Nonjudgment

Why don’t the left and right look at themselves the way the other does? Or do they, but I can’t find it?

Awareness / Nonjudgment

Why don’t the left and right look at themselves the way the other does? Or do they, but I can’t find it?

We've all heard how since the left and right get their news from different sources and those sources present different facts, it's as if two parts of the nation live in different realities. If so, how can they agree on points based on different facts? A related issue I don't think I've seen treated stems from each group evaluating themselves and the others based on different criteria. The left judges the right based on its criteria, not the right's, so it sees the right as failing, wrong, or bad. It also judges itself by its criteria and finds itself as succeeding as best it can, right, and good. Meanwhile, the right does it the other way. It judges the right based on its criteria, not…

February 16, 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

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

The Atlantic Magazine ads

I read stories on The Atlantic's website sometimes, but rarely read the physical magazine. I found a copy in my building's mailing room's recycling bin. I guess a neighbor with a subscription didn't feel like reading this month's issue. Here's the issue in particular online. The articles tended to be intellectual, left-leaning or full anti-Trump, but largely portraying either victimhood or implying solidarity with or support for the downtrodden. The back had an ad for Rolex. Inside I noticed a few ads promoting flying to self-indulgent or elite things, like programs for college-bound kids to pad their transcripts and travel agencies offering luxury vacations. Ads tell you about readers since advertisers don't want to waste their money. The magazine felt aspirational, for rich people whose…

January 13, 2026

Help restore my shaken confidence in people from Christmas Eve day

Habits / Nonjudgment / Stories / Volunteering

Help restore my shaken confidence in people from Christmas Eve day

Regular readers know I volunteer once or twice a week to deliver food from stores that were going to throw it away to community fridges, shelters, and other places for people to get it for free. I wasn't scheduled to volunteer yesterday (Christmas Eve day), but the person who was reported so much overstock that we needed three people to clear it all. Not many other volunteers were around so I was one of them. Here's the load I picked up: So far so good. For better or worse, the usual place I deliver to had this sign on its door: Darn! Now I had to find a place to donate around 3pm on Christmas Eve day, pulling a big load of food. You can't…

December 25, 2025

Democracy, wedge issues, and calm

Leadership / Nonjudgment / Relationships

Democracy, wedge issues, and calm

People's language and emotions get intense around wedge issues like abortion, gun rights, and tax levels. One side says the other wants to control women's bodies, the other says the one wants to kill babies. Such characterizations, mischaracterizations, and seeing the other from your view not theirs makes finding common ground nearly impossible. I call this pattern the worst problem in the world. Yet we have to live together. Secession didn't work so well in 1861. That's at the national level. At the individual level, if we can't talk calmly to our neighbors or think calmly, we can't become calm in the rest of life. Being angry all the time, or being stuck in emotions in that direction, doesn't make for a fulfilling life. My…

December 5, 2025

An important perspective to understand the Israel-Gaza conflict

Models / Nonjudgment

An important perspective to understand the Israel-Gaza conflict

Everyone seems to pick sides. Everyone who expresses an opinion seems to support one or the other but not both. I probably missed something or offended someone in what I write below. If so, I don't mind being told my mistakes so I can learn. There are plenty of ways to look at the situation, and you may have heard more than I have, but I hear people describing the two sides as two cultures with different values and goals that are clashing violently. It seems to me that both sides show different faces of the same culture, which we are in too: a global culture of living unsustainably that drives each community to exhaust its resources and require it to seek those resources elsewhere.…

November 25, 2025

Library strollers and nannies. Why are nannies almost only female? Where is the call for equal employment for male nannies?

Education / Nonjudgment

Library strollers and nannies. Why are nannies almost only female? Where is the call for equal employment for male nannies?

