Author: publius

Fools! I will destroy you all!!

ASFO 2025–01–11

The metaphenomenon of recurrent phenomena occupies a considerable part of my attention this week. Also, a recommendation for a book, The Flying Sorcerers by Gerrold and Niven ; a consideration of the Car Culture in America ; and a warning to be aware of the ape brain that lies between the lizard brain and the higher faculties of consciousness.

Supplementary Show

  • 2025–01–14 “There is now a very large inventory of ways in which Man has been teaching, thinking, and accounting events and values which have no experimentally–demonstrated validity.” The remainder of Summary Address at Vision 65 just rounds out the hour (hey, it had to happen sometime), and provides the title for the book, Utopia or Oblivion.
  • 2024–01–17 “For every problem solved a plurality of new problems arise to take their place. But the problems need not be those of physical and economic survival.” More from Fuller, a short piece titled The World Game — How to Make the World Work, describing a very interesting computer simulation effort, and the beginning of a longer piece entitled Geosocial Revolution.

ASFO 2025–01–04

We humans, time–binding animals that we are, have now exhausted the first quarter of the twenty–first century. And what do we have to show for it? Colonies on the Moon, research outposts on Mars, expeditions to the asteroids and Jupiter? Peace, prosperity, and healthy ecosystems on Earth? Make better choices, children!

Supplementary Shows

  • 2025–01–07 “When we have something vital to say we can usually develop the means of communication. Today with our great vocabulary inheritance we squander meanings on unworthy causes and communicate little that needs to be said.” More of Utopia or Oblivion by Bucky Fuller, the tail end of Prevailing Conditions in the Arts, and the start of Keynote Address at Vision 65.
  • 2025–01–10 “We find that man is developing an increasing confidence in the way in which computers are resolving heretofore vexing and seemingly unsolvable problems.” Completion of Keynote Address at Vision 65, and beginning of Summary Address at Vision 65.

“A Step Farther Out” 2025 Shows

ASFO airs weekly at 19z00, with occasional bonus shows at 15z00 Tuesdays or Fridays. Here you will find links to recordings of the shows from 2025, each accompanied by a brief description.

To understand what this show is about, and for recordings of the shows from 2021, go here. 2022 shows are here, 2023 shows are here, and 2024 shows are here.

  • 2025–01–04 We humans, time–binding animals that we are, have now exhausted the first quarter of the twenty–first century. And what do we have to show for it? Colonies on the Moon, research outposts on Mars, expeditions to the asteroids and Jupiter? Peace, prosperity, and healthy ecosystems on Earth? Make better choices, children!
  • 2025–01–11 The metaphenomenon of recurrent phenomena occupies a considerable part of my attention this week. Also, a recommendation for a book, The Flying Sorcerers by Gerrold and Niven ; a consideration of the Car Culture in America ; and a warning to be aware of the ape brain that lies between the lizard brain and the higher faculties of consciousness.

Supplementary Shows

  • 2025–01–03 “The domain of the virus is apparently the threshold between what we have known in the past as the animate and the inanimate.” Back to Bucky Fuller and Utopia or Oblivion — The Prospects for Humanity, which seems very appropriate as we begin this Glorious Future Year of 2025.
  • 2025–01–07 “When we have something vital to say we can usually develop the means of communication. Today with our great vocabulary inheritance we squander meanings on unworthy causes and communicate little that needs to be said.” More of Utopia or Oblivion by Bucky Fuller, the tail end of Prevailing Conditions in the Arts, and the start of Keynote Address at Vision 65.
  • 2025–01–10 “We find that man is developing an increasing confidence in the way in which computers are resolving heretofore vexing and seemingly unsolvable problems.” Completion of Keynote Address at Vision 65, and beginning of Summary Address at Vision 65.

ASFO 2024–12–28

Key phrases for our final show of the year include “influencer–management companies”, “ten thousand Ronald Reagans”, and “the last full measure of devotion”. Also, the news from Finland should seriously call into question some of the more popular energy strategies, and the Chaos Computer Club is raising money for some folks who really need and deserve it.

