Podcast #36: Jerry Mander

Author and activist Jerry Mander reflects on a long life of technoskepticism and how it relates to the current global moment.

By Mo Lotman | January 5, 2021 | Advertising, Community, Culture, Economics, Environment, Media, Podcasts, Society | Capitalism, Coronavirus, Environment, Exploitation, Globalism, Grand Canyon, Image, Indigenous Rights, Internet, Media, Native Americans, Nature, Power, Propaganda, Television, The Sierra Club

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Escaping Screens: A Tech-Free Travel Quest, Part II

A stranded American tourist shares the story of a six-month screen-free quest through India and Nepal just as the coronavirus explodes. Part II.

By Tom Grotewohl | August 12, 2020 | Cognition, Culture, Media, Philosophy, Society, Well-Being | Acceptance, Addiction, Art, Awareness, Boredom, Boundaries, Concentration, Conscientious Tech Use, Consciousness, Convenience, Coronavirus, COVID-19, Creativity, Distraction, Dystopia, Electronic Devices, Experience, Food, Ganges, India, Jungle, Localism, Lockdown, Meditation, music, Nature, Nepal, News, Obsession, Pandemic, Peace, Photography, Presence, Renunciation, Ritual, Sacred, Screen Sabbath, Serendipity, Smartphone, Social Media, Spirituality, Superficiality, Tech-Free, Time, Tranquility, travel, Wisdom, Writing

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Escaping Screens: A Tech-Free Travel Quest, Part I

An American tourist stranded in India shares his story: six months traveling without a screen, only to pick one up again just in time for the global meltdown.

By Tom Grotewohl | July 30, 2020 | Cognition, Culture, Media, Philosophy, Society, Well-Being | Acceptance, Addiction, Art, Awareness, Boredom, Boundaries, Concentration, Conscientious Tech Use, Consciousness, Convenience, Coronavirus, COVID-19, Creativity, Distraction, Dystopia, Electronic Devices, Experience, Food, Ganges, India, Jungle, Localism, Lockdown, Meditation, music, Nature, Nepal, News, Obsession, Pandemic, Peace, Photography, Presence, Renunciation, Ritual, Sacred, Screen Sabbath, Serendipity, Smartphone, Social Media, Spirituality, Superficiality, Tech-Free, Time, Tranquility, travel, Wisdom, Writing

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E. M. Forster’s The Machine Stops (excerpts)

Excerpts of E. M. Forster’s 1909 futuristic dystopia The Machine Stops

By Mo Lotman | January 8, 2020 | Automation, Culture, Environment, Philosophy, Relationships, Society | Atrophy, Communication, Computers, Decadence, Dependence, Dystopia, E. M. Forster, Fiction, Internet, Nature, Progress, Social Commentary, Synthetic Food, travel

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The Prescience of E. M. Forster

Compared to 1984 or Brave New World, E. M. Forster’s 1909 futuristic novella The Machine Stops was, in some ways, the most eerily accurate prediction of our current technological milieu.

By Geoffrey Dutton | January 2, 2020 | Automation, Culture, Environment, Philosophy, Relationships, Society | Addiction, Atrophy, Class, Computers, Decadence, Dependence, Dystopia, E. M. Forster, Eugenics, Fiction, Internet, Nature, Pollution, Progress, Social Commentary, Synthetic Food

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Print Preview: Issue #3 | Summer 2019

Our third print issue is about to ship nationally.

By Mo Lotman | June 7, 2019 | Community, Economics, Environment, Health, Philosophy, Relationships, Review, Society | Activism, Addiction, Automobiles, Capitalism, Distraction, National Parks, Nature, Ralph Nader, Smartphones, surveillance

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Podcast #26: Adam Gazzaley on Our Distracted Minds

Neurologist Adam Gazzaley discusses how the brain’s attentional system functions–or doesn’t–when buffeted by digital distraction.

