Freedom

Year 5, Day 1 with my apartment disconnected from the electric grid

Freedom / Hands on Practical Experience / Pollution and Depletion

Year 5, Day 1 with my apartment disconnected from the electric grid

I only wish I’d disconnected sooner. Not needing something means more freedom, especially not needing something that Violates the Declaration of Independence (for a government to be just requires the consent of the governed, which pollution and depletion violate) Violates the Constitution (pollution and depletion deprive people of life, liberty, and property without due process of law) Violates property rights as understood by the framers, ratifiers, and public (pollution and depletion do not leave enough as good in common for others) Good luck maintaining democracy without enforcing the minimum requirements for it. Good luck leaving at peace with yourself violating your values. I take for granted you value living in a democracy, not descending into civic disorder leading to tyranny, civil war (remember last time…

May 22, 2026

Should I fear posting concerns about artificial intelligence?

Artificial Intelligence / Freedom / Models / Pollution and Depletion / Visualization

Should I fear posting concerns about artificial intelligence?

I'm posting more about artificial intelligence, maybe enough to make a category for it. I posted that I hesitated to post my last one with this explanation: "I held back on posting it because of the question in the last paragraph. I’m finishing the third volume of The Gulag Archipelago and studying the effects of dominance hierarchy, which artificial intelligence is forming. People who criticized Stalin didn’t fare well. Should we worry about criticizing the people and machines who may be at the top of a steepening dominance hierarchy?" I doubt I have to worry, but reflecting on something thoughtfully and calmly isn't worrying. Besides AI, I also post a lot about dominance hierarchies. They form when there is a necessary resource that can be…

May 19, 2026

Do you want to deprive others of free speech?

Freedom / Pollution and Depletion

Do you want to deprive others of free speech?

Do you want to live in a society where you can deprive others of free speech or freedom of the press? I wouldn't. I presume you value that your government protects your freedom of speech and the freedom of the press for that media you agree with. Can you imagine living under a government that didn't? I'm in the middle of The Gulag Archipelago. It gives some of the picture and it doesn't like desirable. It's tempting, is it not, to think sometimes, "As much as I value my freedom of speech, sometimes people say things I dislike so much that I'd like to be able to restrict theirs. Not always, of course, but sometimes." Or you learn what the other side's media tells them:…

May 16, 2026

If you can’t walk away, you aren’t free. Freedom requires not depleting nonrenewable resources.

Addiction / Freedom / Pollution and Depletion

If you can’t walk away, you aren’t free. Freedom requires not depleting nonrenewable resources.

If someone orders you to do something but you can walk away without risk or loss and they can't coerce or force you to do what they order, you're free and their orders are just words. Freedom means you can walk away. What if your life depends on resources others control, so that the only way you can access them is if they let you? Then you can't walk away. Are you then free? It doesn't look like it to me. What if a nation depends on resources others control, so that the only way it can access them is if those other let it? Then it can't walk away. Is it then free? It doesn't look like it to me. A post What We…

May 15, 2026

Why the government not enforcing the Constitution and Declaration makes avoiding polluting and depleting hard

Freedom / Pollution and Depletion

Why the government not enforcing the Constitution and Declaration makes avoiding polluting and depleting hard

Regular readers know how I bring my portable solar equipment to my building's roof or to the nearby park to charge. Since my sole apartment window faces nearly due south, I can charge through my window most of the year, however limited and blocked the view, but near the summer solstice the sun goes too high. Even though the hemisphere sees more direct sunlight for more hours each day, my apartment sees less. If I could just stick a small panel out my window facing up, I'd get all the power I need without the work of carrying my equipment up the stairs or out to the park. Countless apartments in the city and around the world already have air conditioners sticking out their windows.…

May 14, 2026

John Adams nailed the US today

John Adams nailed the US today

Learning about the US founders leads to finding great insight. I came across words from John Adams as President of the United States. I copy the whole letter below (it's out of copyright), but call attention to a few notes. The words some people know: "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." He's saying we have to know our values and act on them, not take things for granted. What also caught my attention is a sentence in the wordiness of the time, but seemed to me to nail the US today, maybe not completely, but well enough to show how predictable our situation: "should the People of America, once become…

May 5, 2026

More Americans died in the Civil War than all other wars combined

Freedom / Visualization

More Americans died in the Civil War than all other wars combined

From the Civil War Museum in Harrisburg, PA: "The number of war-related deaths in 1861-1865 is greater than the total number of American deaths in all other American wars." I've been stating that finding lately and wanted to cite my source for future reference. Estimates on deaths from wars are hard, as pages like How Many Died in the American Civil War? at History.com describe. Wikipedia's United States military casualties of war links many sources. You can define war deaths to include only people in the military or not, you can pick high estimates or low, and so on. I consider the Civil War Museum a credible source. Its gift shop had signed books from podcast guest David Blight (so far I've only finished the…

