Once upon a time, a traveler asked a shepherd “what kind of weather are we going to have today?” The traveler wanted to know what to expect; who wants foul weather to derail their travels, right?

The shepherd muttered: “the kind of weather I like.” Confused, the traveler responded: “How do you know it will be the weather you like?” Here, the shepherd taught the traveler an unexpected lesson. “Having found out, sir, I cannot always get what I like, I have learned always to like what I get. …

Recently, I analyzed where exactly I could escape climate change within the United States. I picked three northerly regions and ultimately settled on the Upper Midwest as the best place to ride out the climate apocalypse we may face if the status quo persists.

ProPublica and The New York Times Magazine recently analyzed data from the Rhodium Group on how climate change will transform the United States.

You can find that handy analysis here. Its conclusions dovetail with mine.

But many of you wanted a more global perspective. So this time, instead of restricting myself to the United States, I’m…

Reduce, reuse, recycle.

Particularly in America, there’s a curious cultural veneration of the individual as the main agent of influence and change rather than the community. This is of course rooted in our history, or at least the whitewashed history we’re taught in school and then subconsciously carry in our conceptions of the world.

We defeated a tyrannical monarchy as a big underdog. Then, we fulfilled our Manifest Destiny and conquered the West, bulldozing our way across the mountains and prairies toward the ocean.

I’m simplifying here, but the point is, centuries of deeply embedded cultural norms reflect themselves in…

Does the name ‘Malthus’ ring a bell?

In 1798, Thomas Malthus warned of an impending ecological trap driven by overpopulation. As he saw it, exponential population growth would override arithmetic growth in agricultural yields. He foresaw too many mouths to feed and not enough food to feed them. This became known as the Malthusian trap, and the Malthus philosophy has been the subject of vigorous debate ever since.

Six years after Malthus introduced his theory, the world population reached one billion. And 216 years after that milestone, we’re now hurtling toward a population of eight billion.

The overpopulation Malthus expected…

A strong speech can rouse a complacent crowd or inspire tough but necessary action. Speeches can transform a mere collection of words into a powerful force for progress.

I love a good speech. From Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address to MLK’s March on Washington speech to Steve Jobs’s Stanford commencement speech, the best speeches stand the test of time.

Given the stakes of the climate crisis, a few notable climate speeches will also stand the test of time. …

Bryan Cranston is now known as a legendary actor, most famous as the main character in Breaking Bad. But Cranston was starting his sixth decade when he became Walter White.

Long before Cranston ‘made’ it in Hollywood, he was a teenager struggling with an acrimonious family split. His alcoholic father (who was an actor) abandoned the family when Cranston was a preteen, and his mom became an increasingly unreliable parental presence.

Eager to find a more dependable and socially acceptable line of work, Cranston fancied himself a policeman. In junior college, he started taking police science classes. But a guidance…

Tiger Woods is one of those rare athletes (like Serena Williams and LeBron James) who can be universally identified by his first name. He is often considered the greatest golfer of all time. He has won 15 major tournaments (second all-time) and 82 PGA Tour tournaments (tied for first). He has won a higher percentage of tournaments started (22.8%) than any other professional golfer ever.

Tiger is iconic almost beyond compare, but I don’t think his accomplishments on the golf course are the most impressive aspect of his career or his life. …

In the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre film released in 1974, “two siblings and three of their friends en route to visit their grandfather’s grave in Texas fall victim to a family of cannibalistic psychopaths.” I’m quoting that from IMDB because I’ve never seen the movie (and don’t plan to anytime soon since it feels like we’re living through a different massacre every day).

47 years later, we just witnessed a different kind of Texas massacre seemingly out of a movie. …