I’m constantly surprised by the narrowness of people’s conceptions of the world and the relations therein.

For instance there’s loads of people convinced that humanity can never go extinct and furthermore, that the natural environment has little relation to human flourishing.

Where do they think the oxygen they breathe comes from? Magic? Are they not aware of the complex relationships of ocean salinity, temperature and nutrient/pollution levels to phytoplankton, which produce ~70% of the oxygen we breathe?

One of the real and extreme dangers of global warming is of course that we disrupt the oxygen cycle and that is game over for humanity. We are done. Goose, fully cooked.

But it’s not just about that. Just a minor example. I run into this constantly. Most people are specialists knowing one minuscule area and grasp almost nothing about any other area, or even worse have in their heads only some combination of urban myths, long-debunked “science” from the 1900s, and what they’d prefer to believe.

It’s just a bit shocking how little most people are even aware of the complexity of other areas of study, or that the things they take for granted don’t just get created and sustained by hot air and hocus-pocus.

I know that it’s basically impossible for most people to read and to study as much as I do. But still…it seems like more is possible?