The World Wired Web
Despite marketing imagery to the contrary, the “cloud” remains very much grounded in physical infrastructure, including unfathomable miles of wires.
The False Promise of Hydroelectric Dams
In part two of a series on dams, reservoirs and catastrophic failures displace and destroy whole communities and ecosystems.
Voyage of the Dammed
Hydroelectric power is often thought of as “green” energy, but dams have devastated river ecology and the creatures it supports—including us.
Natural Birth: The Long Struggle of Dr. Ágnes Geréb
In the final piece in a series on birth and technology, David Reynolds shares the history of Hungary’s tireless natural childbirth advocate.
The Apex of Technological Birth
In many places, birth by emergency surgery–the C-section–is increasingly the norm. Part three in a series on technological childbirth.
The Death of Natural Childbirth
The second part of a series on childbirth examines how natural birth has been systematically disabled, at the cost of bonding and health.
The Attack on Natural Childbirth
Over the past century or so, the most natural and integral part of the human life-cycle—birth—has been systematically medicalized and institutionalized, at the expense of the body’s own wisdom.
The Informed Preference for Permanence (Principles of Technoskepticism, Part Three)
Our technological mindset leads to an “enforced impermanence” as the new is always prioritized over the old. The resultant rootlessness and churn contributes to a sense of disequilibrium while keeping us apart from the steadying forces of tradition and wisdom.
The Problems of Prediction, Part 2
Our overconfidence in our predictive abilities can be traced to the simple fact that the universe is infinitely complex.
The Problems of Prediction, Part 1
Our technological mindset makes us more inclined to predict and gather ever-more data in service of prediction. We misunderstand the information we have, can’t know the information we don’t have, and yet we are more confident than ever.