1. Biden cancels the KeyStoneXL Pipeline – good riddance to this investment in backwardness
2. Biden signs orders to roll back Trump’s environmental idiocy – now begins the great work to fix the best efforts of grifters and the former toddler-in-charge
3. Finance behemoth Blackrock ramps up to tamp down greenhouse gas emissions – it’s tough to trust anything from the hypocritical finance industry, but BlackRock is the industry leader and is at least partly acting like it
4. Falling birthrates are opening the door to rewilding – shrinking populations bring a ton of challenges, but they’re also allowing our fellow living creatures a little breathing and living space
5. Organized efforts to fully protect much larger swaths of the Earth are growing – 30×30 is just one of a ton of groups working to save what’s precious
6. Bali finds a worthy task for unemployed hospitality workers: restoring coral reefs – these are baby steps but essential for keeping Bali’s ocean waters and economy alive
7. Gen Z continues to lead the charge, and it starts locally with groups like Gambier Island Guardians – young people are fighting to save what we have, and it’s that desire that gives our society any hope of changing how we live
8. Going full war-mode on climate change is becoming a thing – economists like Mariana Mazzucato and policy commentators like Seth Klein are putting in the work to outline how governments should and can rightfully fight climate change with wartime-like efforts
9. NY is developing a viable solution to fix recycling – maybe it’s a long shot, but we need recycling to work
10. GM plans to abandon combustion engines by 2035 – partly a PR exercise, yes, but if GM sticks to this promise it will help make a possible shift in car culture the real deal

This is a snapshot of recent good news for life on our planet. If you look outside at any moment it would be easy to discount these developments; life (excluding Covid, of course) looks largely the same as ever. But if you dig in to this news, and appreciate these are samples only and not the totality, then you can feel that change is happening — because a growing number of people are recognizing that our current path is a suicidal.

The hope, of course, is that these developments large and small are cumulative, that even without everyone on board with them we will reach some positive tipping point and centuries of havoc and devastation will be reversed.

Probably not. If you read the words from Duane Elgin — whose book Choosing Earth I’ve just begun — we’re 20 years too late. Roy Scranton agrees: now is the time to adapt, to live with what we and our ancestors have wrought.

But that doesn’t mean we give up. We have to choose how to manage the fallout of the past. The future isn’t written. We do have choices: of how we live now and especially about how we manage the fallout of our choices up till now. Not doing anything, pretending nothing needs to be done, or perhaps worst of all choosing to live only for the moment, is the cowardly act. As Elgin notes, 

I’ve had a short poem posted on the frame of my computer for years. It’s a Zen poem, and it says, “No seed ever sees the flower.” We plant seeds with books, films, business organizations, social movements, and so on, in hopes we will see them flower. The Zen proverb advises us to give up hope that we will see the results of our actions. Accept that we may not see the flowering. The seeds we are planting now may flower long after we move on. Our job now is to be visionary farmers — and to plant seeds of new possibilities without the expectation we will see their flowering.

mentions:

• Seth Klein
• Mariana Mazzucato
• Duane Elgin
• Roy Scranton

Without getting into plot details or spoiler territory, I will say that at least the initial book in the series is a first contact story — as in, humankind’s first contact with aliens. I’m not well read enough to make comparisons in the genre, but I’ll assume others have covered this concept more eloquently. Still, there’s plenty to like about what author Liu Cixin has done, mainly in how he grounds the story.

That story is built on several pillars, in no particular order of importance. One is contemporary history, and specifically the era covering the height of China’s Cultural Revolution to present day. Another is the environmental movement, especially as it was inspired and directed by the publication of Silent Spring.

A third is mathematics. Not just the three-body problem of the title, though that’s essential, but also the value of the mathematical outlook and the role of math pioneers throughout history.

A fourth pillar is the nature of computing, and that field’s relationship to math and physics. There are plenty of mind-warping passages throughout that gave me a re-invigorated (and still highly ignorant) appreciation of the characteristics and scale of space, time, and information.

A final pillar is the scientific mindset, and the wonders of the world that queries guided by that mindset have revealed to us. Liu’s appreciation for this mindset is woven throughout The Three-Body Problem. But he saved his most forceful opinions on the value of science for the epilogue.

Liu might be right, that creation myths pale in comparison to the big bang. But that’s missing the magic a bit: those myths and epics he derides, and his derision itself, are all products of that same story-telling machine, our imaginations. Those imaginations are just as much a natural product of the big bang as any star, galaxy, element, or animal. What’s more, science — applied to the very minds that have made scientific discoveries and written epics — has revealed far less about those minds than it has about stars.

