Let's look back at some memorable moments and interesting insights from last year.

Your top 3 posts:

• "Happy Cakeday, r/collapsademic! Today you're 5" by u/AutoModerator
• "Loss of Viking-era herring may be a warning to today’s fishers | Science" by u/briancady413
• "How to react to a new change in cosmology? An Interview with Carlos de Castro and Daniel W. McShea" by u/briancady413

Let's look back at some memorable moments and interesting insights from last year.

Your top 3 posts:

• "Footprints to Singularity: A global population model explains late 20th century slow-down and predicts peak within ten years" by u/briancady413
• "Mineral demand for electrified mobility. The dark side of this type of mobility? - GEEDS" by u/briancady413
• "Soil Security, Elsevier Journal" by u/gergytat

/r/CollapseScience/ is run by /u/blueskiesandclover who could use more contributors. Thank you for your consideration.

I found this sub today, along with /r/MakeTotalDestr0i. That sub claims to be a "scientific realist alternative to /r/collapse." I can't post this there, so I am asking it here.

I have been a collapsologist for over 30 years, and I am a scientific realist. I mean that in the strict philosophical way- I am a philosophy graduate who specialised in philosophy of science and related topics.

I am interested in what people here mean by "scientific realism". Does it mean the philosophical position, properly understood? Or does it just mean "taking the results of science at face value" (which is the most defensible position of scientific anti-realists like Bas Van Frassen.) Or does it mean taking a Dawkins-like position with an unexamined metaphysical commitment of physicalism and hostile attitude to all forms of spirituality?

Why does any of this matter?

Firstly I think part of the reason western civilisation is heading for collapse is that we've got the ontology wrong. We're too materialistic. The relevance of this, from a scientific point of view, has been laid out by Thomas Nagel.

I think that if we combine scientific realism and Nagel's arguments about the future of science, we will end up with a much firmer philosophical foundation upon which to build an ideology for a sustainable society. What I am trying to find out is how hard it is going to be to convince people of this. I am researching for writing a book about it.