April 30, 2026

Clarifying what people get when they pollute and deplete less

A6FY1C Brent Delta North Sea

Addiction / Awareness / Doof / Freedom / Hands on Practical Experience / Pollution and Depletion

Clarifying what people get when they pollute and deplete less

What people get from polluting and depleting less: I used to tell people that they'd save money and time because they will. Nobody believes me. Nobody. They see buying coffee at Starbucks to go and ordering takeout as saving time, missing that those who do those things have the least time. Knowing your values so you can prioritize them and dismiss less valuable things (like takeout coffee and takeout) restores time and money. I first thought stopping things that cause pollution and depletion---particularly those that fund extraction of fossil fuels, uranium, and other nonrenewable resources---would bring deprivation and sacrifice. Now I see that many things I once thought necessary or unavoidable are unnecessary. In time and with hands-on practical experience they become repugnant and disgusting,…

April 27, 2026

Why do we fund our enemies by air conditioning the outdoors?

Freedom / Pollution and Depletion

Why do we fund our enemies by air conditioning the outdoors?

Find me a war where at least one side isn't partly funded by oil money. Find me a war that isn't threatening to expand at least regionally, maybe globally. Where is that oil money coming from? Who is helping raise fossil fuel prices, thereby increasing the resources and power of Putin and his peers? Look no further than this restaurant, running the air conditioning with the doors wide open, and all the people patronizing it. Also all its peer restaurants, stores with their doors open, etc, and all of us spending money with them. It's only April. The air outside is comfortable. Pictured below is total waste. Another view:

April 20, 2026

The Constitution has no extraneous protections.

Freedom / Pollution and Depletion

The Constitution has no extraneous protections.

I wouldn't want to live in a nation or world without freedom of speech, freedom of the press, protection of being tried twice for a crime, or any of the protections in the Constitution. I don't know anyone who would. All must enjoy the protections you do for it to work, even if you really want to deprive others of them It might be tempting to think it would be nice to enjoy freedom of speech or of the press for yourself but to be able to limit the speech or press of others, like your political enemies, but if you think about it enough, you conclude that you're better off with everyone enjoying all those freedoms. That is, you might be tempted to be…

April 20, 2026

What we can learn from jarring images from the Civil War Museum in Harrisburg, PA

Awareness / Freedom / Nonjudgment / Visualization

What we can learn from jarring images from the Civil War Museum in Harrisburg, PA

I gave a keynote and led a leadership workshop near Harrisburg, PA---a place halfway between where I grew up in Philadelphia and where my dad grew up, in Pittsburgh, so we passed through there many times growing up. I learned that the city hosts a Civil War Museum, so arranged to spend half a day there. I recommend it. A few items affected me beyond what I would have expected. Scroll down and you'll see the leg irons, collar with spikes, and whip with spiky metal spurs (the card implied that it wasn't known if this particular whip was actually used, but even if not, just that someone made it says a lot). First a few words. I'm not sure the pictures will hit you…

April 17, 2026

The futures that futurists imagine are what I envision: Yet more evidence living without polluting or depleting isn’t regression

Artificial Intelligence / Freedom / Relationships

The futures that futurists imagine are what I envision: Yet more evidence living without polluting or depleting isn’t regression

People consistently refer to life without polluting and depleting as returning to the Stone Age. The lack of historical awareness and imagination staggers the mind, or it would mine if I didn't realize that humans fill our minds with lies, or legitimizing myths, when we are induced to act against our values, to mollify our feelings. I was listening to William MacAskill (bio below) on Sam Harris's podcast. I'm not sure they would describe themselves as futurists, but they aren't far from it and in the part of the conversation I quote below, they were exploring what if artificial intelligence worked out. I quote several minutes of the conversation and share the audio, but I'll call attention to a few comments of what they imagine…

April 14, 2026

Colonized doesn’t mean Indigenous. Being there when colonizers arrived doesn’t mean there first.

Freedom / Nonjudgment

Colonized doesn’t mean Indigenous. Being there when colonizers arrived doesn’t mean there first.