We could follow that thread a lot further, but let’s just thank Liu for it, and move on to how his emphasis on, and this specific praise for, science puts his novel in a different light. Yes, while his dreamed-up version of an alien civilization is creative, it is deeply rooted in details of math and physics. That fact, combined with his preference for “reality” over imagination, makes clear that for Liu first contact isn’t just a mental exercise or a math problem, it is a real possibility. At any time.

Which brings us to this:

Liu has good reason to admonish us for so easily hating one another. We’re cruel. And he also has good reason to (rather gently) condemn how we’re so willing to believe the best about any possible alien invasion, Independence Day and its ilk aside.

Notably, while tales of alien abductions, UFO conspiracy theories, and salvation coming from the heavens have long lived on the fringe, there’s now a case to be made that belief in aliens could be our next religion, thanks mainly to that belief catching on among those in power. As Claire Coffey notes in her review of D.W. Pasulka’s American Cosmic: UFOs Religion, and Technology, “To decent Romans, Christianity was a weird and possibly sorcerous cult practiced by rednecks and illiterates — until suddenly it was the force behind the empire.”

I don’t find this take that convincing, as both “those in power” and the focus of their beliefs remain elusive. But it’s not as though only citizens of the fringe are looking to the skies. Have you seen the March cover of National Geographic?

It’s a powerful front page. And yet for me Liu’s passage above more forcefully brings this possibility of alien life from the realm of storytelling to the realm of — this could happen. At any moment.

Clearly many people can imagine first contact happening. And they, like Liu, recognize that an alien encounter would blow the lid off of our history, philosophy, religion, etc. But most scientists who believe there must be other life in the universe still seek proof, like doubting Thomases, making this possibility of an encounter feel like something always just out there over the time horizon.

To me, the tack Liu takes in the epilogue ups the likelihood of a first contact. Why? Because it’s a warning.

An encounter with an alien intelligence would be a paradigm shift in our understanding of nature, the world, and our place in it. The wishful thinking Liu calls us out on is one way of dealing with that. Liu’s warning is another. It’s possible we all die before either coping mechanism is put to the test. Or both could be tested any minute now.

There’s one other possibility, of course. That we’ve already encountered aliens and just don’t know it.

As Seth Shostak, an astronomer at the SETI Institute, puts it: “The click beetles in my backyard don’t notice that they’re surrounded by intelligent beings — namely my neighbors and me. But we’re here, nonetheless.”

Is anyone getting tired of this yet? Of the combination of selfishness, rage, and weapons. Of the blood and death. Of the prayers and platitudes. Nah, rinse and repeat.

It’s become so common that in the aftermath it feels most appropriate to not bother to even discuss the carnage in Las Vegas, site of the latest outrageous outrage. If, as gun enthusiasts proclaim, now is not the time to discuss solutions to gun violence, then now seems like the time to discuss anything but the violence, sadness, and death there. Why bother with the investigation or trying to figure out a motive? The dead are dead, the next killer is already armed.

And yet.

It’s hard to turn away from the heroism and kindness that bloomed amid the violence.

It is equally difficult to ignore the voices of reason and common sense.

David Frum in The Atlantic, points out that (maddeningly) governments in the U.S. do react to gun violence: by allowing more guns in more places. Enough to change the outlook for a sick society from sad to hopeless.

Thomas Friedman in the NY Times rightly highlighted that “(the U.S.) will turn the world upside down to track down the last Islamic State fighter in Syria — deploying B-52s, cruise missiles, F-15s, F-22s, F-35s and U-2s. We will ask our best young men and women to make the ultimate sacrifice to kill or capture every last terrorist. And how many Americans has the Islamic State killed in the Middle East? I forget. Is it 15 or 20? And our president never stops telling us that when it comes to ISIS, defeat is not an option, mercy is not on the menu, and he is so tough he even has a defense secretary nicknamed “Mad Dog.” But when fighting the N.R.A. — the National Rifle Association, which more than any other group has prevented the imposition of common-sense gun-control laws — victory is not an option, moderation is not on the menu and the president and the G.O.P. have no mad dogs, only pussycats.”

Friedman calls out not only the hypocrisy, but also the motive. Greed. Who wins and who loses in the wars overseas? Follow the money. How about in the fight to apply a vaguely worded amendment, penned over 200 years ago, to modern society and weaponry? Follow the money.

While Friedman ends his column calling the sane to take this fight to the polls, he also hints at the fundamentally broken philosophical foundation of those wed to the notion that owning guns is a right above any and all others. Theirs is a worldview full of contradictions, some of which Matt Taibbi brings into clearer focus.

