Although the title of Peter F Hamilton’s Fallen Dragon (Pan Books, 2001) creates the impression that it belongs to the fantasy genre (not really my cup of tea), one soon learns that you are dealing with science fiction. And you know that you are dealing with a master of science fiction when many of the […]
Environment
Posted inEnvironment, News/Politics
SA govt must face court for xenophobic violence, migration policy
By Evans Wadongo The South African government will soon be in the country’s high court because petitioners from countries like Nigeria, Malawi and Zambia are displeased by the spate of xenophobic attacks and murders of migrants from their countries. These attacks and deaths have also sparked the #WeAreAfrica hashtag on social media, a 30 000 person […]
Posted inBusiness, Environment
What is the ‘logic of sufficiency’ in economics?
Imagine a world in which people, wisely, remind themselves that there is a tomorrow – if not for themselves, indefinitely, then for their children – and that the manner in which they enter into a relationship with their physical environment WILL unavoidably make a difference to the kind of tomorrow their children, and their children’s […]
Posted inEnvironment, Equality, Tech
A ‘cyborg’ future?
When Donna Haraway published her famous (or notorious, some would say) “Cyborg Manifesto” in 1985, later included her book Simians, Cyborgs, and Women (1991), not to mention its many inclusions in various anthologies, she probably could not foresee its incredible history of influence. (For a condensed version of this, see David Bell’s Cyberculture Theorists: Manuel […]
Posted inEnvironment, General
Why Africa should join the fossil fuel divestment movement
By Alex Lenferna Concern for poverty in Africa is coming from the most unexpected places lately: the boardrooms of fossil fuels companies. Multimillionaire fossil fuel execs, like Exxon’s Rex Tillerson and Peabody’s Charles Meintjes, are painting themselves as Africa’s saviours, claiming that fossil fuels are the answer to Africa’s poverty and development problems. The often […]
Posted inEnvironment
Our oceans are dying
When even a mainstream magazine such as TIME highlights the fact that the world’s oceans are in imminent peril, alarm bells should be ringing loud and clear. In Jeffrey Kluger’s short, but punchy article, “Troubled Waters” (TIME, February 2, 2015, pp 12-13) the central photograph says as much, if not more than, his prose. This […]
Posted inEnvironment, Lifestyle, News/Politics, Tech
Mum and the stolen iPhone
Over the weekend I met up with my friend the Diplomat and he presented me with an opportunity that I could not resist. We had not chatted since December when he spent his holidays in Cape Town and it was time to catch up. Although his time in the Mother city delivered on all the […]
Posted inEnvironment, General, Health
‘The Life of I’: Narcissism and (of course) you
“Paranoia is the self-cure for insignificance … the paranoiac is at the centre of a world which has no centre … to be hated makes him feel real: he has made his presence felt. To be unforgiveable is to be unforgettable.” (Emphases mine.) Australian social philosopher Anne Manne shrewdly begins The Life of I: the […]
Posted inEnvironment, Lifestyle
Economy of luxury: We’re like rabbits caught in the headlights
Many readers will be familiar with Watership Down, Richard Adams’ wonderful, albeit sometimes terrifying, allegorical tale of a band of rabbits fleeing from a doomed warren (at the instigation of Fiver, a clairvoyant rabbit, who “saw” the imminent destruction of the warren by humans to make way for a building construction development). In the novel […]
Posted inEnvironment, Equality, News/Politics
Climate change: We have passed the 11th hour
In 2007, Leonardo DiCaprio — one of the few so-called celebrities in the world who seems to care about matters ecological — produced a disturbing film on runaway climate change called The 11th Hour, directed by Leila Conners Petersen and Nadia Conners. Like Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth before it, it was a wake-up call, […]
Posted inEnvironment, Media
How the movie ‘Noah’ reflects our ecological failures
Most people who are familiar with the Old Testament of the Bible know the story of Noah, who was chosen by God, or “the Creator” as the deity is referred to in this remarkable film, to give humanity another chance. Except that, in Darren Aronofsky’s version of the story, Noah understands his task differently: not […]
Posted inEnvironment, General, Lifestyle
Commissioner Street: An experience of interwoven lives
It’s hard to describe some cities. Perhaps we try to give it an identity based on how it is commonly experienced. But Joburg is a very, very fragmented place – its parts just do not seem to sum up into any kind of cohesive whole. Most cities at least have a river that helps to […]