Longtime readers may know that when I lived for a year in Paris in 1990-91, I was an au pair. I lived with a family and took care of their young daughter. It was a wonderful opportunity for all. I don't know if you can tell from the pictures below, but my neighborhood library is a popular place for young kids in strollers, taken there by adults. As far as I can tell, all the adults are not the parents of the kids. I think they are all nannies. I haven't met any of them, but they are all women. I don't know about you, but my world is filled with calls for equality in professions that are segregated by sex. A big call is…

November 15, 2025

Differences between environmentalists’ strategies and mine

Hands on Practical Experience / Leadership / Nature / Nonjudgment

Differences between environmentalists’ strategies and mine

I've been increasingly realizing and pointing out that I am not an environmentalist. I surprised myself to discover it. I had long felt misunderstood when people asked, “If you like nature so much, why don't you go to the woods live in nature?” It had long been obvious to me that we needed to change culture, not escape it, and New York is an influential cultural center. Then I checked and in 2014, shortly before my first experiment in acting sustainably of avoiding packaged food for a week, in a post in this blog entitled The Great Pacific Garbage Patch and the world we live in, I wrote, "The issue is not how other people think about us or trends. Polluting means hurting people. Dirty…

November 11, 2025

Conservative, libertarian, and Christian posts in my blog and podcast episodes

Education / Freedom / Nonjudgment

Conservative, libertarian, and Christian posts in my blog and podcast episodes

Most people who call themselves environmentalists are on the political left. I talk to a lot of them. I also talk to people on the right and in other directions. I learn from all of them. I decided to compile them for reference. Some blog posts (I'm sure I missed a few): This week’s selected media: March 17, 2024: You Are a Badass; Into a Strange Land: Women Captives among the Indians; Conservatism 101 Followed up: watched recommended historical videos from the Leadership Institute’s course “Conservatism 101” My first Hillsdale College online certificate and why I took the course Cultural Exchange Without Flying: My dinner at the Trump International Golf Club at Bedminster More cultural exchange because of not flying: plinking and target practice This…

November 6, 2025

More drugs: a woman pooping in the park in broad daylight and more junkies shooting up in my neighborhood

Addiction / Doof / Nonjudgment

More drugs: a woman pooping in the park in broad daylight and more junkies shooting up in my neighborhood

As always: I post about junkies not to criticize or condemn them as individuals, though I consider adults responsible for their actions. I post about them to illustrate our culture. Their addiction and its harms to others and communities is more acute than most of ours, but it is generally more benign than people with dependencies on flying, driving, doof, takeout, screens, and other things nearly everyone does that hurt innocent people, violate the consent of the governed, and deprive people of life, liberty, and property. I post these images for us to see ourselves. Flying wrecks nature and tears families apart. Not flying connects us. If you chose to live flying-distance from family, you chose to hurt people. You can stop. Yes, withdrawal is…

October 30, 2025

How “helping” people with disposable goods, especially plastic, isn’t helping compared to reusable. It’s not hard to switch back.

Nature / Nonjudgment / Tips / Volunteering

How “helping” people with disposable goods, especially plastic, isn’t helping compared to reusable. It’s not hard to switch back.

Regular readers know I volunteer to deliver food that stores were going to throw away to groups that make it available for free to anyone who wants it, and sometimes to people directly, always for free. The context: free food distributed with disposable plastic One of the groups, Food Not Bombs, distributes food that many volunteers bring. They also distribute for free hot food that they cook. I believe all the food they cook is made from food that would have been thrown away, though maybe small ingredients like spices, salt, and oil might be bought. People who want the hot food get in line. When served, they are given the food in disposable containers in their choice of plastic or paper (lined with coating)…

October 25, 2025

If rivers and animals are people, then are no human people indigenous, only colonizers?

Nature / Nonjudgment

If rivers and animals are people, then are no human people indigenous, only colonizers?