Chief among those contradictions:

• death by guns is acceptable as long as it is brought about by citizens
• falling education standards, which citizens should be figuratively up in arms about, causes hardly a peep, but rising idiocy cannot be an excuse to keep anyone from owning a gun or fifty
• public and personal safety must take a backseat to each person’s right to carry around a weapon designed solely to kill, wherever they like, whenever they like, and regardless of their training, mental state, rage issues, clumsiness, or any and all other problems and faults
• it is patriotically required that no matter where the government send soldiers, bombs, or guns, they and their mission — no matter how destructive and no matter the motive — must be admired and praised without question, because to do otherwise is an insult to the country, the flag, and the government
• but any attempts by that same government to protect public lands (that is, lands owned by all) or public safety by in any way limiting access to those lands or weapons is the cold, crooked hand of tyranny
• and yet, if that same government, as part of an effort to spend trillions of dollars hunting down foreign extremists who are indeed wicked but statistically speaking hardly a threat, spreads that money to friends and shareholders, and simultaneously passes laws to strip away protections of citizens’ rights, data, and privacy, the gun-toting patriots say: squat

The U.S. is a mess, but the few voices of reason rising in volume are at least a sign of intelligent life:

[contact-form]

Meghan O’Gieblyn, in her piece Ghost in the Cloud, gives  a sincere update on all three. As a Christian who lost her faith, her search for salvation in technology — and the people she finds there — provides especially worthwhile insights into the state of yearning in an increasingly godless world. It’s a yearning that runs through rich and poor, tech savvy and not, conservatives and liberals. It’s not, in other words, prejudiced.

O’Gieblyn raises more than a few issues that deserve attention, but a these stood out:

1. The dead that many technologists want to raise might not want to re-join the living. Don’t they get a say?
2. Lost in the debate about the eternal life promised in the Bible, and whether it includes the spirit and/or the flesh, is that the Christian faith is founded on the idea that through his sacrifice Christ has already saved us.
3. Heaven on Earth and immortality are not necessarily linked. In fact, simply living like Christ would be enough to make our world as it is in Heaven.

O’Gieblyn does a great service putting this journey in context, and raising questions about who and what we’re following on our way to hope, heaven, or doom. A sure sign of intelligent life.

Want to know why some college students feel they need “safe places” on campus?

Want to know why addicts keep going back for more, overdose after overdose?

Here’s a clue: start with a little understanding.

This isn’t to say these people are right in what they do. Nor is it the start of a rant in favor of moral relativism. It’s a call to walk in another’s shoes, for only there do you begin to understand. And only then are we on ground where we can agree about something.

Differences remain. They always do, and they always should (who wants a world where everyone is the same?).

But it’s when we understand each other, find something in common, that we can find common goals and — in spite of differences — begin to work together for the things we share. And here’s the thing: when we begin to understand each other, most of the time we find that we are a lot more alike than different.

That’s the bigger picture, but any progress toward this comes day-to-day, in baby steps. They’re the tough ones. And they stand out when you see them, because they’re valiant and the hard work is obvious.

Here’s a perfect example: a subway seat in Mexico City designed to raise awareness about sexual harassment on public transit. It is a bit shocking, with a purpose: to change the perspective, especially men’s perspective, by changing the subject to the object and in that moment giving men just a bit of an understanding of what it’s like being the object.

And then, maybe then, they act a little differently next time.

Seat makers, this is a sign of intelligent life.

A favorite strategy of these practitioners is the Bible quote, otherwise known as “take some easily misunderstood verse, use it out of context, and proclaim it God’s will while emphasizing you are only the messenger.” Though sadly effective over the last two thousand years, it’s also a lazy, often hypocritical, and (ironically) bogus reading of the Bible.

As is the case when fighting most evils, knowledge is the best ammo for a counterattack. A healthy dose recently arrived from Newsweek, which published an illuminating piece about the misuse and abuse of the Bible, mainly at the hands of its most ardent thumpers.

Is it a sign of progress that fewer people are participating in organized religion, at least in the West? That remains to be seen. But by telling the story of the Bible’s origins and evolution, the many pitfalls bringing its authors’ intentions into the 21st century, and the work required to properly understand it, Newsweek has provided a service to atheist and follower alike. What remains is a valid way to focus on the essential message of Christianity. That feat alone is a sign of progress.

Now imagine if that same approach were taken to other religious texts. That surely would be a sign of intelligent life.

Gorillaz, the brilliant love child of Damon Albarn and illustrator Jamie Hewlett, haven’t released a new track since 2011. But the wait is now over, as the band has in a stroke of genius teamed with the stellar Benjamin Clementine on “Hallelujah Money”.

Hallelujah, indeed.

Verdict: this is indeed a sign of intelligent life.