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Reason To Believe

Randall Sullivan on Faith and Evil

Cohen: Do you think part of that evil spirit is found in every human?

Sullivan: I don’t think we’re born with it, but we have receptors that can connect to it, and we decide how much attention we give it, how much we turn toward its allure.

Hive Mind

Lars Chittka on the Surprising Brainpower of Bees

Chittka: For me, understanding the minds of bees and other animals inspires a new respect for nature. Many conservation efforts—and there are a lot of people trying to rescue what’s left of the natural world—are motivated by the utility of these animals. This is especially the case with bees and insects. Many people are aware that bees are in trouble and that we ought to do something to help them, because they pollinate our crops. Many fruits and vegetables depend on bees’ pollination services: for example, melons, tomatoes, raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, zucchini, pumpkins, cherries, cucumbers, squash, apples, and citrus fruits.

But that approach can’t work overall. If you’re really trying to protect nature, then it’s a complete package with many species, including annoying ones like wasps. So in addition to the utility argument, we must recognize that many of the animals around us are likely sentient—and thus quite possibly capable of experiencing the deterioration of their habitats. This creates a responsibility for us to do something about it.

Where the Wild Things Are

John Davis on the Urgency of Expanding North America’s Wilderness

Tonino: Where would we humans go if we returned half the continent to the wild creatures?

Davis: Well, much of Canada and the American West is already rather uninhabited by humans. In fact, I suspect more than half of the continent could become ecological reserves. I like the idea that, instead of wilderness islands within a matrix of human development, we reverse the pattern, and humans live densely clustered within a wild matrix. It’s not politically or economically feasible right now, but some such arrangement might be possible eventually.

Crossroads

Imani Perry on the South’s Vital Place in America’s Identity

The South is made to carry the nation’s slop jar. That’s deliberate, because then the United States doesn’t have to actually contend with all of its violence. We just put the blame on that region where bad stuff happens and where those backward people are. I don’t think it’s incidental, either, that it is the Blackest region culturally (and demographically) speaking. So it is at once seen as the most racist and the Blackest.

Old Souls

Jim Tucker on Children’s Memories of Past Lives

Askey: This is perhaps an ontological question, but do you think James Huston became James Leininger, or is there some other entity—some consciousness, some soul—that was once James Huston and is now James Leininger?

Tucker: The latter much more than the former, I think. We can only speculate, but to my mind there may well be this larger self that has different lifetimes. It’s a core that continues, though the people it inhabits are different. I use the analogy of actors in movies. When you see Jimmy Stewart in a movie, it’s undeniably Jimmy Stewart, and yet he can play very different characters.

Past Futures

billy woods on the Cycles and Patterns of Human History

It just takes the right person, at the right time, to light the right spark and make what previously would have seemed impossible the law of the land. When I was a child, Somalia had a government. They might not have one again for the rest of my life.

Mind the Gap

Melissa Deckman on the Challenges and Strengths of Gen Z

The lion’s share of Gen Z organizing on the Left is being done by young women, because they care passionately about the issues. I think there’s less of that drive among young men. Instead there’s a sense of rootlessness. We’ll have to see whether that actually translates into conservative voting behavior or support for certain policies.

Blind History

Tiffany Griffin on America’s Narrow View of Africa

China is racist. Russia is racist. The US is racist. . . . Africans need to bet on each other. The Black Diaspora and the Global South need to bet on and support each other.

Returning

Suzanne Kelly on Green Burial and the Embrace of Mortality

The fact is, “green” is the way we buried our dead over 150 years ago in the US. It’s the way many Indigenous peoples in North America have cared for their dead. This other, more recent, method is the anomaly.

A Seat at the Table

Aviaja Lyberth Hauptmann on Indigenous Arctic Foodways in an Industrialized World

The terrible emotions I was filled with are the truth of what it means to be alive. When you live, something else dies. Even if you only eat plants, animals die for you to be able to eat. We do not talk about that often enough.