The Ministry for the Future 38-50: Metabolisms of Capital, the Family Form, and Pooping Angels

In a shrewd bit of counter-programming, we're releasing this episode on the day of what we're told is the most important election of our lifetimes...since the last one, and until the next one. This chunk of chapters seems occupied with a breakdown in the metabolic functioning of the lifeworld, and it asks us to shit or get off the pot. The primary science fictional technology KSR seems to be deploying in this novel is one of political economy. We touch on carbon quantitative easing, but we're more concerned with issues of circulation and metabolism. Now that capitalism seems to have reached its terminal phase, entering an apocalyptic moment, as Mike Davis has recently argued, how ought we be managing the residuum, the surplus, the effluvia of goods, and of people?  Here we're interested in the surplus, excess, remainders, containment, entrapment, enclosure, capture, and incomparability. What happens when the taps run dry? (Society.) Would it help to hijack Davos? (Unclear, but it would be hilarious.) Do rich people love their kids? (Sort of? Maybe?) Is the family form a mechanism of individuation that keeps us from collective thinking? (Duh.) Can we imagine a nonsentimental human being outside of the calculations of economic rationality, and make it real? (We'd better.) Q: What do you call it when Benjamin's angel of history goes to the bathroom? A: Making progress. Email us at [email protected] Follow us on Twitter @podcastonmars Leave us a voicemail on the Anchor.fm app Rate and review us on iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts! Music by Spirit of Space