You’re probably not old enough to remember, but a commercial in the 70s reminds me of this episode. In the commercial, a woman who represented Earth informed the viewer, “‘It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.” I don’t know if this ad made an impression on me, but my adult self agrees with it. I don’t think we consult Mother Nature often enough. It might be my Evolutionary Ecology background showing, but I tend to…
For the past twenty-some Episodes, I have been trying to figure out how to formulate my current question of interest. Generally, I am trying to make the case that Nature provides a wealth of information. Further, I am pleading with humankind to CONSULT nature when making decisions. Especially decisions that affect our species’ or planets’ health. I have used evolution and natural selection (with DNA being the mechanism) as filters, of sorts, that approve or…
Sex. We’re obsessed with it. And for good reason. Sexual reproduction is the mechanism that perpetuates life. We can’t live forever, but we can become essentially immortal by passing on our genes to the next generation. Humans, and other life forms, don’t live forever. But one can argue that our DNA does. And it’s not all sex, but it’s more fun to talk about sex. We used to get along great without sex. All organisms…
I have been thinking a lot about the popular images of aggressive male competitors. Silverback gorillas. Wrestlemania or UFC fighters. These popular ideas feature ‘Alpha males’ bullying and pushing around ‘weaker’ males in order to get mates, habitat, or food. These toxic stereotypes probably spill over into popular culture and contribute to the issues we have among genders today. My question is, how common are these ‘alpha males’? How ‘fit’ were these gender differences across…
Much of this episode, and future episodes, are inspired by The Great Simplification and the concept of ‘Energy Blindness’. I am also reading Morgan Housels’ book, ‘The Psychology of Money’, https://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Money-Timeless-lessons-happiness/dp/0857197681 I mention these guys, as well as an older KEW episode, in this Episode. Here I argue that nature provides enough. Probably the concept of enough doesn’t exist in nature because it almost always exists. Hoarding and gluttony don’t seem to be common practices…
I really dislike Competition. And it is a touchy subject. In an article I published on Medium, I received several hateful comments defending the importance of competition in business and sports. In KEW Episode 95 I discuss Rugged Individualism vs. Unified Connection to make the point that competition focuses on isolation rather than community. I talk about this topic a lot. And it is important for me to revisit this in the spirit of the…
It’s a good question. Why? Maybe we should always be asking why. When we don’t know why we’re doing something, what’s the point? Whether it’s for money. Or for power. Or to get something. Or maybe it’s a more altruistic reason. The ‘why’ we do things is critical and isn’t it crazy to think we might not know it? It seems to me the tools we have traditionally used to answer these questions, like Religion,…
Everything about our ‘biological-ness’ is related to change. The developmental stages are all changes. We all grow bigger through life. We go through a brief period of fast growth, then switch over to a period of reproduction. These things are true for all life forms. We share, with ALL biology, this unanimous and ubiquitous feature. We change. Evolution is simply change through TIME. The universe also changes. The laws of thermodynamics essentially describe these changes.…
Do you believe in Evolution? What if I told you that all Evolution says is that ‘things change’? Can you argue with that? Kind of hard to argue. Because things change. Not much is true or guaranteed in life. See my first Episode on Facts for a thorough analysis of that tenet. But one thing you can bet on is that things change. And I’ve always wondered why people resist the Theory of Evolution when…
I kind of can’t believe the title of Episode 99, but this is the culmination of all the work so far including nearly 100 KEW Episodes and over 30 Interviews. Hopefully this body of work, thus far, has earned me a bit of credibility. Coupled with my PhD in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, and over a decade in multiple modalities of therapy, counseling, and coaching, I think I have some room to ‘weigh in’ on…