Human Nature Odyssey

23 - What Is Human Nature Odyssey?

You, me, and everyone we know were born on the Titanic. Some are warning of icebergs. Some are shoveling coal into the furnaces. Some are jamming out while the band plays louder than ever. In this special episode beginning Year Four of Human Nature Odyssey, Alex gathers friends together in a living room for a live-recorded podcast potluck conversation exploring civilization, collapse, climate change, community, and the strange experience of trying to live a meaningful life while the world feels increasingly unstable. Drawing from Lord of the Rings, the Titanic, Daniel Quinn's Ishmael, ecological philosophy, and the first three years of Human Nature Odyssey, this episode becomes both a reflection on the journey so far and an exploration on what it means to "come home" to the living world. Come join us in the living room. There's still space on the couch. CITATIONS Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien Ishmael by Daniel Quinn If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Substack [https://humannatureodyssey.substack.com/] for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes. For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast [https://xn--if%20youd%20like%20to%20support%20human%20nature%20odyssey,%20please%20subscribe%20wherever%20you%20listen,%20leave%20a%20review,%20and%20join%20us%20on%20patreon%20for%20exclusive%20audio%20extras,%20writings,%20and%20notes-7z99l.%20for%20full%20episode%20transcripts,%20essays,%20and%20additional%20context,%20visit%20resilience.org/] Music: Celestial Soda Pop By: Ray Lynch From the album: Deep Breakfast Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI All rights reserved.

Hajar Tazi: Weaving Our Way Back Home

Today Hajar Tazi joins us on our odyssey. Hajar is a poet, writer, facilitator, and self-described "ecosystem weaver." Our conversation is part of a new five-episode miniseries from Resilience that I'm hosting in collaboration with the Omega Resilience Awards. It's called In the Rising Tide and it brings together conversations with five people from around the world, exploring the interconnected unfolding crises of our time—and how each of them is responding within their own communities. Across the series, I speak with a chef and farmer from the Philippines, an Indigenous water defender in Chile, a young organizer in Uganda resisting mega oil projects, and a narrative practitioner in India. I wanted to include this conversation with Hajar here on Human Nature Odyssey because it touches many of the themes we've been exploring here on the podcast. Hajar has been deeply influenced by the scholar and activist Joanna Macy, and facilitates something called the "Great Weaving Game," which draws on Macy's framework of the Great Unraveling and the Great Turning to help people imagine new possibilities for the future. If you want to learn more about Joanna Macy's work, you can check out the recent Human Nature Odyssey episode with Jess Serrante [https://www.resilience.org/stories/2026-03-06/human-nature-odyssey-episode-20-joanna-macy-the-great-turning-with-jess-serrante/]. Today, Hajar and I explore many things: neurodivergence, eco-villages, the IMF and World Bank, surfing, political polarization, and the art of coming home. In The Rising Tide was made with support from a grant from Omega Resilience Awards, a project of the nonprofit Commonweal. Find out more at ORAwards.org [http://orawards.org/] You can learn more from Hajar at her substack Remembering the Future [https://hajargaia.substack.com/]. If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/HumanNatureOdyssey] for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes.

22 - Earth Abides (Part 2): Future Animists

Okay, it's been fifty years since the sudden collapse of civilization - why isn't everything back up and running already? In the 1949 sci-fi novel Earth Abides, Isherwood Williams tries and tries to teach the next generation about law, economics, and geometry but these dang kids would rather explore the streams that flow over abandoned boulevards and overgrown shopping malls. In Part 2 of this two-part series, Alex and astrophysicist Tom Murphy explore the unexpected evolution of life after the fall—when civilization fades into myth, and a new way of seeing the world begins to take root. It's been decades since airplanes filled the skies, since stadiums roared with crowds, since global supply chains stitched continents together. The children born after the Great Disaster have never known that world. To them, skyscrapers wrapped in vines are normal. Mountain lions at the edge of the cul-de-sac are normal. The quiet is normal. And as they grow up, they begin to tell different stories. Stories not of dominance, progress, or control—but of relationship, mystery, and a living world they are part of, not apart from. You don't need to have read the book to enter this world—this episode is an experience in itself. This episode is for listeners interested in societal collapse, critiques of progress, and the big questions about the future of humanity on planet earth. CITATIONS * Earth Abides [book]] by George R. Stewart (2026) * Tom Murphy's Do The Math [https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/] blog If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/HumanNatureOdyssey] for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes. For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast [https://xn--if%20youd%20like%20to%20support%20human%20nature%20odyssey,%20please%20subscribe%20wherever%20you%20listen,%20leave%20a%20review,%20and%20join%20us%20on%20patreon%20for%20exclusive%20audio%20extras,%20writings,%20and%20notes-7z99l.%20for%20full%20episode%20transcripts,%20essays,%20and%20additional%20context,%20visit%20resilience.org/] Music: Celestial Soda Pop By: Ray Lynch From the album: Deep Breakfast Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI All rights reserved.