By Mo Lotman | February 6, 2019 | Cognition, Health, Neurology, Podcasts, Psychology, Well-Being | ADHD, Aging, Anxiety, Attending, Attention, Attention Deficit, Boredom, Cognition, Concentration, Depression, Digital Devices, Distraction, Education, Empathy, Enhancement, Exercise, Filtering, Focus, Goals, Habit, Ignoring, Information, Information Foraging Theory, Interference, Marginal Value Theorem, Medicine, Meditation, Memory, Metacognition, Monotasking, Multitasking, Nature, Neurology, Perception, Plasticity, Prefrontal Cortex, Prescribable Video Game Treatment, Psychology, Smartphones, Suppression, The Brain, Therapy, Video Games

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Podcast #24: Michael Zimmerman Gets Philosophical on Tech

In a wide-ranging conversation, philosopher Michael Zimmerman contextualizes our technological journey within the history of Western thought.

By Mo Lotman | January 9, 2019 | Artificial Intelligence, Culture, Employment, Environment, Ethics, Knowledge, Philosophy, Podcasts, Religion, Society | Acts of Enclosure, Addiction, Agriculture, Ancient World, Anger, Aristotle, Arnold Toynbee, Artificial General Intelligence, Artificial Intelligence, Authenticity, Axial Age, Behavior, Bible, Bolsheviks, Boundaries, Buddhism, Capitlism, Carolyn Merchant, Christianity, Civilization, Control, Craving, Creativity, CRISPR, David Loy, Death, Decadence, Deep Ecology, Delusion, Desire, Distraction, Earth, Ease, Embodiment, Engineering, Environment, Eternity, Exploitation, Exponential Growth, Facebook, Fake News, Fate, Finitude, Fire, Francis Bacon, Friedrich Nietzsche, Gnosticism, Golden Rule, Google, Greed, Hatred, Hegel, Heiddeger, Hubris, Human Nature, Humanness, Immaturity, Immortality, Industrial Revolution, Infantilization, Isaiah, Islam, Jaron Lanier, Karl Jaspers, Karl Marx, Knowledge, Lab-Grown Meat, Life, Loss, Martin Rees, Marxism, Master-Slave Dialectic, Meaning, Meat-Eating, Mediation, Medieval World, Metallurgy, Mind, Mining, Modernity, Money Economy, Morality, Mortality, Native Americans, Nature, Nazis, News, Nihilism, Obesity, Pain, Pascal, Peter Thiel, Philosophy, Plato, Playing God, Power, Production, Progress, Propoganda, Protestant Reformation, Ray Kurzweil, Reincarnation, relationships, Religion, René Descartes, Resentment, Resources, Respect, Sailing, Security, Self-Mastery, Silicon Valley, Smartphones, Socialism, Soviets, Spirituality, Splintering, Steve Jobs, Suffering, The Overman, The Singularity, Trade, Traditional Societies, Transhumanism, Twitter, Utopia, Wealth, Wildfires, Will to Power, Wisdom, Wonder

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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.

By David A. J. Reynolds | June 27, 2018 | Community, Culture, Ethics, Family, Health, Medicine, Reproduction, Society, Well-Being | Ágnes Geréb, Amniotomy, Anesthesia, Asphyxia, Babies, Barbara Bridgman Perkins, Birthing, Caesarean Section, Childbirth, Children, Consumerism, Control, Demerol, Efficiency, Els Hendrix, Epidural, Finland, Forceps, Home-Birth, Hungary, Ignác Semmelweis, Infant Mortality, Institutionalized Birth, Interventionism, Irvine Loudon, Jacqueline Wolf, Jennifer Block, John Whitridge Williams, Kieran O’Driscoll, L.H. Lumey, Machines, Medicine, Michel Odent, Midwifery, Nature, Obstetrics, Oxytocin, Perfectionism, Pitocin, Pregnancy, Puerperal Fever, Rationalism, Sarah Buckley, Standardization, Taylorism, Technocentrism, The Netherlands, Twilight Sleep, UK, US, Western Medicine

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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.

By David A. J. Reynolds | June 13, 2018 | Community, Culture, Ethics, Family, Health, Medicine, Reproduction, Society, Well-Being | Ágnes Geréb, Babies, Barbara Bridgman Perkins, Birthing, Childbirth, Children, Control, Efficiency, Hilary Marland, Home-Birth, Ina May Gaskin, Institutionalized Birth, Jennifer Block, L.H. Lumey, Machines, Maternity Care, Medicine, Midwifery, Nadine Edwards, Nature, Obstetrics, Oxytocin, Pathology, Physiology, Pregnancy, Rationalism, Repression, Standardization, Surgery, The Netherlands, Western Medicine

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