Supplementary Shows

  • 2024–12–31 “The future development of mankind, on the spiritual no less than the material plane, is bound up with the conquest of space.” On this final (366th) day of the year, I take the opportunity to read Arthur C Clarke’s famous essay The Challenge of the Spaceship (the version from the 1961 book of the same title).
  • 2025–01–03 “The domain of the virus is apparently the threshold between what we have known in the past as the animate and the inanimate.” Back to Bucky Fuller and Utopia or Oblivion — The Prospects for Humanity, which seems very appropriate as we begin this Glorious Future Year of 2025.

ASFO 2024–12–21

Canadian retaliation? It’s more likely (and more effective) than you think! Also, a description of some potential future “Man and Atom” merchandise (or supporter premiums) I am working on ; Skylab helmets making a comeback ; and more of my thoughts on some of the many things people mean when they refer to “the gold standard”.

ASFO 2024–12–14

Pressure vessels occupy a great deal of my attention today, but gosh darn it! They’re important. Also postage stamps. Lots and lots of postage stamps. Give me an excuse to use them, won’t you? And a couple of comments about politics and current affairs, which I can’t totally ignore.

Supplementary Show

2024–12–17 The tail end of The Music of the New Life, and beginning of Prevailing Conditions in the Arts, from Utopia or Oblivion (1969) by R Buckminster Fuller.

ASFO 2024–12–07

The last third of this broadcast is a jeremiad against the schooling system in the United States, including a recommendation of a book with which I do not necessarily wholly agree, but which I find usefully thought–provoking : How to Survive in Your Native Land, James Herndon, 1971. We get there by way of some updates on my activities, reflections on democracy in various countries, and a consideration of the “precautionary principle”. (More discussion of the gold standard will have to wait.)

Supplementary Shows

  • 2024–12–10 “We can say that world society through overspecialization has reached the brink of extinction.” More of The Music of the New Life from Utopia or Oblivion : the Prospects for Humanity by R Buckminster Fuller.
  • 2024–12–13 “What we mean by understanding is : apprehending and comprehending all the interrelationships of experiences.” Yet more of The Music of the New Life from Utopia or Oblivion : the Prospects for Humanity by R Buckminster Fuller.

ASFO 2024–11–30

Heraclitus tells us that we can never step in the same river twice, so although you are surrounded by voices proclaiming that that the world is coming to an end, do not be deceived. The inevitability of change means that it is every bit as just, or unjust, to speak of beginnings as of endings. It is, perhaps, only natural to be afraid of the colossal opportunities that are even now opening out before us, but if we seek to shun them, we will only get changes we like less. Also, a bit more about the gold standard (hopefully I will finish with that next week) and erroneous ideas about “intrinsic value”.

Supplementary Shows

  • 2024–12–03 “Man is the great antientropy of universe” — Utopia or Oblivion : the Prospects for Humanity by R Buckminster Fuller (who else?), Introduction (Robert W Marks), A Citizen of the 21st Century Looks Back, and the beginning of The Music of the New Life.
  • 2024–12–06 “In is individually unique as a direction toward the center of any one system — but out is common to them all.” More of Utopia or Oblivion : the Prospects for Humanity by R Buckminster Fuller, continuing with The Music of the New Life, and a discussion of the importance of flush toilets over any other educational facility.

ASFO 2024–11–23

Mail call! Did Russia actually launch an ICBM with no warhead against Ukraine? The Steppenwolf Plan for disarmament. And, more of the story of the gold standard : Isaac Newton enters the picture.

Supplementary Show

  • 2024–11–26 The Treaty of Peace between the United States and Germany, and a list of other treaties arising from the Paris Conference of 1919.
  • 2024–11–29 “German Observations on the Conditions of Peace” (with a liberal helping of well–deserved sarcasm) and the Allied reply.

ASFO 2024–11–16

In which my motivations for reading selections from an annotated version of the Treaty of Versailles are, perhaps, revealed, and the vexed question of German War Guilt is examined ; along with an attempt to introduce some of the basic concepts of banking and currency, with the intention of eventually explaining the various things that might be meant by a person referring to “the gold standard”, and the contexts in which these meanings arise.

Supplementary Show

  • 2024–11–19 More from the annotated Treaty of Versailles, and specifically the Covenant of the League of Nations.
  • 2024–11–22 After a bit of a glitch at the start, mostly the Preface and first section, “The Paris Peace Conference, 1919”, of The Treaty of Versailles and After.