Bibliography

I assume that most people won’t dive as deeply as I did into all the available collapse content. Nevertheless, here’s a list of key contributors whose work I’ve encountered and considered. This contains a range, from deep green to human supremacist, and plenty of hopium. Inclusion isn’t an endorsement.

I feel that, if one were designing a degree in Collapsology, a high-quality curriculum would need to include most of these. The ‼️ mark my top 3 recommendations.

I also aim to demonstrate that this field is broad and not an echo-chamber. Mainstream discourse on climate and politics is where the narrowness is.

Alex Leff - I generally enjoy his podcast, Human Nature Odyssey. My favorite episodes were: “Can We Escape Modern Civilization? A Conversation with the Hosts of Crazy Town” & “Out of Society and Into the Wild: The Legend of Christopher McCandless”. The early HNO episodes convey the plot of Ishmael in a creative, engaging way.

Alice Friedemann - I’ve read her book “Life After Fossil Fuels” and some posts on her blog, “Energy Skeptic”. You can find her interviewed on several podcasts, including this appearance on Planet: Critical. She also has a book called “When the Trucks Stop Running”, which I haven’t read.

Andrew Boyd - I read his book “I Want a Better Catastrophe”. Interesting premise (interviews), but he misspelled Nate Hagens’ name, called Richard Heinberg’s book “The Game’s Over” instead of “The Party’s Over”, and didn’t include excerpts from his interview with Heinberg, despite having spoken with him. Sketchy.

Andrew Nikiforuk - Good journalist at The Tyee. Here’s a 2021 talk he gave. You can also check out his “Tech Won’t Save Us. Shrinking Consumption Will”; “Inflation, Scarcity and the Road to Survival“; “We Built the Technosphere. Now We Must Resist It“.

Antonio Turiel - Here’s a recent interview he gave. Here’s Resilience’s archive of his posts. His blog is The Oil Crash.

Art Berman - Here’s his blog. Here are his appearances as a guest on The Great Simplification: ep 3, ep 92, ep 101

“B” - Author of “The Honest Sorcerer” substack. His posts that I most often recommend include

"This Civilization Is Not Interested In Saving Itself”
“Collapse Will Look Nothing Like the Movies“
“Power Down: A Scenario”
“Will There Be A Second Stone Age?”, including the comments on that last one (forgive the terrible stock photo)

Bayo Akomolafe - I think my favorite interview he gave was this Buddha at the Gas Pump ep. He has a blog…

Chris Ketcham - awesome deep green journalist. His work at: Truth Dig, Harper’s, The Intercept

Carey King - I can’t find his talk that I remember but here he is being interviewed by Steven Keen. And here’s a review of his book “The Economic Superorganism: Beyond the Competing Narratives on Energy, Growth and Policy”

Chris Hedges - He has a blog/podcast “The Chris Hedges Report”, and many books, of which I’ve read only “The World As It Is”, plus this article “This Time the Collapse Will Be Global” and I’ve listened to a review of his “America, The Farewell Tour”

Chris Martenson - I’ve listened to a few episodes of his podcast “Peak Prosperity”. He’s also known for his YouTube series “Crash Course” and book “Prosper!” He, Greer and Kunstler have shifted to the right/conspiracy.

Chris Smaje - I’ve read his “A Small Farm Future” but it didn’t stand out to me.

Cory Doctorow - I haven’t read his work, but I know he made the term “enshittification” popular and here’s a piece by Nikiforuk on “The Enshittification of Everything”

Daniel Quinn - I’ve read “Ishmael”, “The Story of B”, and “My Ishmael” - and I will not pick a favorite.

Daniel Schmachtenberger - I liked his talk, “An Introduction to the Metacrisis”, and blog posts “How to Mislead with Facts” and “Development in Progress”. Here are most of his appearances on The Great Simplification, including the “Bend Not Break” series.

Daniel Zetah - I appreciated his spot on The Great Simplification and occasionally browse his farm website / blog, New Story Farm.

David Fleming - I’ve read “Surviving the Future”, the abridged version of Lean Logic. It was okay.

David Holmgren - I think his best creation are these “Four Descent Scenarios”. I’ve skimmed his “Retrosuburbia”.And,of course, he and Bill Mollison “created” permaculture.

David Pollard - My favorite post on his blog, How to Save the World, was “How Do We Teach the Critical Skills Needed to Face Collapse?”