Over and over, people refer to societies that were colonized as indigenous. For example, I see nearly all Native American groups referred to as indigenous. Here's a dictionary definition of indigenous, which covers the meaning here. indigenous adjective in·dig·e·nous 1 a : produced, growing, living, or occurring natively or naturally in a particular region or environment b usually Indigenous : of, relating to, or descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a place and especially of a place that was colonized Here's another: "Being a member of the original inhabitants of a particular place." Consider Manhattan, where I live. Humans have lived here for five or ten thousand years. Europeans arrived ten percent of that time ago. If someone calls the people who lived on…

April 8, 2026

Every group claims Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Douglass. Every group says the other produced Calhoun and eugenics.

Freedom / Models / Nonjudgment / Perception

Every group claims Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Douglass. Every group says the other produced Calhoun and eugenics.

The more I learn from different traditions, the more I find each group claims that their intellectual and cultural forebears are the people everyone likes and says the others descend from the ones everyone dislikes. I grew up in liberal, progressive households and schools. I learned that people who worked for liberty and freedom, and who fought against slavery and tyranny were the ones our traditions descended from. I learned that conservatives and libertarians just wanted profit. They would sacrifice the things we valued, like liberty and freedom, in favor of helping themselves. Hence, they were responsible for slavery and laissez-faire practices that caused hunger and poverty. I didn't learn to see the world from their perspectives. When I started to, in recent decades, I…

April 4, 2026

Did America wrongfully denigrate “I’m from the government and I’m here to help”

Did America wrongfully denigrate “I’m from the government and I’m here to help”

President Ronald Reagan said in 1986: “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help.” The quote has an appeal. Many Americans loved him. He was in his second term. I've been reading about slavery, abolitionism, the Civil War, and Reconstruction. One part seemed relevant: when the Union army liberated slaves from captivity. Were they not from the government, there to help? I don't think the slaves considered those representatives of the government terrifying. How about when schools were desegregated in the Civil Rights era. People from the government came to protect students in the minority, enabling them to practice their rights. How about during Reconstruction, in the early part, when it was working, when…

March 28, 2026

More on Eric Williams’s “Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery”

Freedom / Nonjudgment

More on Eric Williams’s “Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery”

I found a piece that expanded on something I wrote in Sustainability Simplified about how racism developed. Since I found that we needed to change culture to restore sustainability, I've been learning about abolitionism and related issues, since abolitionism is an example of humans changing global culture where no one thought it possible, then it happened, started by a small number of visionary people. In my book, I wrote: Oxford-educated Trinidadian historian Eric Williams wrote, “A racial twist has thereby been given to what is basically an economic phenomenon. Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery.” Recently, historian Ibram X. Kendi agreed. He wrote, “I had been taught that racist ideas cause racist policies. That ignorance and hate cause…

March 26, 2026

The United States situation regarding pollution and depletion

Freedom / Nonjudgment / Pollution and Depletion

The United States situation regarding pollution and depletion

We are living in the wake of the corruption of otherwise great people, in particular George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison, as well as their peers. They risked their lives to promote liberty, freedom, equality, democracy, and national security. They claimed those values were universal but defended them for themselves and their peers only. Their corruption was not to extend them to their slaves. The legacy of their corruption follows a direct line to John C. Calhoun and Jefferson Davis, then to Margaret Sanger, Henry Ford, and Ford's dear friend Adolph Hitler, through to today's persistent, enduring racism and greatest risks to national and global security. Still, I don't blame them. They didn't ask to be born into a slave culture. They couldn't help…

March 9, 2026

Why consistency? Self-awareness and integrity

Awareness / Fitness / Freedom / Habits / SIDCHAs

Why consistency? Self-awareness and integrity

I write about sidchas and standard procedures a fair amount. I don't remember how often I clarify the main reasons for doing them. You might think the point of fitness-related ones to be fitness. I'm proud of fitness results, but they're more a side effect. One of the big benefits is mental freedom. I think many people consider diet and exercise sources of stress, never knowing if they're doing enough or if they're doing them right. Making sidchas for the most important parts of your life means you always know they're taken care of. You never have to worry about them. The most important parts of life are easy to put aside here or there, then soon you've lost them. I consider the three pillars…

March 7, 2026

More wealth or stuff doesn’t mean freedom: Distinguishing freedom from abundance and prosperity

Awareness / Freedom

More wealth or stuff doesn’t mean freedom: Distinguishing freedom from abundance and prosperity

You've probably heard people say, "Even poor people today can do things beyond what kings and emperors of the past could dream," talking about cell phones, airplanes, and so on. Yes, but technological power doesn't necessarily lead to people valuing life more. Most people value freedom. Money and technology can enable us to do what we couldn't otherwise, but what if it comes with a loss of freedom? If you have nice stuff but if someone tells you what to do, you can't walk away and you have to do what they tell you to, what's the stuff worth? What if it comes at the loss of liberty, equality, democracy, and national security? You can talk to people on the other side of the world…

March 5, 2026

Heritage Foundation promoting socialism, as usual. Charlie Kirk did too.

