Writing

Essays on rights, free thought, political freedom, and the long view of what we are doing here.

Unalienable is not inalienable

Two words that look like typographical variants of each other. One of them describes a right your government cannot touch. The other describes a right you can be talked out of.

Earth rising above the surface of the Moon, photographed from Apollo 8

What free thought asks of you

Freethinking is not the same as disagreeing with things. It is a standard for how an opinion is allowed to get into your head in the first place.

Earth photographed from space, half in daylight and half in darkness

Political freedom is more than being left alone

Freedom is usually defined by what is absent. That definition is comfortable, incomplete, and quietly convenient for anyone who benefits from the arrangement.

A large crowd filling the street outside the Bank of England, with a rainbow overhead

A message that outlives us

We bolted a description of ourselves to a spacecraft and sent it out of the solar system. It is worth asking why we can think in centuries for that, and not for this.

The gold-anodised Pioneer plaque mounted on the spacecraft antenna support struts

Together we are more

If you wish to help, or you need help, write and say which. Both kinds of message are answered.

Get Involved

SPEAK UP

DO SOMETHING

BE CONCERNED