occupied building across the road from Hackney Town Hall. Many people lived there and its residents created a cafe, workshops and exhibition space for artists, and a music/party venue. It was named after some eccentric sculptures that were placed by the windows by one of its residents. As the video makes clear, Spikey Things With Curves was very much focussed on being a creative community space and most people seem to agree that it was briefly a happening hub for some innovative art and great parties. After the eviction, a mural painted on the building by local artists remained a feature of Mare street until a Wetherspoons pub was built in the vacant lot next-door, opening in February 2003, Although the mural disappeared when the pub was built, a picture of it was hung in the pub. Wetherspoons decided to close the pub, Baxter's Court on November 2 2025, so I went along for a pint.

What an honour and a privilege to ride through stunning terrain in your company!

Iceland is one of the most active volcanic regions in the world, located on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, where the Eurasian and North American Plates are moving apart. A mantle plume, thought to originate deep in the mantle, perhaps at the boundary between the core and the mantle at about 2,880 km (1,790 mi) depth, enhances the volcanism already caused by plate separation. In early August 2024, we went for a bike ride round some of the most active regions. Katla erupted under its ice cap on the day we landed, causing a glacial outburst that knocked out a bridge on the island's ring road. After three days in the Southern Highlands, skirting Katla to its North West, we headed for the Reykjanes Peninsular in the South West, which has seen ongoing eruptions since the 2021 eruption of Fagradalsfjall began a new period of volacnic activty after nearly 800 years of inactivity.

Another world is possible. Throw those curtains wide.

Don't tell King Charles III that wild camping on his land is not dead. Long Live wild camping!

The Forest of Bowland was cleared of its 'forest' in the 1800's. A forest in UK refers to a royal hunting ground. This one, in Lancashire, is owned by the Duke of Lancaster, King Charles III.

Either We dismantle our toxic culture and its psychopathic governance structures, or we lead increasingly limited lives in the rubble of its accelerating destruction.

Either we disarm our toxic culture and its psychopathic governance structures or we lead very limited lives in the rubble of its accelerating destruction.

Carry On Up the Red Sea. Houthi Rebels, Anshallah, started attacking Israeli ships when the International Court of Justice ruled that Israel was plausibly carrying out a Genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza. On that same day 16 Western Governments agreed to defund the UN human rights agency that is the only source of food and medical supplies into what is the world's largest concentration camp. It takes time to coordinate an agreemnent between 16 governments. Anshallah said they would stop their blockade of Israeli ships if Israel stopped the slaughter and allowed aid in to Gaza. The US and UK struck targets in Yemen with airstrikes and formed a coalition of Naval ships to "protect" shipping through the Red Sea and Suez Canal. Now the Houthis are attacking US Navy Ships and British Freight ships aswell.