There’s no escaping or avoiding the second law of thermodynamics, so you have to learn to roll with it — There are few things more frustrating in regular, day-to-day life than accidentally destroying one of your prized possessions through carelessness or haste. For example, a month or so ago, while reaching for my favorite ceramic coffee mug, half-asleep and distracted, I accidently bumped it against the cupboard door while pulling…

That famous Santayana quote, or welcome to Dark Ages 2.0 — Many people are familiar with the quote by philosopher George Santayana, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” …

How Christianity can be manipulated to either protect or subdue the environment. — Unless you’ve been frozen in cryogenic storage for the past century, or you spend every waking moment fully immersed in the Metaverse, it’s hard not to notice that our planet and our biosphere are in pretty rough shape. As one of my favorite musicians sang over fifty years ago: What…

Leave your guns at home, Bill — Country folks love their guns. As bizarre and inexplicable as this may seem to many urbanites, it’s a fact of life. And really, if you’ve spent any amount of time far from the cities, it makes perfect sense. First of all, for many poor rural dwellers, when it comes to…

Where tradition clashes with modernity — When you look outside your window, what’s the first thing you see? Trees or buildings? Green or gray? Vegetation or concrete? Nature or artifice? The answer to this simplest of questions can shape your worldview in profound and surprising ways, yet I’m not certain how deeply many people consider its…

Not everything’s about race — I was reading an article recently about “code switching.” For those unfamiliar with the term, it’s an old concept from linguistics, which these days is mostly used to describe something that for many Black workers in America — especially those with “white collar” jobs — is no mere intellectual abstraction…

We may not always agree, but surely we don’t need to invalidate each other’s reality — One notion I’ve always maintained about life and society is that you can’t deny anyone their own lived experience. …

Or how to lose friends and win enemies in four easy steps — Few things rile up the passions more than politics — particularly in today’s hyper-partisan, highly charged, and increasingly polarized world. It’s bad enough discussing political matters face to face (which is why it’s long been advised to avoid such discussions at family gatherings or anytime alcohol’s involved). …

A naturalist’s guide to the digital menagerie — Anyone who writes online, or even spends much time reading online, will be well aware of the peril that comes with putting yourself out there, with trying to take part in the global conversation in the hopes of contributing something interesting, or at least entertaining. …