earthquake of perspective
In the year 2525: Beyond trivial divisions
One of the less tangible changes over time may be in the ways we categorize each other.
Solarpunk humanism: How we dream bigger than despair
Solarpunk offers a potent narrative space for imagining secular worlds to come, and how to get there.
Literally building the future: Infrastructure as an act of secular love
When we fix a bridge or give someone better healthcare, we’re saying that this life and this world are worth protecting.
Climbing the Kardashev ladder: How civilization survives
The power to control ever-greater amounts of energy is a hallmark of civilization’s progress, and humanity is poised to take the next big step.
Could the rise of the nonreligious defuse the population bomb?
The UN estimate of Earth’s human population has flown past eight billion. Can less religion slow the explosion?
I want to die like a dog
Dying like a dog is the best death I can imagine.
The saved and the damned of Proxima Centauri B
How might Christianity work intelligent alien life into their worldview? Did everyone get a Jesus?
On ‘tomorrow sorrow’: How we grieve the future today
Humans have the capacity to grieve the world ahead, knowing how much is going wrong today. But tomorrow sorrow can make us stronger actors.
What do trees say to each other?
The more we look, the more intelligence we find in nature. Even trees are capable of communicating, sharing resources, and responding to their environment.
Our secular struggle with medically assisted dying
Reading Time: 14 minutes Suffering from chronic pain, a friend’s grandmother took her own life when I was 18. I was over when my friend and her mother heard the news. I will never forget the character of her mother’s grief. She was devastated to lose her own mother, yes. But she was even more devast
The deathbed perspective
Reading Time: 4 minutes It’s easy to forget that life is temporary. How would you live differently with that knowledge in front of you?
The overthinking humanist: Life in a world of eight billion
Reading Time: 13 minutes At 4 a.m. on Sunday, I just needed fifteen minutes to finish a news brief. Fifteen minutes, and I’d be ready to leave for a trip to a pueblo two hours away. Fifteen minutes, and I’d switch modes completely: from English to Spanish, from digital to analog, and from the high-m