Tangentially Speaking With Dr. Christopher Ryan

Thank you Bejinha, Midwest Timecapsules, John Climenhaga, david price, Ryan Hichens, and many others for tuning into this live video with Anya Kaats! Join us for our next live video in the app. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comWhat are some of the potential unintended positive consequences of this shitstorm we’re all living through in 2026? Is there a way to question the US/Israel relationship without being accused of anti-semitism?

Ryan is an aspiring underachiever. He’s worked for NASA, planned and conducted his own scientific research at the CDC, and served as a foreign affairs analyst/speechwriter in the British Parliament; he’s founded four companies and he’s published peer-reviewed scholarship in fancy-pants journals across two separate academic disciplines. All this misguided, insecure early-life ambition mostly just taught him how disappointing and anticlimactic status-driven accomplishments can be. (His words.) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comWe respond to a listener's question about our own addictive behaviors and addiction in general. How to engage with the inner voices. Why would one be sexual with a close friend? Why do some men prefer to scan the radio stations even if they don’t like the music very much? Upcoming Substack live about DTF St. Louis.

Guustaaf Damave is a Dutch technologist and writer based in Taiwan. He has been writing a weekly newsletter about AI, culture, and the future since 2023. You can read it at guustaaf.substack.com. He is also the author of The Minimum You Need to Do Before AI Changes Your Life: A No-Panic Checklist for Normal People in an Abnormal Moment. Learn more about the situation we all face here. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

Author, historian, professor, podcaster, father, partner, son, funny and smart dude. Daniele is a man of many dimensions. We just bullshit for an hour or so, but I’d like to think it’s Grade A Prime bullshit. After this, we went out for Thai food. Wish you’d been there. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comIs violence ever justified? Is structural violence different from interpersonal? What about violence against property? What about when property is violent against us? Is the US/world approaching a tipping point? Deep issues considered from a shallow bathtub.https://warehousefire.watch/

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comConspiracies and collapse. Felt the lightning. Waiting on the thunder.

The QWERTY keyboard and its resonance with cognitive and behavioral assumptions we all carry within us that are designed around conditions that no longer exist. And other stuff. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comOn this AROMA, we answer a listener’s question about whether non-monogamy is an expression of a desire for escapism, fantasy, and a lack of commitment — a perpetual state of discontent. We talk about the nature of falling in love, projection, and what our longing can teach us if we engage with it intentionally. We also discuss the puer aeturnus archetype in connection to these themes, and how that energy manifests not only in people, but also within subcultures like Burning Man. We end with a discussion of how/whether it’s possible to maintain an anti-consumerist enterprise (like this podcast) in a deeply consumerist world.

Andy grew up in the UK, but a series of events led him to drop his life there fly off to a place where he knew no one (although he was born there). As you’ll hear, that gutsy decision paid off very well. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comIn which we talk about our last days in LA, our impressions of the tenth Bombay Beach Biennale, our arrival back in Crestone, and the importance of choosing your discomforts wisely.

Jesse Bering is an award-winning science writer specializing in evolutionary psychology and human behaviour. He is the author of The Incredible Afterlives of Dr. Stevenson, about the world's leading reincarnation researcher. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

Peter Michael Bauer is an internationally known leader in the cultural rewilding movement. For over 20 years he has written and taught about rewilding. He has served as an expert source in multiple academic articles and books on the subject. He is the founder and director of Rewild Portland, a trend setting community based nonprofit. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

Tao is a magical man, living a magical life. Film director, musician, philosopher, bon-vivant, and all-around lovely human being. I’m thrilled to bring him back into our party again (for the fourth time?). Anya, Tao and I recorded this in our van at his recent 50th birthday celebration. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

I got an email from a guy named Nick, who suggested I might like to meet his buddy, Ryley, who happened to be in Baja. I could sense the love and respect Nick felt for his friend. And then fate placed Ryley just a few miles down the coast from where we were camped out, so it all came together pretty organically. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comProbably our last AROMA from Baja. This one comes to you from a campfire on the beach. We talk about education, the war in Iran, and the ones who walk away from Omelas, among other things.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit chrisryan.substack.comIn this one we talk about our reactions to “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” by Ursula K. LeGuin. Is there any walking away? What are we walking away from? Is there a way to live in this world without the stain of guilt and corruption? What does it mean to be in the world but not of it?

We figure out the framing a minute in. Thank you Nickalas Chisari, Bob Goldsmith, Dustin Fenster, Devin McManus, Raymundo Ortiz, and many others for tuning into our live video! Join us for my next live video in the app. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe

Barbara, Anya’s grandmother, has lived a full life of 91 years and going strong. She’s lived all over the world, raised two sons, studied Jungian psychology, loved and lost and loved some more. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chrisryan.substack.com/subscribe