I posted this question before in A paradoxical consequence of considering animals, plants, and rivers people, but wanted to pose the question more directly: If rivers and animals are people, then are no human people indigenous, only colonizers? That is, if we consider animals people, doesn't that they are indigenous and that humans who came into their territories are invading colonizers? I was reading about how humans crossed the Bering Strait, or at the time the Bering land bridge, then populated all of the Americas. To clarify, I'm not trying to prove anything in this post, nor to say "I'm just asking questions," then make a point with loaded questions, in the style of many media personalities. When I first heard the concept of making…

October 13, 2025

I love where I live but it’s being destroyed, part 3b: More drugs

Addiction / Doof / Nonjudgment

I love where I live but it’s being destroyed, part 3b: More drugs

My posts about addiction aren't about the addicts in the pictures or videos. They're about our culture. I see the person in the video below as the inevitable outcome of our culture. He is a more extreme example in one direction, but only a few steps ahead of many users of McDonald's, Instagram, Delta Airlines, and Netflix. Context: I was walking home, saw this guy, and decided to get my phone out and record. Did I worry about making his identity public? Yes, but his face isn't visible and he's already in public. I didn't look for the guy. I didn't suggest he do anything. He was there. I may not have even broken stride. I'd been looking up the fentanyl fold and nodding out.…

August 1, 2025

Not hurting innocent people a “purity test”? I think your ignorance or internal conflict is showing.

Freedom / Leadership / Nonjudgment

Not hurting innocent people a “purity test”? I think your ignorance or internal conflict is showing.

Thomas Jefferson owning slaves, including his own children, wasn't an abstract immoral act. He hurt people. He took away their freedom and hurt them. It isn't a "purity test" to say that by owning slaves he hurt people. When people act like living more sustainably is a "purity test" I see two possible causes. The generous one, which I find implausible in today's world, is that people don't know polluting hurts people. People often tell me "Josh, they really don't know. " When I respond that they know enough and if they pretend not to know, they're deliberately keeping themselves ignorant, people generally agree, and intentional ignorance doesn't make you innocent. It means they knew enough to know they're hurting people, they just want to…

June 22, 2025

More junkies shooting up in broad daylight in the park

Addiction / Doof / Nonjudgment

More junkies shooting up in broad daylight in the park

The title says it all. Here are pictures of more junkies shooting up in broad daylight in the park. Sorry the exposure isn't brighter for the people but I was trying not to draw attention to myself. I was in the park charging and trying to work. There were half a dozen people in the group shortly before I took these pictures. If you magnify the second image you can see the syringe going into his arm. For the record, as far as I can tell, people who fly, drive, buy doof, order takeout, buy fast fashion they dispose of soon after, or shop a lot online hurt other people and communities more than these junkies. A lot more. It's just less visible, or rather…

June 21, 2025

My first Hillsdale College online certificate and why I took the course

Education / Freedom / Nonjudgment

My first Hillsdale College online certificate and why I took the course

June 14, 2025

Nature’s discipline missing in today’s world

Addiction / Nonjudgment

Nature’s discipline missing in today’s world

Walking across the Manhattan Bridge, I saw a lot of graffiti. It looked to me like it was painted by boys or young men, likely making a statement vaguely like lashing out. I'm not sure, but it didn't look like it was designed to make the place feel safer or more secure. I thought about how many boys and young men feel motivated to show their independence and probably have since before our ancestors became human hundreds of thousands of years ago. Back then they couldn't spray toxic chemicals. They probably would have done things to show their independence without some equivalent of defacing public property. It got me thinking how we've created a world where behaviors resulting from our natural motivations become antisocial despite…

June 3, 2025

If you pollute and deplete, make your peace with the consequences of your actions instead of accusing others of making you feel guilty

Awareness / Nature / Nonjudgment / Tips

If you pollute and deplete, make your peace with the consequences of your actions instead of accusing others of making you feel guilty

I've written before that if you do something that kills people and you don't want to kill people, you have to stop doing that thing, even if you like it. That sentence seems about as matter of fact as you can get. It's not designed to make anyone feel guilty. That polluting and depleting kill people isn't an open question. We all pollute and deplete. Come to think of it, wouldn't not feeling guilty be a problem? But I didn't start this post to talk about an old one. I started there to point out I'm not starting today to use the direct language of what polluting and depleting does (kill people) instead of the abstract talk I used before, since everyone else did, like:…

May 30, 2025

Are we the 1%? Are you?

Are we the 1%? Are you?