Heritage Foundation promoting socialism, as usual. Charlie Kirk did too.

The Heritage Foundation states: "Heritage’s mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense." Those words may sound nice, but talk is cheap. What happens when it comes time to act? From Kevin Roberts of the Heritage Foundation and his podcast cohost: After years of rigorous research, I am proud to announce the release of The Heritage Foundation’s newest paper, “Saving America by Saving the Family: A Foundation for the Next 250 Years.” In creating this pivotal paper, our scholars challenged outdated assumptions, studied other nation’s attempts to reverse declining families (both successful and unsuccessful), and put our best minds to work to create actionable solutions.…

March 3, 2026

Visiting the Jackie Robinson Museum

Visiting the Jackie Robinson Museum

The Jackie Robinson Museum offered free admission this weekend. I didn't know about it and don't remember how I learned of the offer, but it turns out it's a 20-minute walk from my front door so I took them up on the offer. I recommend the museum to anyone. I presume most Americans know Jackie Robinson as the guy who "broke the color barrier" in baseball. Scroll to the bottom of this page for the overview of his life from Wikipedia, which is fascinating. This museum shows his life from childhood, born in Cairo, Georgia, his father disappeared, his mother brought his family to relatives in Pasadena, California as part of the Great Migration, becoming a star athlete (along with his brother). He was UCLA's…

February 14, 2026

Civil war results: obligation to kill old friends

Freedom / Stories

Civil war results: obligation to kill old friends

People read prediction of environmental problems like climate change or biodiversity loss and think the problems we face will be from things like crop failure or heat exhaustion from a warmer globe or lack of plants from honeybees dying. Those results won't cause the most suffering. They will provoke what causes the suffering, but fighting between people and societies will cause the most suffering. I'll illustrate. Say crops start producing smaller yields globally. Before people start starving, people will realize a resource is dwindling. While we live in mostly democratic societies, every nation also has systems that give different people different levels of access to resources when they become scarce. In other words, we live in dominance hierarchies, at least to some extent. Some people…

February 12, 2026

Did Thomas Jefferson start scientific racism?

Thomas Jefferson

Freedom / Nonjudgment

Did Thomas Jefferson start scientific racism?

I was watching a dialog on Slavery and the Constitutional Convention hosted by the US National Archives (see the video below). Thomas Jefferson My upcoming book focuses on many relevant things, especially how culture induces people to act against their values, then to create beliefs to rationalize and justify the behavior violating their own values. Thomas Jefferson represents one of the most prominent cases of someone who promoted liberty, freedom, equality, and democracy to the point of risking his life for these values for himself and his peers. He didn't extend them to his slaves. A renowned and accomplished historian and lawyer, Paul Finkelman (bio below) said the following, which I found interesting and relevant. Most of us have been induced to violate our values…

February 4, 2026

Jobs don’t just mean working in a dominance hierarchy. They mean working for the whims of people with rank.

Affluence Without Abundance, by James Suzman

Freedom / Nature

Jobs don’t just mean working in a dominance hierarchy. They mean working for the whims of people with rank.

Before the Holocene, our immediate-return egalitarian ancestors lived in environments in which each person could access their material needs. People who were hungry could, on their own, climb a tree, dig up a root, or hunt an animal. For needs like safety from predators, they'd have to cooperate with others, but they had the freedom and responsibility to make those relationships work. By contrast, living in dominance hierarchies mean that some people control access to what others need. By definition, if you have rank, you control something others need. When we say people need jobs, we imply that if they work hard they can provide for themselves, but today, to the extent our societies are based in dominance hierarchy, that work differs from then. Then,…

January 30, 2026

Meditation thoughts: What is meditation?

Awareness / Doof / Freedom / Habits / Hands on Practical Experience / Nonjudgment / SIDCHAs

Meditation thoughts: What is meditation?

I lead a meditation group that meets in person a couple times a month. We've found we can get a laugh if we talk in the group about talking about meditation to others who don't meditate by saying, "I can't meditate. My mind is too crazy to empty it of thoughts," or words to that effect. Why does it make us laugh? Because it's like a knee-jerk reaction that betrays a misunderstanding of meditation closer to its opposite. Everyone's mind is full of thoughts we can't help. Meditation doesn't empty your mind. Meditation can do many different things for different people, but a common goal is to find comfort with the eternal state of all human minds: scattered like yours. We know that what they…

January 26, 2026

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