Wild with Sarah Wilson

Indy Johar (founder of Dark Matter Labs, systems designer) closes this 12-part series on the life-enhancing “what comes next” that we need (and want) to be creating. Indy is one of the world’s most original voices on redesigning societies and he has a radical thesis that brings together most of the themes we’ve discussed so far. He calls it “civilisational optionality”. Our job is not to save civilisation or to know what comes next…. It’s to preserve or expand the capacity for life (that is, humanity and the living world) to adapt to whatever comes next.Indy is an architect and Professor of Planetary Civics at Melbourne’s RMIT and the University of Sheffield. He has advised organisations including the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, and governments across Europe and the UK, helping them solve all kinds of complex, entangled problems.In this very wild conversation, Indy returns to Wild to loop together many of the themes of this series – emergence, fascism, steering AI to a pro-human future and, importantly, wrestling with what it means to be human. An expansive, fun and very real finale, to be sure!SHOW NOTESYou can listen to our previous conversation: The Starkest Collapse Prognosis I’ve HeardWe discuss game theory, and I point to a former Wild interview that explains this, specifically “Moloch”. Catch up here.I reference Indy’s Substack essay on the collapse of the self.---Watch on YouTube or SubstackIf you need to know a bit more about me… head to my "about" pageFor more such conversations, subscribe to my Substack newsletter, it’s where I interact the most!Let’s connect on Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

John Seed (Deep Ecology OG, global rainforest steward) says we can’t save the world. And that the planetary crisis is not a failure of information or awareness; it’s a failure of human identity. We have the story, the mindset, all wrong. And we need to change it (from human chauvinism to deep ecological connection) if we’re to keep spinning in the Earth’s embrace.John is a globally respected Australian rainforest activist and one of the foundational figures of the global Deep Ecology movement. He collaborated for decades with the late Joanna Macy – they co-wrote How To Think Like a Mountain and developed a “re-earthing” technique called Council of All Beings. John’s activist work - via the Rainforest Information Centre he founded - has seen rainforests around the world receive various forms of protection status, including World Heritage listings. In this chat, John and I get to “the work that reconnects”, how to use our despair and numbness to lift into action and how to get around our fear of “woo woo”.SHOW NOTESHere is the Features of Narara Ecovillage that John mentions at the end of the episode.You can subscribe to John’s SubstackLearn more about the Rainforest Information Centre here, and follow him on Instagram and YouTubeYou can catch up on my episode with Meg Wheatley (in which we discuss “islands of sanity”) here---Watch on YouTube or SubstackIf you need to know a bit more about me… head to my "about" pageFor more such conversations, subscribe to my Substack newsletter, it’s where I interact the most!Let’s connect on Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Vanessa Andreotti (Indigenous Knowledge advocate; author) is a Brazilian academic who has developed a radical thesis for how to move through the multi-crises we face. In her book Hospicing Modernity: Facing Humanity's Wrongs and the Implications for Social Activism she draws on Indigenous wisdoms and entanglement theory to steer humanity through the destruction, grief and uncertainty as democracy, the growth model, “the West” crumbles around us. Dr Andreotti is the Dean of the Faculty of Education at the University of Victoria, Canada where she is also one of the designers of the Facing Human Wrongs: Climate Complexity and Relational Accountability course. She has written 100-plus papers on climate education, global justice and race. In this chat – the last in the current Wild series – she talks through how modernity is the most “adolescent” civilisation in history, how Indigenous cultures have the knowledge to assist us, how the West won’t act until “the water is up to their bum” and the value of “black belt aunties”.Get your copy of Hospicing Modernity: Facing Humanity's Wrongs and the Implications for Social Activism. Find out more about Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures--If you need to know a bit more about me… head to my "about" pageFor more such conversations subscribe to my Substack newsletter, it’s where I interact the most!Get your copy of my book, This One Wild and Precious LifeLet’s connect on Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Indy Johar (founder of Dark Matter Labs, systems designer) re-imagines and redesigns systems for a changed world. The architect and Professor of Planetary Civics at Melbourne’s RMIT and the University of