Author Archives: Dave Pollard

Conversations That Matter: What It Takes to Have Them

Posted on July 6, 2019 by Dave Pollard

photo by Maren Yumi on flickr CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 Ironically, despite the fact that I engage in fewer conversations than I used to (maybe because since I’m retired I don’t have to, and because I find few conversations valuable anyway), I’ve started … Continue reading →

Posted in How the World Really Works, Our Culture / Ourselves, Preparing for Civilization's End | 3 Comments

Being Adaptable: A Reminder List

Posted on June 28, 2019 by Dave Pollard

image from PXHERE, CC0 It’s been about four years since I produced an updated version of my rather complicated Community-Based Resilience Framework. The revisions I made then had already begun to acknowledge how little we can actually do to prepare ourselves … Continue reading →

Posted in Preparing for Civilization's End | 2 Comments

Did Early Humans Have Selves?

Posted on June 22, 2019 by Dave Pollard

image by Neil Howard on flickr CC-BY-NC2.0 Ontology is “a gathering of or speaking (-logy) about ‘what is, what exists’ (onto-)”. The suffix -logy has come to mean a study or science, but originally it just referred to something said … Continue reading →

Posted in Our Culture / Ourselves | 7 Comments

Links of the Quarter: June 2019

Posted on June 11, 2019 by Dave Pollard

image of the Maldives by David Mark from Pixabay, CC0; the islands will likely be completely submerged due to sea level rise from glacial melt by mid-century I’ve recently updated the (highly subjective) list of my ‘best’ 94 posts. That’s out … Continue reading →

Posted in How the World Really Works, Our Culture / Ourselves, Preparing for Civilization's End | 4 Comments

Things I Do While Waiting, Hopelessly, for the Dawn

Posted on June 8, 2019 by Dave Pollard

photo by Vahap Kìlüken from pxhere, cc0 The expression the dark night of the soul seems to resonate with a lot of people. It’s used as a metaphor for times of extreme personal, often existential, doubt, angst, hopelessness, depression, meaninglessness, purposelessness, … Continue reading →

Posted in Our Culture / Ourselves | 2 Comments

The Work That Seems Worth Doing Now

Posted on May 26, 2019 by Dave Pollard

painting “In Deep Conversation” by Irish artist Pam O’Connell “It’s about negotiating the surrender of our whole way of living,” writes Dougald Hine. Dougald was the co-founder ten years ago of the Dark Mountain project he is now leaving behind, and … Continue reading →

Posted in Preparing for Civilization's End | 6 Comments

A Plague

Posted on May 25, 2019 by Dave Pollard

painting: A Swarm of Locusts by Emil Schmidt, in the public domain A plague (in its generic meaning) is defined as “a destructively numerous influx or multiplication of a noxious animal; an epidemic disease causing a high rate of mortality”. It … Continue reading →

Posted in Preparing for Civilization's End | 2 Comments

Where We Are Now: More on the Culture of Fear

Posted on May 21, 2019 by Dave Pollard

Image of ghost town in Japan, near Nagasaki, abandoned when the coal ran out, from pxhere, CC0 Three years ago I wrote an article entitled A Culture Driven By Fear: The Psychology of Collapse that argued that while healthy cultures strive to meet … Continue reading →

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What Will It Take?

Posted on May 9, 2019 by Dave Pollard

Last evening a group of about 30 Bowen Islanders watched a documentary called The Reluctant Radical. I arranged it, since the film profiles Ken Ward, who is a friend of Tree’s and who I’ve met a couple of times myself. … Continue reading →

Posted in How the World Really Works, Our Culture / Ourselves, Preparing for Civilization's End | 6 Comments

Nothing on Offer Here

Posted on April 28, 2019 by Dave Pollard

image CC0 via maxpixel People want to believe, and they want people who seem to have found answers to tell them what they’ve learned, and what to do as a result. It’s flattering to be asked for advice, and very … Continue reading →

Posted in Our Culture / Ourselves | 8 Comments