Yes, climate change is real and yes, without a doubt, humanity is responsible for much of the warming. If left unaddressed, we will suffer catastrophic consequences. However, its often characterized as the defining issue of our age. It is not. Its a distraction from the root cause of climate change. That root cause is mindless …
Wildlife populations plummet by 69% since 1970s. That’s the recent headline from the World Wildlife Foundation 2022 report. What’s driving the trend? In a word, consumerism. Consumerism is the driving force behind three large scale threats that humanity faces today: climate change, the loss of biodiversity, and (as reader’s of Health in Flames and this …
In contrast to our pre-industrial ancestors who moved around constantly throughout the day, most of us in the modern world are largely sedentary. Few of us realize just how hazardous this is. It’s true, sitting is the new smoking and our work is a health hazard. Just a brief run down of the adverse health …
Our species, homo sapiens have roamed the Earth for an estimated 200-300K years. For nearly all of our time on Earth we spent well over 90% of our time outdoors. In fact, there was no such thing as indoors for >95% of our history. The post-industrial era in which we now live accounts for only …
Run a google image search for “tasty food”. What you’ll find almost completely missing is pictures of actual food - instead you’ll see pictures of highly processed “food”. In my search, among the first 25 images only one was of real food… (Mango salsa fish tacos anyone?) Capitalism leads to processed foods Let’s admit it. It’s …
Garages Require Paved Roads Among the things we mindlessly consume which sometimes undermines our own happiness are certain conveniences. In Health in Flames, there’s a chapter that envisions a society where people live without garages. I was meaning to illustrate that the garage is a a problem for our health. Having a garage automatically necessitates …
Happier Studies show that those who are financially secure are happier. You don’t need to be a multimillionaire to be financially secure. Financial security has certain benefits. In the first place you sleep better at night knowing your needs are taken care of. Moreover, those who are financial independent have a degree of agency (or …
Happier. Healthier. Wealthier. More Engaged. Simply Better. Read More »
Bad Advice I’m a doctor. I am not a financial expert. So you’re right to wonder why you would want to take financial advice from a doctor. Well, it turns out that our health is heavily impacted by our spending (see here). Moreover, the vast majority of financial “experts” will give you bad advice. Even …
As you might imagine, there’s been lots of research on the factors that determine happiness. If you read Health in Flames, you know that the determinants of happiness seem to coincide with those factors that engage the body, the mind, or the soul of the human person in some way. And in the book, I …
How does consumerism (the purchasing of goods and services) lead to the sad state of health in America? The link between our spending habits and our health is not at all obvious at first. It’s natural to be skeptical of the claim that consumerism is in fact the driving force for the rise of chronic …