David Gardner - “Growthbusters” documentary, Growthbusters podcast, 2024 POTUS campaign site

Dean Spade “Climate Disaster Is Here - and the State Will Never Save Us”; and on Live Like the World Is Dying (Part 1, Part 2)

Derrick Jensen - I’ve read “Bright Green Lies” (which he co-authored with Lierre Keith and Max Wilbert) and “The Myth of Human Supremacy”, but not his other big works “Endgame” Vol 1 & Vol 2 … also with Keith, he founded Deep Green Resistance with its Deep Green Resistance News Service

Donella Meadows & Dennis Meadows -

I haven’t read the original “Limits to Growth”
true-crime-esque podcast LTG: “Tipping Point”
“Thinking in Systems”
Dennis’s LTG 50-year-anniversery interview with Richard Heinberg
Dennis’s The Great Simplification ep

Dougald Hine - I really loved “At Work in the Ruins”

Douglas Rushkoff - His biggest recent piece was about “The super-rich ‘preppers’ planning to save themselves from the apocalypse”, which inspired his book “Survival of the Richest”. I’ve read only a bit of his “Present Shock”. His podcast Team Human is sometimes good (like the Jem Bendell episode)

Erin Remblance - I’ve read a few posts of hers, including “We are not supposed to live like this”

Ernest Becker - I’ve read “The Denial of Death” … without realizing the influence on Varki’s MORT Theory and Sheldon Solomon’s Terror Management Theory.

Gaya Herrington - I’ve read her “Update to limits to growth” paper and listened to some interviews…

Helena Norberg-Hodge - She’s known for “Ancient Futures”. I’ve browsed her website “Local Futures”. Does that count?

Herman Daly - Introduced the concept of a steady-state economy and was a leader in ecological economics. see: Ecological Economics for All

Iain McGilchrist - I have not read “The Master and His Emissary” or “The Matter with Things”, but I’ve watched his talk at Cambridge.

James Howard Kunstler - I’ve watched his 2004 TED Talk “The ghastly tragedy of the suburbs” and bits of his documentary, “The End of Suburbia”, and read a little bit of “The Long Emergency”. “The Geography of Nowhere” and “Too Much Magic” sound good. Oh look! The Nation featured him in a 2011 video series.

‼️ Jason Bradford – Favorite content:

his article “The Future of Food: Getting Beyond the Energy Blindness of Techno-Utopianism”
his report “The Future is Rural: Food System Adaptations to the Great Simplification“
his spoof “A Species-level Taxonomic Treatment of the Phalse Prophets with Hypotheses on their Origin and Evolution”
his presentation “The Future is Rural: Adaptation to Energy Descent”
Planet: Critical ep
The Great Simplification ep
Green Dreamer ep
He, Asher Miller and Rob Dietz are great on the Crazy Town podcast, of which I’ve listened to almost every episode.

Jason Hickel - I’ve read “Less is More”.

Jean-Marc Jancovici & Jean-Baptiste Fressoz - French Nate Hagens x2. The Great Simplification ep (Jancovici made a comic book, “World Without End”) // The Great Simplification ep (Fressoz wrote “More and More and More”)

Jem Bendell – I’ve read his Deep Adaptation paper, his book Breaking Together, and enjoyed listened to the Liminal News ep and LowImpact ep part 1 & part 2. Also, his blog!

Joanna Macy - I’m aware that “The World that Reconnects” and “The Great Unraveling” are her things, but I haven’t read her books. I’ve listened to her Post-Doom Conversations ep.

John Gowdy - I’ve read his paper “Our hunter-gatherer future” and the one he co-authored with Lisi Krall about “The ultrasocial origin of the Anthropocene”, introducing the idea of a human superorganism which Nate Hagens now uses in his work.

John Michael Greer - I’ve read “Dark Age America” and “The Ecotechnic Future”. Both have hints on Catton. He’s also known for “The Long Descent”

John Mulrow – professor, co-founder and Executive Director of the Degrowth Institute; article for Gaianism “Degrowth: A Hard Truth”

Jordan Perry - I’ve read some of his blog “The Descent into Madness Precedes the Climb Back Out” and have watched him interviewed, maybe on this Collapse Club ep?

