S2E51: Kim Stanley Robinson chats The Ministry for the Future, blockchain, & macroeconomics

12 years ago, Nori cofounder and CEO Paul Gambill was a College Republican. And while he wasn’t a climate denier, he didn’t think that humanity’s 1% contribution to global CO2 emissions was a big deal. And then he read Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars Trilogy and began to understand the outsized impact of our actions. Not only did the science fiction novels change Paul’s perspective on climate change, they inspired him to dedicate his life’s work to making it better.

American novelist Kim Stanley Robinson is one of the foremost living writers of science fiction. Many of his books explore how climate change will impact us in the coming decades, including the new release (and self-described mic drop moment) The Ministry for the Future. On this episode of Reversing Climate Change, Stan joins Ross and Paul to discuss how science fiction can help us make better decisions and share his perspective on the politics of the genre.

Stan explains why central banks play such a prominent role in his most recent work, introducing us to the financial system he imagines in his future history novels and sharing his ‘creeping reformist’ approach to building an economy around carbon removal. Listen in for Stan’s insight on why cryptocurrency is featured in his new book and learn how carbon sequestration might work within the framework of modern monetary theory.

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Resources

There are so many things referenced in this show. When Anchor ups its character limit for show descriptions we will go back and add them all. Here's a curated list:

Stan’s Website

The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson

J.G. Ballard

Frederic Jameson

Georgy Plekhanov

Raymond Williams

Ernst Bloch

Louis Althusser

Ursula K. Le Guin

Iain Banks’ Culture Series

Ghosts of My Life: Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost Futures by Mark Fisher

The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction by John Clute and Peter Nicholls

Delton Chen’s Carbon Coin Plan

Socialist Calculation Debate