National Geographic

Key Components of Civilization

Civilization describes a complex way of life characterized by urban areas, shared methods of communication, administrative infrastructure, and division of labor.

Paul Vidal de La Blache

Provinces

We see where the advocates of unification have led us—nowhere. Let us apply the theory of size, then, and see what solutions an opposite approach might offer us. Instead of union, let us argue for disunity. Instead of merging the small, let us dismember the large. Instead of creating ever larger and ever fewer states, let us create smaller ones. For from all we have seen so far, this seems to be the only way to confine power to dimensions where it cannot produce any significant harm, at least as far as its external effects are concerned.

Transition Culture

Exclusive to Transition Culture!

Space itself is somehow being-like, has the potential for beings to appear in it – not in a mechanistic sense of assembly from components, but in the far more startling sense of something within space and matter. That something within space and matter could be awoken by the presence of proper configurations.

Jeremy Lent

What Will It Really Take to Avoid Collapse?

Along with their warning, the scientists list a dozen or so examples of the kind of actions that could turn humanity’s trajectory around. These include indisputably necessary strategies such as halting the conversion of native habitats into farmland; restoring and rewilding ecologies; phasing out fossil fuel subsidies; and promoting dietary shifts toward plant-based foods. With the future of humanity at stake, why aren’t we already doing these things?