Paul Ehrlich Was Early, Not Wrong
When Paul Ehrlich died recently (March 13, 2026), many of the obituaries and articles about him repeated a familiar judgment: he was alarmist, even brilliant, but ultimately wrong. His 1968 book, The Population Bomb, warned of mass famine and ecological collapse that...
Anthropocentrism was not created by the West
The claim that Western colonization created anthropocentrism has become surprisingly common in contemporary discourse; I was just recently surprised to see an author I respect repeat this claim. It’s an appealing idea: historically convenient and useful for critiquing...
When the World is Already Gone
Chinese state-owned COSCO shipping owns a 60% stake in Port of Chancay, and developed the port. On the Peruvian coast, north of Lima, a monumental construction project rises out of the Pacific. The new deep-water port at Chancay, backed by China’s state-owned shipping...
How destroying the land became “green”
To some, the undulating grey and brown fells of the sagebrush sea in the arid American West are dull and boring. Driving at 80mph along the highway, through mile after mile of sagebrush, often with little sign of life except the occasional black cow roasting in the...
Electric Vehicles will worsen plastic pollution in the world’s oceans
Car tires and brakes are major sources of pollutants that are poisoning fish and littering the ocean with microplastics, and EVs will only make this problem worse. Car tires contain 6PPD-quinone, a toxic chemical used to help stop car tires from breaking down. This...
Protect Thacker Pass: Solutions
If Electric Cars Won’t Save the Planet, What Will? by Max Wilbert and Elisabeth Robson Since January 15th, 2021, we have been fighting to Protect Thacker Pass from a proposed open-pit lithium mine. For some people, our protest is confusing. Most mainstream...
Graphite, a key ingredient in EV batteries, is made from fossil fuels
The implications of replacing cars (and other vehicles) with electric vehicles (EVs) are many. This includes perpetuating car culture and the devastating damage to the natural world caused by roads, and the massive increase in mining that will be required to source...
The Power of One Little Word
Most of us don’t want to think about climate change or ecological collapse or any of the other crises facing humans and this world in the 21st century. We just want to live our lives. The problem is that the way we’re living our lives is causing pollution, extinction,...
The Evisceration of Nevada
Before getting involved with environmental activism, I barely gave Nevada much of a thought. I visited only once, reluctantly, to go to Las Vegas on a trip with a friend, on the condition that we spend at least some of our time exploring outside the city. In the end,...