Sheffield has worked with and advised organisations worldwide. Including the Scottish Government, the Mayor of London and WikiHouse, solving complex, entangled problems. Using complexity, emergence and entanglement theories he is a rare expert in this space to provide the (only) path to fixing the world, which is to say fixing our relationship with the world.This conversation goes to a level I’ve not been to before publicly. On his modelling, we don’t have any choice but to start building the world that comes next, for the current one has no viable pathway. He gives a vision for this this. And he gives a timeframe, too. For this episode, I’m providing a forum where you can talk through how you feel about the ideas and your feelings with others. Indy has offered to chime in too: Join the chat on Substack HERE.SHOW NOTESIf you are new to this collapse topic you might want to catch up via this conversation with Luke Kemp, the one with Meg Wheatley and this one with Corey Bradshaw.There are some previous guests and topics that are referenced in this chat:Nate Hagens on the future of fossil fuelsKate Raworth on Doughnut EconomicsWe talk about zero-sum theory. I talked about this with Liv Boeree, former world poker champion.We also cover the Blue Zones concept. I interviewed the man behind this, Dan Buettner, here. Indy also references the work of Iain McGilchrist, a guest a few weeks back.You can learn more about Indy's work via DarkMatterLabsConnect with Indy on socials @DarkMatter_Labs and @indy_johar  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Luke Kemp (historical collapse expert; associate at the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk) has studied past civilisations and mapped out a picture of how long they tend to last before they collapse, what tends to tip them and what (if anything) can be done to stall their demise. Luke works alongside Lord Martin Rees and Yuval Noah Harari, is an honorary lecturer in environmental policy at the Australian National University and his collapse insights have been covered by the BBC, the New York Times and the New Yorker. His first book, 'Goliath's Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse' will be published in June 2025. In this episode I get Luke to provide a bit of a 101 on how civilisations do indeed decline and perish and to update us on the latest theories on how and whether ours might make it through. The answer is surprising.SHOW NOTESHere’s Luke’s original report on complex civilisation’s lifespans.Keep up to date with Luke's work hereA few past Wild guests are referenced by Luke. You can catch the episode on Moloch with Liv Boeree here, the interview with Adam Mastroianni here and my chat with Nate Hagens hereThe first chapter of my book serialisation – about hope – is available to everyone hereAnd here are the two chapters that I reference at the end--If you need to know a bit more about me… head to my "about" pageFor more such conversations subscribe to my Substack newsletter, it’s where I interact the most!Get your copy of my book, This One Wild and Precious LifeLet’s connect on InstagramIf you need to know a bit more about me… head to my "about" pageFor more such conversations subscribe to my Substack newsletter, it’s where I interact the most!Get your copy of my book, This One Wild and Precious LifeLet’s connect on Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Prof. Joel Pearson (Neuroscientist; AI and cognition scientist) returns to Wild, this time to discuss whether free will is an illusion. In our last chat (about intuition) the subject was raised and Joel promised to come back to discuss it further, particularly in the context of AI, algorithms, the rise of totalitarianism and our agency in systems collapse. Joel is the founder and Director of Future Minds Lab which applies neuroscience findings to art, AI, media, advertising and various philosophical quandaries. He’s also a National Health and Medical Research Council fellow and Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of New South Wales, Australia. He developed the first scientific test to measure intuition and wrote The Intuition Toolkit. In this conversation, we also cover the science of manifesting!SHOW NOTESI mention the chapter on Blame and the very robust discussion the Substack community had around it. You can join this hereHere’s the previous episode where Joel talks about the scientific proof of intuitionGet Joel’s book The Intuition Toolkit: The New Science of Knowing What without Knowing WhyFollow Joel on his Future Minds Lab Substack I previously had willpower expert Roy Baumeister on Wild to talk about how the female orgasm shapes the world! --If you need to know a bit more about me… head to my "about" pageFor more such conversations subscribe to my Substack newsletter, it’s where I interact the most!Get your copy of my book, This One Wild and Precious LifeLet’s connect on Instagram and WeAre8 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.