Human Nature Odyssey

This episode originally aired in October of 2024.
Gather around the campfire for a ghost story about the most destructive monster in history: civilization itself. 
In this episode, we delve into the countercultural writings of Fredy Perlman, whose strange 1983 book "Against His-Story, Against-Leviathan"—riddled with grammatical errors and misspellings—blends myth and history to explore the nature of power, subjugation, and the struggle between the rulers and the ruled.
Our journey takes us back to ancient Sumer, where egalitarian hunter-gatherer communities transformed into peasants and slaves bound by a mysterious force even the rulers couldn't control. 
We trace the rise of the first Lugals, the original kings of Mesopotamia, from Urukagina of Lagash, whose reforms sowed the seeds of his downfall, to Sargon of Akkad, who conquered all of Sumer only to become part of the Leviathan's vast machinery.
Together, we'll explore how power and control first took root in the world's earliest cities—and how those ancient systems still shape our world today.
This is a spooky episode. The hair on the back of your neck might stand up. But we can stay seated and relax. It is just a story after all. A fairytale, as Fredy would call it.
 
CITATIONS
Against His-Story, Against Leviathan [book] by Fredy Perlman (1983)
Sargon of Akkad [article] by Joshua J. Mark (2009)
Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles [book] by Albert Kirk Grayson (1975)
Akkadian Empire victory stele circa 2300 BC from Louvre Museum
 
If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you enjoy your podcasts and leave us a review.
Join us on Substack and get exclusive access to audio extras, writings, and notes.
For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast
Theme Music is "Celestial Soda Pop" (Amazon, iTunes, Spotify) by Ray Lynch, from the album "Deep Breakfast." Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI. All rights reserved.
 
.  Amazon: Celestial Soda Pop 
https://amazon.com/music/player/albums/B000QQXURI    
2.  iTunes: 
https://music.apple.com/us/album/celestial-soda-pop/3242445?i=3242425
3.  Spotify:  
https://open.spotify.com/track/2THDVIVytLuGX7S7UghuC1?si=20ea63807bba401f
 
Additional Credits
Vanhan ajan sota, taistelu, miekkailu / Ancient, old time battle, combat, horses snorting and galloping, men shouting and barking, fencing, swords clanging, mix by YleArkisto -- https://freesound.org/s/258207/ -- License: Attribution 4.0

How did humans go from living in small-scale communities where everyone knew each other to building a massive civilization filled with billions of strangers? And what the heck holds those societies together?
In this episode, philosopher C. Thi Nguyen, author of The Score: How to Stop Playing Somebody Else's Game, joins the odyssey to explore  the strange relationship between games, bureaucracy, and large-scale society.
We explore why bureaucracies are so inescapably powerful, what they can—and can't—see, and whether large-scale institutions are doomed to lose sight of nuance and local context. Does the flexibility and experimentation of games offer clues for designing better ways of organizing society?
This is a conversation about civilization, bureaucracy, social organization, community, games, human nature, and the possibility of changing the rules of the game we're all playing.
 
CITATIONS
The Score: How to Stop Playing Somebody Else's Game by C. Thi Nguyen

C. Thi Nguyen's blog Objectionable
 
If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you enjoy your podcasts and leave us a review.
Join us on Substack and get exclusive access to audio extras, writings, and notes.
For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast
Theme Music is "Celestial Soda Pop" (Amazon, iTunes, Spotify) by Ray Lynch, from the album "Deep Breakfast." Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI. All rights reserved.

You might think that you are not a forager. But what if no matter our lifestyle or job title, we are forever hunter gatherers in this world: of food, of love, of meaning. In this immersive episode, join Alex on a walk through an ancient forest as you explore what it means to live life as a forager. It's a journey through the Garden of Eden grocery store, a wrestling with the gods, and a coming home to feast and famine.
 
CITATIONS
Changes in the Landscape by William Cronon

 
If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you enjoy your podcasts and leave us a review.
Join us on Substack and get exclusive access to audio extras, writings, and notes.
For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast
Theme Music is "Celestial Soda Pop" (Amazon, iTunes, Spotify) by Ray Lynch, from the album "Deep Breakfast." Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI. All rights reserved.

What if the crises of our time are not just ecological or political, but also mythological?
Poet and author Sophie Strand joins Human Nature Odyssey for a wide-ranging conversation about stories, illness, ecology, and transformation. Drawing from mythology, religion, folklore, and her own experience living with chronic illness, Sophie explores how the stories we inherit shape our relationship to the living world—and what happens when those stories no longer serve us.
Together, we discuss death and rebirth, animism, the power of storytelling, and the art of composting old narratives so that something new can grow. From Jesus of Nazareth to One Thousand and One Arabian Nights to the ancient Greek epic of Odysseus, we explore stories not as relics of the past, but as living companions for navigating an uncertain future.
This conversation asks what it would mean to truly live in an animate world—to encounter plants, animals, rivers, and landscapes not as resources or scenery, but as relatives. At a time when many of our cultural myths are unraveling, Sophie offers a vision of belonging rooted in reciprocity, relationship, and participation in the wider community of life.
 
CITATIONS
Sophie Strand's Substack: Make Me Good Soil

Sophie Strand's Instagram: @cosmogyny

 
Thank you to Blindspot for sharing their original music. Check out Blindspot on Bandcamp and Spotify.
If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you enjoy your podcasts and leave us a review.
Join us on Substack and get exclusive access to audio extras, writings, and notes.
For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast
Theme Music is "Celestial Soda Pop" (Amazon, iTunes, Spotify) by Ray Lynch, from the album "Deep Breakfast." Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI. All rights reserved.

You, me, and everyone we know were born on the Titanic. 
Some are warning of icebergs. Some are shoveling coal into the furnaces. Some are jamming out while the band plays louder than ever.
In this special episode beginning Year Four of Human Nature Odyssey, Alex gathers friends together in a living room for a live-recorded podcast potluck conversation exploring civilization, collapse, climate change, community, and the strange experience of trying to live a meaningful life while the world feels increasingly unstable.
Drawing from Lord of the Rings, the Titanic, Daniel Quinn's Ishmael, ecological philosophy, and the first three years of Human Nature Odyssey, this episode becomes both a reflection on the journey so far and an exploration on what it means to "come home" to the living world.
Come join us in the living room. There's still space on the couch.
 
CITATIONS
Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
Ishmael by Daniel Quinn
 
If you'd like to support Human Nature Odyssey, please subscribe wherever you listen, leave a review, and join us on Substack for exclusive audio extras, writings, and notes.
For full episode transcripts and additional context, visit: resilience.org/human-nature-odyssey-podcast
 
Music: Celestial Soda Pop
By: Ray Lynch
From the album: Deep Breakfast
Courtesy Ray Lynch Productions © Ⓟ 1984/BMI 
All rights reserved.