21 - Earth Abides (Part 1): Life After Civilization

You ever go on a little trip, to just get away from it all — only to come home and find all of civilization collapsed while you were gone and you might be the last person left on earth? Well then you could totally relate to George R. Stewart's 1949 science-fiction novel, Earth Abides. Earth Abides is not your typical post-apocalyptic tale. It challenges some of our core notions on progress, human happiness, and civilization itself. It's a study of how our built infrastructure crumbles in our absence and becomes home to nonhuman life. It's about how human communities organize without the enforcement of the state, and how culture changes over time—taking us from the immediate aftermath of civilization's sudden collapse to a distant future when the last generation, known only as the Americans, leaves behind a people who barely remember what the United States once was. In this two-part series, Alex is joined by astrophysicist, writer, and friend of the show Tom Murphy to retell and explore this science fiction classic, unpacking its radical ideas about collapse, resilience, and what it means to live a meaningful life. This episode is for listeners interested in societal collapse, critiques of progress, and the big questions about the future of humanity on planet earth. CITATIONS * Earth Abides [book]] by George R. Stewart (2026) If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/HumanNatureOdyssey] for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes. For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast [https://xn--if%20youd%20like%20to%20support%20human%20nature%20odyssey,%20please%20subscribe%20wherever%20you%20listen,%20leave%20a%20review,%20and%20join%20us%20on%20patreon%20for%20exclusive%20audio%20extras,%20writings,%20and%20notes-7z99l.%20for%20full%20episode%20transcripts,%20essays,%20and%20additional%20context,%20visit%20resilience.org/] Music: Celestial Soda Pop By: Ray Lynch From the album: Deep Breakfast Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI All rights reserved.

20 - Joanna Macy & The Great Turning — with Jess Serrante

How do we live through wild times? Legendary scholar, activist, and systems thinker Joanna Macy named the moment we are living through the Great Unraveling—a time when our ecological, political, economic, and social systems destabilize to the point of no return. And yet, she also insisted that we stand on the threshold of a Great Turning: a profound transition toward a more just and sustainable world. Before Joanna's death in 2025, climate activist Jess Serrante recorded a series of intimate and insightful conversations with her. In this episode, Alex sits down with Jess, weaving in clips from those recordings to explore the questions Joanna devoted her life to asking: How do we live with meaning as civilization unravels? How do we turn toward the grief of this moment—and transform it into action? And how do intergenerational relationships help us become elders for the future - when wisdom is needed most? CITATIONS * We Are The Great Turning [https://www.soundstrue.com/a/resources/we-are-the-great-turning-podcast/?srsltid=AfmBOopSby0gBERLTlld8FgFrpCbdNxGVehcbG2QIBH114frz9cBfYHK] [podcast] If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/HumanNatureOdyssey] for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes. For full episode transcripts, essays, and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast [https://If%20you%E2%80%99d%20like%20to%20support%20Human%20Nature%20Odyssey,%20please%20subscribe%20wherever%20you%20listen,%20leave%20a%20review,%20and%20join%20us%20on%20Patreon%20for%20exclusive%20audio%20extras,%20writings,%20and%20notes.%20For%20full%20episode%20transcripts,%20essays,%20and%20additional%20context,%20visit%20resilience.org] Music: Celestial Soda Pop By: Ray Lynch From the album: Deep Breakfast Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI All rights reserved.