Josh Spodek - This Sustainable Life blog and podcast

Juan Pablo Quiñones - Post-Doom ep, Breaking Down: Collapse ep

Joseph Merz, Phoebe Barnard, Nandita Bajaj et al. - “World scientists’ warning: The behavioural crisis driving ecological overshoot” … and I’ve browsed various related institutions: Overshoot Behavior Lab, Population Balance and its podcast Overshoot, Population Matters, Population Media Center … and going from anti-pro-natalism to anti-natalism: Stop Having Kids

Joseph Tainter - I haven’t read “The Collapse of Complex Societies” but I remember the 2020 NYT article from before I was collapse-aware! And I’ve heard him interviewed: Breaking Down: Collapse ep and The Great Simplification ep.

Karen Perry - I’ve read some of her blog “Living with GRAC/E: Getting Real About Collapse/Extinction“ and have listened to her Post-Doom Conversations ep multiple times.

Kate Raworth - I’ve read “Doughnut Economics”. Here’s her TEDx Talk

‼️ Kory & Kellan – Breaking Down: Collapse is THE BEST COLLAPSOLOGY 101 OF ALL TIME. Go alllllll the way to the beginning and listen to the earliest eight episodes. Ep 3 (Energy) and Ep 4 (Overshoot & Limits to Growth) tipped me into collapse-awareness.

Lisi Krall - I’ve read “Bitter Harvest” and listened to her interviews, including the Planet: Critical ep.

Manda Scott - host of Accidental Gods, originator (I think) of the “thrutopia” concept

Margaret Killjoy - Live Like the World Is Dying podcast. More political than ecological.

Martin Prechtel - I like his appearance on Green Dreamer.

Max Wilbert -

Planet: Critical ep
“Response to the Case for Technorealism” (see Rachel Donald entry)
presentation “Strategy for Grassroots People’s Movements Against Ecocide”
presentation “Technological Somnambulism and the Failure of the Scientific Imagination”
blog Biophilia (with posts like “How to Stop Worrying and Love the Bulldozer” and “Real Solutions”)
As mentioned under Jensen, he co-authored Bright Green Lies

Meg Wheatley - I heard her on a Wild ep …

Michael Dowd - presentation “10 Inevitables: Post Doom, No Gloom”, talk “Being The Calm in The Storm”, podcast Post-Doom Conversations, audio for classic books

Nate Hagens - “The Great Simplification” movie, “The Superorganism and the future‍” talk, his The Great Simplification podcast. Among his many insights is this 4-part series on why civilization won’t voluntarily reduce fossil fuel consumption: Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four

Nora Bateson - of Warm Data

Olivia Lazard - “The blind spots of the energy transition‍” talk

Pablo Servigne - “A Future Without Oil?” talk. I have not read his books (including “How Everything Can Collapse” and, same as Halstead’s title, “Another End of the World is Possible”)

Paul Chefurka - stages of collapse awareness

Paul Ehrlich - I have not read “The Population Bomb” but have listened to his The Great Simplification ep

Peter Turchin - I had not read “End Times” but have listened to his The Great Simplification ep and read his article “Welcome to the Turbulent Twenties”

Peter Zeihan - I have not read “The End of the World is Just the Beginning”, but I’ve read Chris Smaje’s analysis of it!

Rachel Donald - host of Planet: Critical. I appreciated her email thread between Donald and Bill Rees. And this (fairly critical) interview of Hannah Ritchie for Mongabay.

Rex Weyler - This post on the LTG 50th anniversary. and The Great Simplification ep

Richard Heinberg - Of his many books, I’ve read only “Powerdown”. And his Museletter blog, for example, this post on the 50^th anniversary of the LTG; “Why We Can’t Just Do It” (stop oil), “The Allure of Cult Thinking” (‘clean’ tech fantasies)

Robert Evans - It Could Happen Here podcast. I thought the first few episodes were his best, told from a future fractured USA

Rob Hopkins - I just know of the Transition Towns, of which Hopkins was a founder

Robert Jensen & Wes Jackson - I’ve read “An Inconvenient Apocalypse”. I prefer this interview. Here’s Alice Friedemann’s long-form summary.

Robin Wall Kimmerer - I read “Braiding Sweetgrass”. Meh.

Sam Bliss - “Post-environmentalism: origins and evolution of a strange idea”. Debating ecomodernist Linus Blomqvist. Google Scholar page of all his really cool research!

Sam Mitchell - his Collapse Chronicles channel has an excellent playlist of interviews that he conducted

Sandy Schoelles - her Environmental Coffeehouse channel has some very science-y interviews as well as casual conversation

Sarah Wilson - I’ve listened to many episodes of Wild. Her TEDx talk committed some pleasant-washing but I liked her Planet: Critical ep.

