Hello friends!
I'm excited to announce that our short animated documentary "The Great Simplification" will go live on Youtube Premiere this Thursday morning May 19, 2022. And, Thursday evening from 6:00-7:00 pm US Central time, I'll host an online reception with the production team to highlight some clips and field questions from the public.
This film began as an intended 2-3 minute teaser for our podcast of the same name, but we kept adding concepts and graphics until the end result was an artistic mini-documentary on the constraints - and the opportunities - that our culture now faces.
The movie combines four sequential short films into one 32 minute animation:
Act 1 - Energy Blind
Act 2 - The Human Superorganism
Act 3 - The Human Being
Act 4 - The Great Simplification
This was my first foray into combining science with art. Thanks to Jumbo/Justin Ritchie/Elliot Wilks and the rest of the team for its vision and artistry. (Another project also merging art/science is this month's Earth Day talk using Tarot-card inspired original art to represent ~80 ecological concepts.)
I hope you enjoy the movie and it makes you think about our collective challenges. If you are so motivated, it'd be great if you share/promote it. By definition the complexity and subject matter make it unlikely to be popular, yet the film's interpretation of reality affects all of us.
Link to video (will go live Thurs 5/19 6 am central):
to Premiere party/QA (6pm Thurs 5/19 6pm US central): https://lu.ma/great-simplification?fbclid=IwAR0MMxbxtr7wWCrgozGvJUpZ8ViN-iN6DrTRy_izDXlZuk3ti7js9rqiu4w
Thank you!
Nate Hagens
Director - Energyandourfuture.org
Announcing: The Great Simplification -Movie Premiere!
Very interesting! Your movie vocalizes many of my own thought that have occured to me, especially in recent years. I've also now listened to several of your podcasts, including a recent one with Dr Rees that I found especially interesting.
One aspect I haven't heard you address is the negative population growth mechanism as vocalized by Hans Rosling e.g. https://youtu.be/FACK2knC08E How would you fit that mechanism with you systems hypotheses?
Also not addressed is the use of nuclear energy technologies. Granted that merely delays the inevitable "great simplification" but surely it lessens the effect of the "carbon pulse" we are currently experiencing.
Finally, the movie does not, nor do any of the podcasts I've listened to, address what could replace our current monetary system. Is there any solution to our innate predisposal for valuing the immediate future more highly than some possible future? What does the system approach suggest?