Last Born In The Wilderness

I speak with journalist John H. Richardson. Former writer-at-large for Esquire, John is the author of the captivating article Children of Ted: The Unlikely New Generation of Unabomber Acolytes, published December 2018 in New York Magazine. In Children of Ted, Richardson takes a deep dive into the world of Theodore Kaczynski (aka the Unabomber) acolytes and apostates, a journey that documents his i...

I speak with Jasper Bernes, Managing Editor of Commune Magazine. We discuss his recent article, Between the Devil and the Green New Deal, featured in the second issue of Commune Magazine. In this interview, I asked Jasper Bernes to explain the details of the Green New Deal, as has been proposed by the more progressive wing of the United States political establishment and most famously by New York...

Writer, political theorist, and Gods & Radicals co-founder Rhyd Wildermuth returned to the podcast to discuss his soon-to-be-released book, All That Is Sacred Is Profaned: A Pagan Guide to Marxism. We examine how capitalism directly informs the ways we relate with the land in which we live and the spirits that reside there, the bodies we inhabit, the labor we perform, the rituals we engage in, and...

I’m joined by Michael Sliwa, former co-host of Nature Bats Last and the author of Chasing A Different Carrot: A Manifesto For The Predicament Of Privilege, and RS, host of Moving Forward on the Progressive Radio Network. In this lively discussion, we examine the overwhelm many are feeling in trying to navigate through our times of overlapping social, economic, ecological, and political complexitie...

Psychedelic scholar, editor, publisher, and researcher Robert Forte returns to the podcast. For over three decades, he has collaborated with some of the most influential and well-known figures within the psychedelic movement, including R. Gordon Wasson, Timothy Leary, Stanislav Grof, and Alexander Shulgin, to name a few. As the use of psychedelics enters the public discourse again, and as we conti...

Environmental scientist and ecologist Dr. Francisco Sánchez-Bayo joined me for this episode. Dr. Sánchez-Bayo is the lead author of the scientific survey Worldwide decline of the entomofauna: A review of its drivers, co-authored with Kris Wyckhuys, which reviews dozens of contemporary research studies from around the world, documenting the rapid decline of global insect populations, indicating tha...

Change strategist, complexity researcher, and cognitive scientist Joe Brewer returns to pick up from our first conversation last year, recorded right before he and his family moved to Costa Rica to engage more fully with cultural design work and planetary collapse management. Brewer details his work in designing in-depth courses that lay the groundwork for individuals to build regenerative hubs ac...

Physicist, engineer, and popular science communicator Paul Beckwith joined me for this episode. He is well known for his approachable and comprehensive analysis of the global climate crisis through his popular YouTube channel, where he provides a multidisciplinary examination into climate science data and research through his in-depth understanding of meteorology, oceanography, and the Earth scien...

Engineer and writer Dmitry Orlov returns to provide an overview of the ongoing collapse of the United States empire on the geopolitical, economic, and political fronts since our first interview was recorded and released last year.  As Dmitry Orlov explains in this interview, the United States is facing collapse. The nation carries massive debt and relies on its global military presence to maintain...

Birgitta Jónsdóttir—former Icelandic politician, anarchist, poet, and activist—joined me for the episode. She is the co-founder of the Pirate Party of Iceland, in which she served as a representative from 2013 to 2017, and collaborated with WikiLeaks in the production and release of the Collateral Murder video resulting from the courageous leak by whistleblower and former US Army private Chelsea M...

In this episode, I speak with Xabat, a representative of the Internationalist Commune of Rojava. We discuss the ecological dimension of the Rojavan Revolution in Northeast Syria, represented and explored in the book Make Rojava Green Again, which examines the environmental perspective and ecological practices inherent in the egalitarian and anticapitalist revolution in the region. // Episode notes...

Meteorologist and geoscientist Nicholas Humphrey joined me to detail the record-breaking flood in the Midwest United States this season, its impacts on the agricultural center of the country, and how this event is directly tied to the dramatic global changes associated with abrupt climate disruption. // Episode notes: https://www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/nicholas-humphrey // Sustain +...

