「Progress」out—looking intriguing and challenging, by @smillermcdonald.bsky.social. Much looking forward to reading a solid social science framework, which most literature on climate policy lacks, that aims to develop possible alternatives to the idea of progress. bookshop.org/p/books/prog...

Organisations like Our World in Data and folk like Steven Pinker would have us believe that everything is getting better because lines are travelling a certain way on charts. This week's guest @smillermcdonald.bsky.social thoroughly debunks that. Listen now: www.planetcritical.com/the-myth-of-...

@smillermcdonald.bsky.social considers Black liberation, the abolition of slavery, and the myth of progress.

Geographer @smillermcdonald.bsky.social on the myth of progress — a delusion that's been following us for 5000 years and justified endless wars, genocides and ecological destruction. Full episode out now: www.planetcritical.com/the-myth-of-...

'How progress has legitimised violence for over 5,000 years, recycled through Holy Books, colonial legislation, international development, and even technological innovation.' Had a great chat about my book on Planet:Critical. Have a listen: www.planetcritical.com/the-myth-of-...

AI is a Performance of Progress, Not the Real Thing. Despite driving "growth", AI is failing to improve anyone's life, and its harms are piling up. substack.com/home/post/p-...

Had a delightful chat with @andrewsage.bsky.social about my book, Progress www.youtube.com/watch?v=95CO...

Very happy to see my book Progress as one of 8 titles selected as Best History books for December on Amazon

New review of my book out! www.truthdig.com/articles/is-...

I have a piece on Post-Holocene Progress at St Martin's Press History Reader: 'we cannot assume an ever-increasing energy expenditure...fossil energy use must stop and everything dependent on it must be abolished or reformed' www.thehistoryreader.com/world-histor...

In a strange alliance, right wing traditionalists, tech professionals, and an abominable billionaire are pushing a pronatalist agenda on Americans, while cutting the very programs that help parents and children. This, and more in our Quarterly Mag. ⬇️ populationconnection.org/magazine/sep...

lovely to visit Toppings bookshop in Edinburgh today for @smillermcdonald.bsky.social to sign copies of his book Progress - a street over from where we used to live and the final edits were completed

“There is an idealism to this book that refreshes readers jaded by the claims of 'techno-futurism' and the aspirations of oligarchs. You read this book and want to love the earth rather than reach for stars.” Delighted to have this Kirkus Review on PROGRESS

“Geographer McDonald debuts with a sweeping reappraisal of the notion of historical progress. … The result is a provocative interrogation of the very foundations of modern society.” Very honored for PROGRESS to receive a starred review from @publisherswkly.bsky.social

“Tax the rich out of existence, and suddenly there are no more psychopathic oligarchs trying to kill us, no more brutally unfair distribution of resources, no more mafia boss-style politicians rigging the system.” @smillermcdonald.bsky.social www.currentaffairs.org/news/dirty-l...

The human population is currently so massive, so out of balance with the rest of life on Earth, so pathologically “abundant” that it would take decades or centuries of decline to put a noticeable dent in it—unless, that is, there is some external force which leads to mass death.

THIS. Read and share. Need more straight talk like this about the truths behind pushing panic over birth rates.

What role has the idea of progress played in building civilization and its gifts, as well as dispossessing, enslaving, or even eradicating billions of people and animals over the last 5,000 years? This interview with @popnbalance.bsky.social gives a good overview: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ij2X...

'If you have a sense that things aren't getting better, or you're interested in how progress myths have shaped societies for the last 5,000 years, grab this book!'

Today is publication day for my book! @wmcollinsbooks.bsky.social You can get your hands on it at most bookstores in the UK, or online at any of the vendors listed here: harpercollins.co.uk/products/pro...

Had a great launch the other day in Oxford. Very grateful to @wmcollinsbooks.bsky.social for organizing it, and to my sweet friends and kind colleagues who came to celebrate! Five days until (UK) publication. Let's get out and explode the powerful myths imperiling our futures

I’ve been intrigued by the prospect of a history of the idea of progress ever since I heard @smillermcdonald.bsky.social was writing it, and I was very pleased to be invited to the launch in Oxford last night.

“The world is inside us, now. What are we going to do about it?” www.nytimes.com/2025/08/04/o...

Now even prouder to be a longtime loyal Little Caesars partisan #pizzapizza

Excited to have a short provocations piece, 'Against Entanglement', in the first issue of American Gothic Studies. In a time of pandemics, militant land grabs, and extinctions, the Gothic uses tales of zombie infections and nuked landscapes to show us the dark side of being entangled with others.

The fertility panic is an elite fixation that is rooted in a human supremacist worldview and a deep fear of slowing growth. In this episode of OVERSHOOT, Samuel Miller exposes how our parasitic relationship with Earth lies at the core of ecological overshoot www.populationbalance.org/podcast/samu...

