About Me

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“For decades,  William Ophuls has been among the world's most original thinkers about  the implications of our global ecological crisis for freedom, democracy,  and political order. In Plato’s Revenge, he goes to the essence of this  crisis: the deep, tacit, and widespread beliefs that nature and society  are nothing more than machines, that the state should play no role in  cultivating citizens’ virtue, and that self-interested individuals  should rely solely on reason to guide their lives. Ophuls weaves  together the ideas of some of history’s greatest thinkers to argue that  humankind's future lies in small, simple republics that cultivate their  citizens’ virtue through natural law. In doing so, he shreds  conventional wisdom and invigorates our conversation about the kind of  world we intend our grandchildren to inherit.”

—Thomas Homer-Dixon,  University of Waterloo, author of The Upside of Down: Catastrophe,  Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilizati

"For decades Patrick Ophuls has been a beacon of

clarity with his brilliant assessment of the human

prospect. Now in six brief essays, he brings

together much of his wisdom in one accessible

summary.

It offers a grim diagnosis.

The patient, human civilization, is desperately ill—

but, addled by denial, greed, and pride, persists in

rejecting the remaining slim possibilities of

treatment. Very few people, and certainly not the

leaders of the world’s remaining democracies, truly

grasp the dimensions of the challenge our societies

face, and even fewer are truly prepared for the

harsh future of scarcity, insecurity, and violence

that awaits our communities and families. Ophuls'

analysis is unsparing but almost certainly right,

and the slight hope that something meaningful

might be rescued from the human experiment

likely rests on us paying attention."

Thomas Homer-Dixon, PhD

Director, Cascade Institute, Royal Roads

University

Author, The Upside of Down and Commanding

Hope