Lawyer, grief therapist, and community builder Holly Truhlar joined me to discuss their provocatively titled essay, Mainstream Psychology Can Go Fuck Itself. They address the ways mainstream psychology, as it is currently practiced today, largely lacks the framework, language, and tools to adequately counsel those coming into the growing awareness that the systems we are embedded within are leadin...

I speak with heathen writer and poet Ramon Elani, a frequent contributor at Gods & Radicals. In exploring his unique perspective on how to address the converging social, spiritual, and ecological crises on this planet, we examine three essays published for Gods & Radicals, which include Land, Home, and the Gods; World’s End; and Our Rage Against The Modern World, co-written with Gods & Radicals co...

In this collaborative interview with RS, we speak with Yoav Litvin, doctor of psychology, photographer, and writer. His work focuses on the roots of Zionism, trauma, and the policies and actions of the State of Israel and such influential organizations as AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee), "a lobbying group that advocates pro-Israel policies to the Congress and Executive Branch of t...

Truthout senior editor and lead columnist William Rivers Pitt joined me for this episode. We discussed the federal investigation by former FBI Director Robert Mueller into Donald Trump’s alleged collusion with Russian foreign agents during the 2016 presidential election—an investigation that lasted for most of Trump's time as US president. Without buying into the media spectacle that has clouded l...

Kevin Tucker joined me to discuss his book The Cull of Personality: Ayahuasca, Colonialism and the Death of a Healer. The book takes a deep dive into the reality of the ayahuasca eco-tourism industry and places it within the centuries-long history of colonialism and resource extraction in Amazonia, in particular Peru, where much of the narrative of this book is centered. // Episode notes: https://...

Author, journalist, and political researcher Shane Burley returns to the podcast. We discuss the recent mass shooting in Christchurch, New Zealand, in which an Australian white supremacist targeted Muslim worshipers at two separate mosques, murdering 50 people—the largest mass shooting in the nation’s history. We place this event within Burley’s larger analysis of far-right ideology and insurgency...

I speak with sociologist Milton Bennett, director of the Intercultural Development Research Institute and the creator of the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity, also known as the Bennett Scale. What is a cult in the literal sense, and what is culting? As can be observed in the hardcore base of support for leaders such as Donald Trump and other examples Bennett is very familiar with,...

Lecturer, activist, and author Bayo Akomolafe returns to the podcast. We pick up where we left off over one year ago and get into some of the major cruxes of his work, including radically reshaping the understandable, but often unexamined, sense of urgency we feel in a time of accelerating change and collapse as we fully enter into the Anthropocene, "the human epoch." // Episode notes: https://www...

Economist and cryptocurrency/blockchain specialist Alex de Vries joined me to discuss his research into the energy-consumptive cryptocurrency Bitcoin, the most popular cryptocurrency in the world at the present moment. I asked de Vries to elaborate on how Bitcoin and blockchain work—particularly Bitcoin “mining” and transactions—his research into the disturbing amounts of energy required to keep B...

Alexander Koch joined me to discuss the groundbreaking new scientific paper, Earth system impacts of the European arrival and Great Dying in the Americas after 1492, which he is a lead author of. As the title suggests, the research indicates that dramatic global climatological changes resulted from Indigenous peoples first contact with Europeans in the Americas in 1492—an event that resulted in ma...

I speak with Clare Farrell, co-founder and spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion (XR), a nonviolent international social movement that aims to drive radical change to minimize species extinction and avert climate breakdown. This discussion includes an overview of the principles and the proposed demands of this movement, the global implications of climate change and environmental disintegration and...

In my second joint interview with RS, we speak with Shane Burley​, journalist and author of Fascism Today: What It Is and How To End It. Our discussion covers numerous topics, including the "Intellectual Dark Web" (or, as Shane says, "the academics that circle around Joe Rogan​ for some reason"); the pseudoscientific claims surrounding race, ethnicity, and IQ; and an examination of observable patt...

In this episode, I speak with independent political analyst Eric Draitser. He expands upon his analysis of recent events in Venezuela, expressed in his piece in CounterPunch, Trump’s Coup in Venezuela: The Full Story, in which he lays into the recent decision by the Trump Administration to back “interim president” Juan Guaido as the rightful leader of the nation. Eric Draitser defines the celebrat...