David Deutsch’s The Beginning of Infinity brims with ideas that turn conventional wisdom on its head. One especially eye-opening chapter in this book, titled “Unsustainable,” challenges the familiar notion that human progress inevitably stumbles over finite resources. Deutsch suggests that what truly brings about societal collapse isn’t the depletion of a particular resource, but rather a failure to keep creating new knowledge. It’s a perspective that, paradoxically, leads to optimism—even about environmental issues such as climate change—because creativity and innovation can render the “limits of nature” far less limiting than we might think.

Continue reading “David Deutsch on (un)sustainability & climate optimism” →