I had a great conversation with Nandita Bajaj and Alan Weisman on the OVERSHOOT podcast about why fixation on growth and increasing birthrates is fundamentally authoritarian and anti-life (and also about conviviality, solidarity, and more). Have a listen! www.populationbalance.org/podcast/samu...

Sam has a fantastic movie-trailer voice. So excited for PROGRESS to come out next month!

The idea of progress helped build the world's first civilizations ~5,000 years ago. It is now driving global civilizational collapse. My book tells the history of this process. You can now preorder it at: uk.bookshop.org/p/books/prog... for August 14 (in the UK)

Weird duet last night

To bomb Iran the US deployed 7 B2 bombers, each of which cost $2.1B to build. They used 14 huge “bunker busters,” a model that cost $500 million to develop. The US invested ~ $15 billion in this attack—almost 50% more than it invested in affordable housing construction this year.

Why have I tabled a motion against the continued funding of Drax to burn US trees, to be heard on Monday in #HouseofLords? www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

We have every reason to believe that new sources of “clean energy” will go toward powering AI, crypto, and other superfluous sources of consumption, rather than to making energy widely available or reducing fossil energy use for more necessary consumption. www.currentaffairs.org/news/dirty-l...

In order for these alternative energy projects to put a dent in carbon emissions, they must be coupled with state-mandated restrictions on fossil fuel development and deployment. www.currentaffairs.org/news/dirty-l...

Growthism is not just anti-living, it’s anti-life. If we maintain the current level of energy consumption and continue drilling the land and seas for energy at the current pace, a great deadening will be the fate of everyone and everything. www.currentaffairs.org/news/dirty-l...

My latest piece for @currentaffairs.bsky.social: Far from solving climate change, alternative energy may only increase carbon emissions—unless a strong state is willing to do things like ban AI, prosecute crypto, shrink cars, and keep fossil fuels in the ground www.currentaffairs.org/news/dirty-l...

FUN FACT: Since 2019, Nigel Farage's Reform has taken more than £2.3 MILLION from oil and gas interests - making up an astonishing 92% of the party's donations. Reform are NOT for ordinary people. They're in the pockets of the big oil lobby.

Cars are deadly, inefficient, and climate-killing. Cars aren't inevitable, and they are standing in the way of a better, transit-friendly future for our country. www.currentaffairs.org/news/carmage...

Great article by @smillermcdonald.bsky.social! The "baby bust" panic is deeply misleading. Lots of info on actual demographic trends and why declining birth rates are not to be feared on our site. See e.g. populationconnection.org/blog/baby-bu... and populationconnection.org/blog/the-tru...

9. For 14 years those of us who cared for the living world sought to evict the Tories in favour of something better. But this is much, much worse. Just as the US is captured by a Billionaire Death Cult, the "Labour" government is opening the door to the same forces.

Attention! @barnesandnoble.com is doing a promotion for Members. 25% off pre-orders of my book from today to Friday (PREORDER25): www.barnesandnoble.com/w/progress-s...

About 132 million people are born every year. Overall, about 180,000 people—or the equivalent of Fort Lauderdale, Florida’s population—are added to the world’s population every day. www.currentaffairs.org/news/there-a...

Wrote about why panic over human birth rates falling is not just delusional but evil www.currentaffairs.org/news/there-a...

One reason I dislike abundance discourse is that it's all too easily appropriated by the right to spin horrific extractive practices, whether fossil fuel production or, here, the mass logging of public, old-growth American forests.

Looks like the Trump admin is already afraid of my book. You can preorder it in the US here: us.macmillan.com/books/978125... and UK here: harpercollins.co.uk/products/pro...

Apparently her crime consisted entirely of writing an oped that the people in power did not like. If you're in or near Boston, there's a rally at Powderhouse Square in Somerville at 5:30. www.salon.com/2025/03/26/d...

It's here! Nature's Genius is out on 8 May - available to pre-order now. Thanks to @robgmacfarlane.bsky.social, @wanderinggaia.bsky.social, @calflyn.bsky.social, @casparhenderson.bsky.social, Charles Forster and Isabella Tree for some wonderful quotes!

alright here's a Take: checks and balances (and federalism) were supposed to protect against tyranny. But instead they just prevented a "tyranny of the majority" from doing universal health care and gun control, and it turns out they do basically nothing to stop an autocrat

This is a corporate attempt to put an end to climate protest and *particularly* to Indigenous led climate protest. Massive 1A assault. Pretty shocking that our little outlet was one of maybe 3 or 4 that had a reporter there every day of the trial (one of the others was a fake newspaper 🙃)