week 32 / 2026: nature and culture
In this episode: we wander into the forests of medieval Europe, return with the underlying imagery of Enlightenment and Romanticist thought, and then feel for their bones beneath the skin of the present.
philosophy
week 31 / 2026: art and artifice
In this episode: a long hard look at the distinction between art and artifice, and what it means to make things for their own sake. Plus: technical aspects of the new Ann Leckie novel!
week 30 / 2026: here and elsewhere
In this episode: contemplating the end of the Western cosmopolitan urge; hanging with the New York neoLuddites; and Silicon Valley’s highly selective readings of science fiction. Plus, G K Chesterton!
week 27 / 2026: progress and myopia
This week, a debunking of bio-factory protein production, which leads us to a broader look at solutionism, and the frustrating impossibility of simply swapping one metanarrative for another. Plus, the short fiction of Iain M Banks...
week 24 / 2026: showing and telling
Like science fiction literature, a well-executed work of experiential futuring can look prophetic in hindsight—but it’s what they get wrong that tells you the most in hindsight. Plus: when to show, and when to tell?
week 22 / 2026: fathers and sons
After the hourglass has been overturned, there is a period during which the sand must resettle itself before the flow of time can become regularised once again. We are living through just such a period.
week 21 / 2026: empire and multitude
I’m pleased to announce a new publication: you can read a short story by yours truly in the just-released RISCS anthology! Meanwhile, feel free to hang around and discuss the shaky foundations of the USian technopoly, and the possible fates of the nation-state...