The other day someone pushed back, as usual, about flying. For most people who fly, flying hurts people more than anything else they do through polluting, depleting, funding lobbyists, funding advertising, displacing people from their homes, etc. He started responding by saying, "The problem is that everyone has to see family ..." After he finished his whole answer, I pointed out not "everyone" flies to see family. Most Americans live within driving distance of their families. In the rest of the world, nearly no one lives flying-distance from families. We're so spoiled and entitled from the perks of being at the top of a dominance hierarchy we don't know how spoiled and entitled we are. The guy I was talking to was an environmentalist, and…

May 29, 2025

My comment on the media pooh-poohing “bros”

Nonjudgment / Relationships

My comment on the media pooh-poohing “bros”

I wrote this letter to the editor of the New Yorker. It's been long enough that I doubt they'll print it, but I wanted to share my thoughts. Everyone knows our culture misunderstands women. I think men could use more compassion and that doing so won't hurt any other group. To the editor, Andrew Marantz's article The Battle for the Bros perpetuates a subtle but common double standard: when society conflicts with men, there's something wrong with men and they need fixing, but society conflicting with women means there's something wrong with society and it needs fixing. It shows up more among liberals and overcoming it would help answer the article's question "Young men have gone MAGA. Can the left win them back?". It appears…

April 30, 2025

Some insensitivity I perceive from parents

Hands on Practical Experience / Nonjudgment

Some insensitivity I perceive from parents

I hear consistently from parents, "Since you aren't a parent you can't understand the challenges of raising a child and how it makes doing what you do about sustainability impossible," or words to that effect. They often imply or even imply, though not as bluntly: "You haven't held a newborn you created and have to care for for its survival. You haven't felt that love. You haven't experienced as much as I have." No one has lived anyone else's life so no one can know or feel what it's like to live as someone else. I'm not them so I don't know exactly what they mean, but similar messages come from many sources, so I think I catch some of the pattern. I think they…

April 28, 2025

Do conservatives oppose the practices of seeking diversity, equity, and inclusion or just those practices being mandated?

Choosing/Decision-Making / Nonjudgment

Do conservatives oppose the practices of seeking diversity, equity, and inclusion or just those practices being mandated?

I understand that liberals/progressives support DEI programs and that conservatives attack them, but I haven't followed this culture war that closely. I think the battle affected the presidential election. I hope I don't make myself look too ignorant about an important issue, but it seems that there is a distinction between what is being attacked and what conservatives actually object to. I wonder if conservatives value practicing these things, though they may define them differently than liberals and progressives. Could it be that they just don't like making the programs mandatory? Speaking only for myself, I don't like being coerced, but I value diverse opinions and backgrounds, treating people equally when I can and being treated equally, and to include people. I think anyone who…

April 23, 2025

More cultural exchange because of not flying: plinking and target practice

Freedom / Hands on Practical Experience / Nonjudgment / Relationships

More cultural exchange because of not flying: plinking and target practice

I don't know your views on guns, but I value both exploring different cultures and not polluting, which destroys life, liberty, and property. When my friend invites me to go to target practice at his shooting range outside the city, I'm happy to explore a culture as different from Greenwich Village, NYU, and Columbia as most places on earth. Unlike nearly anyone I know, I find cultures as diverse as any without flying and polluting. Many people I know look the other way at polluting, depleting, and homogenizing other cultures. Flying detracts from the values traveling is supposed to deliver. This one remains a constitutional right too, and I only took commuter rail to meet my friend. I didn't have to work months to save…

April 22, 2025

Filter bubbles, algorithms, polarization, and living in different worlds? What you can do about it.

Nonjudgment / Tips

Filter bubbles, algorithms, polarization, and living in different worlds? What you can do about it.

We've all read stories about how algorithms, polarized media, and so on are leading to situations where people with different political views learn such different information about the world we might as well be living in different worlds. If one person watches only liberal media and another only watches conservative media, they view events through different lenses. One may view the environment as an issue about protecting wildlife while the other may view it as protecting our government from being taken over. Therefore the first might view a politician proposing emergency powers to act as taking things seriously and a potential savior. The other may see that politician as threatening dictatorship. The pattern happens across many issues. I can see polarized media. I can see…

March 22, 2025

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