How To Get Things Less Wrong: Tools for Navigating Reality's Terrain and Rivers

How To Get Things Less Wrong

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Small leggy bird parent and even leggier fuzzy chick on sandy beach with water in background

Recent-ish Reads, August 2, 2025

For your reading pleasure, and my gratification that some really brilliant people agree with me, here are a few more direct and indirect illustrations of basic comparative metaphysics and process-relational reality. ABSOLUTELY MANDATORY READING: This piece by Māori-Pākehā scholar Christine J. Winter is a few months old, but timeless. It&

Collage of diagonally tiled images of climate impacts: glacial destruction, forest fires, intensified hurricanes, flooding, heat danger, drought and famine

news and politics

The Catastrophically Stupid Metaphysics of Climate Deniers

Trump proposed scrapping EPA's authority to regulate climate pollution, based on a core map-territory mistake.

It's Really Not Hard

everyday practice

It's Really Not Hard

The two basic directions of understanding things are within any willing person's grasp, even that of a child.

Photo of a tabby cat wearing dollar sign necklace, sideways cap, and other '90s stereotypical "gangsta" costume bits

news and politics

The Metaphysics of Humiliation

Relations of domination and humiliation are at the heart of reactionary politics; metaphysics explains further.

A view of the Chicago skyline in the distance from Montrose Harbor, with trees, boats, and ducks in the foreground

Recent-ish Reads, July 12, 2025

Process-relational politics, brains, and Making Earth Healthy Again: more articles that prove this blog's point.

Colorful raspberry, pistachio, chocolate, cinnamon, etc. donuts on a wire tray

Recent-ish Reads, June 23, 2025

Capitalism, AI brain rot, and fascist weirdos... I promise these reads/listens/watches are good.

Several hundred people from Chicago's “No Kings” protest and march, attended by tens of thousands, make their way north on Wabash Street, under the "L" train

news and politics

Fascists' Crumbling Tower

All the History happening exemplifies the importance of the implicit ways we think about things in general.

3-panel comic: 1 "Let's not talk about politics anymore, I can't bear it" "same" 2 "..." 3 "THE THING IS THOUGH" "THOSE FUCKING IDIOTS" @emilyscartoons

Recent-ish Reads, June 6, 2025

More fun instances of basic map-versus-terrain comparative metaphysics: birthday week edition!

Thich Nhat Hanh in a colorful procession with yellow-clad Buddhist monks at 2007 festival in Da Nang, Vietnam

religion and culture

Here It Is, Your Moment of Zen

Buddhist process-relationality, and where basic comparative metaphysics meets religion in general.

A melanistic Eastern gray squirrel, Sciurus carolinensis, carrying a walnut in its mouth as it pauses while crossing a walkway

Recent-ish Reads (and Listens), May 21, 2025

More process-relationality out in the wild! Mostly on one big topic this round: Power to Make the World Better I was honored to be on a conference panel a few years ago with the amazing Steph Speirs, the Solstice co-founder interviewed here on ways to redesign a better world. I

Philosophical Plumbing and Practical Examples

Philosophical Plumbing and Practical Examples

We are always already bringing metaphysical frameworks to bear on our thought and action.

Real Process Biology

Real Process Biology

Subject matter experts have got my back on process-relational metaphysics.

Recent-ish Reads, May 8, 2025

Recent-ish Reads, May 8, 2025

A few more curated gooders for you on process-relational reality.

Less Wrong = More Right (Brain Hemisphere?)

Less Wrong = More Right (Brain Hemisphere?)

Directions of seeing reality correspond to halves of our brains. Maps to the left, terrain to the right.

A young Black man in a helmet that says "RYAN" and other safety gear works on a solar installation, with a fence, cloudy sky and trees in background.

news and politics

Why Fascists Love Cancer and Hate Volunteerism

Examples show how the far-right's map-metaphysics explains choices that seem incomprehensible.

Black swallowtail butterfly with iridescent blue and yellow accents on some small pink flowers, with wings curved away from its head

Life on Earth Proves a Process-Relational World

Map-metaphysics assumptions about things' reality can distort our understandings of those things.

Small concrete dome bunker in the middle of a green field with small trees, under a blue sky with clouds.

news and politics

Rapture vs. Regeneration

Reality through the lens of Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor's "Rise of End Times Fascism."

Grainy 1925 photo of Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein, reclining and mid-conversation, at the home of Paul Ehrenfest in Leiden, Germany.

Less-Wrong (Meta)Physics

Modern physics and comparative metaphysics unlock understanding of each other and everyday life.

DC cherry blossoms by Javier Robles, via https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cherry_Blossom_Washington,_DC.JPG.

Recent-ish Reads, April 12, 2025

Comparative metaphysics is hidden everywhere! So, I'm going to aim to provide short lists of recent articles every so often, maybe about bi-weekly. They'll feature readable writings that that illustrate aspects of the map/territory or substance/process-relational ways of understanding reality, even though few reference

Photo of Northern Italy and surrounding land and sea areas from International Space Station

news and politics

Fighting For Reality, For Real

Our assumptions about reality define the boundaries of what we think is possible, and reality is anti-fascist.

1637 world map by Gerhard Mercator, via the New York Public Library, via rawpixel

news and politics

We're In a Winnable Fight Over Reality

Distinguishing the map from the territory is one of the best practical tools we have against fascism.