Shaun Chamberlin - I haven’t read much of his Dark Optimism blog but I did especially like “The secret truth behind environmentalists’ favorite argument”

Sheldon Solomon - He, along with Jeff Greenberg and Tom Pyszczynski, proposed Terror Management Theory (“Terror management and aggression: evidence that mortality salience motivates aggression against worldview-threatening others”, 1998). I have not read his book “The Worm at the Core” but I have listened to the Crazy Town episode about TMT.

Sid Smith - “Why You Shouldn’t Let Collapse Get You Down” presentation

Simon Michaux - The Great Simplification eps on “Minerals Blindness” and “The Arcadians”. His presentation on “Developing a Sustainable Community”.

Sophie Strand - collapse-adjacent, daughter of Perdita Finn and Clark Strand. I haven’t read any of her books, but of the interviews I’ve heard, I liked the Rooted Healing ep most.

Stanley Cox - I’ve read “Any Way You Slice It: The Past, Present, and Future of Rationing” but he has several books.

Stephen Jenkinson - The Great Simplification ep. I have not read “Die Wise”.

Steven Keen - Planet: Critical ep

Stuart McMillen - comics about Energy Slaves and Peak Oil and St. Matthew Island

Susan Krumdieck - Planet:Critical ep

“There’s No Tomorrow: Limits to Growth and The Future”

Tim DeChristopher - Crazy Town ep

Tim Garrett - Planet: Critical ep. Presentation on “Jevons’ Paradox: Why increasing energy efficiency will accelerate global climate change”. Interestingly, as he states in this Reddit AMA (itself very much worth a read), he reveals that he figured out the Paradox through independent reasoning, and also at the “food makes babies” insight that might be “officially” attributable to Catton and Quinn

Tim Watkins - The Great Simplification ep

Timothée Parrique - Planet: Critical ep. Blog where (aside from documenting how busy he is) he picks apart the most egregiously eco-blind assertions. I have not read “Slow Down or Die” (“Ralentir ou Perir”)

‼️ Tom Murphy - He created the Planetary Limits Academic Network. His whole blog Do the Math is EXCELLENT! Favorites:

“Our Time on The River”
“Was Modernity Inevitable?”
“Evidence, Please?”
“Our Ugly Magnificence”
“Are We Lucky?”
“Mysterious Materialism”
His Metastatic Modernity video series (note that each one comes with a written companion)

Tyson Yunkaporta – I’ve read “Sand Talk” and “Right Story Wrong Story”. My favorite interview he’s done was the Death in the Garden ep. This ep with Emergence was good too.

Vaclav Smil - I haven’t read any of his books, but I’ve read the NYT interview

Vanessa Andreotti - I’ve read “Hospicing Modernity” and “Outgrowing Modernity”

Vicki Robin - What Could Possibly Go Right podcast

William Catton - I’ve read “Overshoot”

William Rees -

along with Mathis Wackernagel, came up with the “ecological footprint” concept, the inspiration for Earth Overshoot Day
talk “Ecological Overshoot: Economic Growth, Energy and the Population Conundrum”
paper “The Human Ecology of Overshoot: Why a Major ‘Population Correction’ Is Inevitable”
talk with John Mulrow, hosted by Gaian Way: “Dispelling the Myths of a Renewable Energy Transition”
talk “The Enigma of Climate Inaction – On the Human Nature of Policy Failure”

Less-canonical but well worth checking out

Adan Noone - “Oh, Pooh, It’s Over: A Story of Our Gentle End”

David Lauterwasser - I really resonate with his blog, “An Animist’s Ramblings”. Two posts of his that really stuck with me are “We are living in the Good Old Days of tomorrow“ and “The End of Bananas & Dwindling Diversity“

Elisabeth Robson - I appreciate her post “Propaganda and Power”, her critique of the human supremacy behind Herrington’s “Five Insights for Avoiding Global Collapse” and the fact that of all the submissions in this The Great Simplification listener ep, hers was the only one that only ever showed other beings instead of her own face.

“Goobie” - channel of deep green musings. I especially like his “Scary Bedtime Stories” series

“Pig”

“Truth Wizard” - the only Millennial YouTuber I know of who regularly covers environmental headlines. For example, this video.