Why do people who care about climate change still jet off on planes (including, occasionally, me?) This is an excerpt of me attempting to answer that surprisingly complicated question on Joel Walker's Look Near First podcast - where Joel asked me all about the psychology and culture of flying. How come despite knowing about climate change, and the damage aviation causes, those who fly keep on doing so - even if they're ostensibly really concerned about the planet? And if facts don't do ...

For most of the last two decades, the right of UK politics were all for climate action. Heck, in 2019 a Conservative Prime Minister signed us up to net zero emissions by 2050! But a few short years later both of the two major parties on the right are now very much against 'net "stupid" zero', and everything they think that means. What's going on? What are they trying to do? And - will it work? I'm joined by Becca Massey-Chase, Head of Citizen Engagement at the Institute for ...

If you've ever caught yourself writing off a group of people with a simple and dismissive description of why they do what they do - or been thusly written off yourself - then you'll be familiar with 'thin description'. It's a bad way to learn what makes someone tick and probably annoys them as well. So instead, here's the idea of 'thick description': properly spending time with people to understand their complex inner lives and what they really think about things, including climate chan...

I am good. I protest. I save people. I must save the world - now. If this even slightly feels like something you've told yourself, then this episode is for you. Author and campaigner Anthea Lawson's brilliant new book is called How Not To Save The World. It's about the 'script' that activists - including her - tell ourselves, often without realising it. From this script, which can come from deep cultural and psychological places, comes many things that aren't much help - like burn...

When's the last time you were bored? Thanks to our phones, it's easier than ever to be distracted, stimulated, and fed attention calories of varying quality so you never have to worry about being bored again. But what do we miss when we live life without giving ourselves time not to do anything at all? In this Micro episode, I revisit my chat from 2024 with broadcaster Simon Mundie, remembering what Simon told me about how much about the natural world - good and bad - we can notice and ...

In this episode I go for a walk in the woods with a former airline pilot who packed it in because of his climate anxiety. Joel Walker flew for years but could never quite ignore the state of the planet - like the forest fires and melting glaciers he could see from his cockpit. Eventually, in 2025, the cognitive dissonance got too much and Joel left flying forever. As we natter through the trees not far from Luton Airport, Joel tells me what it feels like to walk away from a prestigious...

Would you rather have a fiver today or a tenner this time next year? That kind of calculation is called 'discounting', and the more you'd rather have the fiver today, the more you are discounting the future. Humans are hardwired to lean towards getting things now, unless the deal is sufficiently sweet. That preference makes sense when you evolved to not know where your next antelope was coming from. But our bias towards discounting the future is one of the reasons we haven't done ...

Climate change is REALLY SCARY, right, but that doesn't mean you have to wibble helplessly in the corner. While the go-to currency of most climate awareness campaigns is 'hope' – does fear get a bad press? It turns out fear is a great motivator of climate action too, as long as we learn how to use its power for good, not the dark side. After all, if you think climate change isn't a bit alarming, you're not paying attention. Joining me on this episode is Professor Sarah Jaquette Ray...

A few years ago I learned the Dutch word 'goedprater': the excuses we give to justify something to others, which we can barely justify to ourselves. I do it all the time and I bet you do too, whether it's not going for that run you planned (ow, leg suddenly hurt) or caring about climate change but taking loads of flights (well, they were just going to go anyway, right?) In this micro episode, I learn all about goedprater as part of understanding the BYSTANDER EFFECT. I revisit a snippet...

Hope! What is it good for? (Absolutely every'thin). We ain't doing much about the climate crisis without it. Movements are founded on it, and most campaigns are about wanting us to feel it. Which is exhilarating for those who feel it most urgently - but what about everyone else? The good news is it turns out there are lots of different ways to have climate hope, even ones that might not look like it. Raising kids in the age of climate breakdown; doing a strange little climate podc...