For most of our history, humans lived in relatively egalitarian societies that actively prevented the accumulation of power. Author of Goliath's Curse, Luke Kemp, examines how hierarchical states, 'Goliaths', came to dominate the world. We explore why Goliaths repeatedly collapse, the likely trajectories of today's global Goliath, and what it might take to radically democratize power before history repeats itself. Highlights include:

• Why Luke rejects the term 'civilization' in favor of 'Goliath' to describe the large-scale societies that have emerged over the past several thousand years and were built on dominance hierarchies such as ruler and ruled, rich and poor, man and woman, and free and slave;
• How archaeological and anthropological evidence suggests that for most of human history people lived in relatively egalitarian, democratic, and cooperative societies, challenging long-standing assumptions about humanity's supposedly violent and selfish nature;
• How humans historically constrained would-be tyrants through ridicule, ostracism, exile, and if necessary group execution;
• How the first Goliaths emerged thousand of years after intensified agriculture, using war and violence and growing their power through the 'Goliath fuel' of 'lootable resources, monopolizable weapons, and caged land';
• How 'babies, bombs, bacteria, and barbarism' enabled Goliaths to expand across the globe, conquering and absorbing non-state people into today's global Goliath;
• Why the 'darker angels of our nature' - status competition, the 'dark triad' of personality traits, and the authoritarian impulse - also provide fuel to the growth and persistence of Goliaths;
• Why Goliaths function as engines of inequality that become increasingly vulnerable to shocks like popular rebellion, environmental stress, disease, and how this makes societal collapse a recurring feature of large-scale societies throughout history;
• Why, if we continue with business as usual, the most likely long-term fate of today's global Goliath is collapse, and why in the short term we may be heading toward a 'Silicon Goliath' of increased digital surveillance and potential for autocratic repression;
• How we might 'shackle' Goliath through a process of radical democratization in 4 different forms of power - political, economic, violence, and information.

See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:

https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/luke-kemp

OVERSHOOT | Shrink Toward Abundance

OVERSHOOT tackles today's interlocked social and ecological crises driven by humanity's excessive population and consumption. The podcast explores needed narrative, behavioral, and system shifts for recreating human life in balance with all life on Earth. With expert guests from wide-ranging disciplines, we examine the forces underlying overshoot: from patriarchal pronatalism that is fueling overpopulation, to growth-biased economic systems that lead to consumerism and social injustice, to the dominant worldview of human supremacy that subjugates animals and nature. Our vision of shrinking toward abundance inspires us to seek pathways of transformation that go beyond technological fixes toward a new humanity that honors our interconnectedness with all beings.

Hosted by Nandita Bajaj and Alan Ware. Brought to you by Population Balance.

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Support our work with a one-time or monthly donation: https://www.populationbalance.org/donate

Learn more at https://www.populationbalance.org

Copyright 2016-2026 Population Balance

For millennia, animals have been treated as property or passive recipients of moral concern rather than as political beings with agency. Political philosophers Sue Donaldson and Will Kymlicka, authors of Animals and the Right to Politics, argue that decades of research reveals that animals are members of complex political societies capable of negotiation, cooperation, and collective decision-making. We explore what it would mean to recognize animals' political rights and build a meaningful politics with animals, and why that requires transforming our laws, institutions, and everyday relationships with animals from violence and domination toward coexistence. Highlights include:

• Why we need to move beyond the idea of the "minimal animal," which focuses on the animal's capacity to suffer or engage in species-specific behaviors, toward the "maximal animal" recognized as an agent with personality, culture, and political capacities;
• Why we must learn to elicit and be responsive to animals' needs and wants - their political communication - and not assume that humans can represent animals' interests easily and accurately;
• Why animal politics requires attending not only to animals' resistance to violence and domination but also to the many ways they express cooperation, preference, and consent;
• Why the "cosmopolitan bias" in animal ethics privileges humans' global mobility over the place-based lives of both animals and indigenous and local human communities;
• How meaningful coexistence and honoring animals' rights to politics differs for domesticated, liminal, and wild animals - from expanding freedom and choice, to redesigning shared living spaces, to respecting territories and habitats.

See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:

https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/will-kymlicka-sue-donaldson

OVERSHOOT | Shrink Toward Abundance

OVERSHOOT tackles today's interlocked social and ecological crises driven by humanity's excessive population and consumption. The podcast explores needed narrative, behavioral, and system shifts for recreating human life in balance with all life on Earth. With expert guests from wide-ranging disciplines, we examine the forces underlying overshoot: from patriarchal pronatalism that is fueling overpopulation, to growth-biased economic systems that lead to consumerism and social injustice, to the dominant worldview of human supremacy that subjugates animals and nature. Our vision of shrinking toward abundance inspires us to seek pathways of transformation that go beyond technological fixes toward a new humanity that honors our interconnectedness with all beings.

Hosted by Nandita Bajaj and Alan Ware. Brought to you by Population Balance.

Subscribe to our newsletter here: https://www.populationbalance.org/subscribe

Support our work with a one-time or monthly donation: https://www.populationbalance.org/donate

Learn more at https://www.populationbalance.org

Copyright 2016-2026 Population Balance

Every age is the Stone Age. Geologist and author Marcia Bjornerud discusses how thinking like a geologist can cultivate the grounded humility of a deep time perspective. We explore Earth's turbulent history, humanity's emergence as a geologic force, and why humanity and all of life - past, present, and future - is utterly dependent on the rocky planet beneath our feet. Highlights include:

• Why geology is not just the study of rocks but the habit of seeing in four dimensions - including time;
• Why rocks should be seen as 'verbs' and not just 'nouns', preserving the memory of long ago ecosystems and Earth processes that created them;
• The geologic history of Earth in about 5 minutes;
• Why humanity's massive impact on the planet is affecting Earth and its atmosphere faster than any known geologic force in Earth history;
• Why the process of evolution is not inherently 'progressive' and how Earth's long history teaches us that change is the only constant - and that 'bad things do happen to good planets';
• Why geology is in a 'golden age' of discovery and has made incredible advancement in both the understanding of Earth processes and the tools to measure and analyze those processes;
• Why we're still in the 'stone age' - utterly dependent on the rocky Earth for biological life and all of the products of humanity's modern techno-industrial civilization;
• How 'timefulness' - thinking like a geologist - can help us develop a deeper sense of both the past and the future, cultivating humility and countering the narcissistic focus on the perpetual 'now'.

See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:

https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/marcia-bjornerud

OVERSHOOT | Shrink Toward Abundance

OVERSHOOT tackles today's interlocked social and ecological crises driven by humanity's excessive population and consumption. The podcast explores needed narrative, behavioral, and system shifts for recreating human life in balance with all life on Earth. With expert guests from wide-ranging disciplines, we examine the forces underlying overshoot: from patriarchal pronatalism that is fueling overpopulation, to growth-biased economic systems that lead to consumerism and social injustice, to the dominant worldview of human supremacy that subjugates animals and nature. Our vision of shrinking toward abundance inspires us to seek pathways of transformation that go beyond technological fixes toward a new humanity that honors our interconnectedness with all beings.

Hosted by Nandita Bajaj and Alan Ware. Brought to you by Population Balance.

Subscribe to our newsletter here: https://www.populationbalance.org/subscribe

Support our work with a one-time or monthly donation: https://www.populationbalance.org/donate

Learn more at https://www.populationbalance.org

Copyright 2016-2026 Population Balance