When the Arab Spring erupted in 2011, the post-modern era of skepticism and pessimism in relation to positive, progressive political change was broken, albeit momentarily. The sight of thousands of people on the streets, demonstrating against corrupt politicians and their own exclusion from the system, filled many across the globe with intense optimism for the battlefield of politics in the 21st century. Not since the fall of the Soviet bloc had observers looked so rosily to the future, and many drew grand comparisons between the strikes that erupted in the Mahalla region of Egypt and the prolonged strikes led by Solidarność (Solidarity) in Poland in the 1980s.

Egypt has long been politically diverse and articulate, from the Nasserite era of Pan-Arabism to the neoliberal cronyism of Mubarak, and so of all the sites of the Arab Spring, it has attracted the grandest hyperbole in relation to real tangible political ‘change’. But who were the people on the streets chanting and demanding change? Was this a united group of unspecified ‘liberals’, brought together by an abstract desire for ‘freedom’? Or was the uprising, in fact, a very divided and diverse set of forces uniting behind a single objective for that purpose alone? The Arab Spring was a dualistic process of a burgeoning young, educated, middle class, demanding a stake in society on the one hand, and the dying embers of working class radicalism in the neo-liberal age of deindustrialization and the creation of an international flexible labour market, on the other. Whilst united for the critical point of overthrow, the post-revolt era has seen the two sides splinter and suffer electoral defeat subsequently.

Many have been quick to sew the Arab Spring into the tapestry of radical politics handed down from 1848 to 1968, with the barricades of Paris at the center. Indeed Egypt’s revolution of 2011 has hit the same ‘18th Brumaire’ problem that the French revolution did in 1848 – namely the disjointedness of radical elements in the cities and the considerably larger conservative rural population. The protests that began the revolutionary process in Cairo were orchestrated primarily by a young, educated middle class, frustrated at their unemployment or under-employment at a time when the IMF was predicting an upturn in the Egyptian economy under Mubarak. Mubarak sought to sever ties between his neoliberal clique and the middle classes, who had been bonded to the State since the time of Nasser, but this severing ultimately led to Mubarak’s overthrow. The middle classes could only be kept excluded for so long.

Much like the French radicals in 1848, the Egyptian radicals suffered a defeat in the first elections post-Mubarak, with the victory of the Muslim Brotherhood. Whilst the Brotherhood was able to paint itself as part of the revolutionary wave, activists in the grassroots of Tahrir Square were under no illusions. What this defeat re-enforces is that middle class revolutions cannot be counted on to implement change – their interests lie too heavily in their own social standing, and it is this inward looking tendency that the Brotherhood has managed to tap into, making ground at election time by being sensitive to the disgruntlements of the new aspirational middle class. The concentration of power under President Morsi does not mean, however, that the revolution in Egypt will be reversed as Morsi entrenches his rule. But it does mean that the struggle for the victory of the Egyptian revolution will be ongoing.

This is what makes the autonomy declaration of Mahalla so significant. The “Independent Republic of Greater Mahalla” was declared on the December 7th 2012 in the aftermath of violent street battles between opponents to Morsi’s rule and his representatives, which followed Morsi’s announcement of a new constitution that was hastily pushed through parliament. 5,000 workers, after finishing their shift at the Misr Spinning and Weaving Company, coalesced in Shon Square. They were quickly met by pro-Morsi forces armed with shotguns and molotov cocktails, leaving more than 700 injured.

Mahalla has been at the centre of Egyptian radicalism for many years. The so-called “Industrial Citadel of the Nile Delta” has seen historic strikes such as in 2006 at the Misr Spinning and Weaving Company, which continued into 2007 and 2008, and saw 20,000 workers strike. The strike action met severe resistance in 2008 when state security services arrested strike leaders and intimidated workers back into work. But it is at this point that the first signs of the Arab Spring can be noted – portraits of Mubarak were torn apart in the streets and anti-regime slogans resonated from the streets of Mahalla.

Mahalla highlights the disjuncture within the revolution, between the radical and more conservative strands, and the ease with which the Brotherhood has inherited the repressive elements of the Mubarak state. As a youth activist has said: “This city resisted and confronted the previous dictatorship. It helped to bring down Mubarak. We are now refusing Morsi’s dictatorship, and we will topple him if necessary”.

Whilst the calls for autonomy and workers’ militancy in the “Republic of Mahalla” are indeed significant, they are in reality, opportunistic. But what they reveal is the split at the heart of the Egyptian revolution, i.e. Between the liberal uprising of the young aspiring middle classes and the dying embers of the militant working classes in Mahalla. These classes are all entwined in the make up of post-Mubarak society, yet they are pulling in very different directions, and it will be this struggle that determines the future of Egypt and its revolution. The figure of Mubarak and the crony-regime that he built still haunts the heirs of the Egyptian state, and crucially, the Egyptian revolution itself.

In an age where Satnav offers a guiding light through places unknown, and Google Street View reduces us all to that tiny orange man, it’s easy to assume that the thrills of individual exploration have been lost to a universalised perspective. The comprehensive, digital nature of modern mapping not only leaves little to the imagination in its uniform presentation, but also serves as an uninspiring reminder that there are few original pleasures left to find. Early cartographers weren’t just mapmakers, but pioneers of discovery who took it upon themselves to understand their surroundings in minute detail. Thanks to the convenience-led digital age, it’s now easier than ever to navigate the city (or indeed any) space, but perhaps with a simplicity that is an injustice to our complex environments.

Japanese photographer Sohei Nishino has sought to reimagine the urban landscape through his work, encouraging us to look at our cities from a new vantage point through his blend of artistry and photography. What began as a university project quickly turned Nishino into a huge international success: currently represented in the UK by the Michael Hoppen Gallery, the photographer’s Diorama series was featured at the Saatchi Gallery’s Out of Focus exhibition last year, and has received notable acclaim worldwide.

More recently, the entire 13 works in the series were shown together for the first time at The Foundation of Vevey photography festival in Switzerland.

His process is as important as the work itself: Nishino wanders through the chosen city on foot, taking hundreds of photographs along the way. He later arranges the prints according to the memory of his journey, forming a vast yet incredibly detailed black and white collage. The desire to capture urban spaces in this way has taken him from his college home of Osaka to iconic cities the world over.

On one level, the work recalls the sheer scale of human endeavour that cartography demands. Nishino’s process is a painstaking one, mimicking the technique of 19^th Century cartographer Ino Tadataka, who mapped Japan by surveying the land on foot over a period of seventeen years. Although Nishino executes each project with precision, he does not strive for accuracy – in fact, his purpose is quite the opposite. His ‘maps’ resemble something more like a ten-thousand piece jigsaw incorrectly put together, simultaneously aerial and oblique in appearance. Despite the high level of detail, there is something almost wild about each composition, with famous monuments positioned incongruously in unexpected places, and whole cities turned into oddly shaped islands surrounded by sea and sky.

Nishino goes beyond merely refreshing the visual satisfaction that old maps provide. His process reveals well-trodden physical surroundings that remain psychologically unexplored. In the Diorama series, every piece prioritises a mental conception of the city rather than the actual lay of the land through a kind of photographic impressionism. Though they are instantly recognisable, each collage is idiosyncratic and slightly irrational, an effect that seems to echo the experience of city living, where myriad worlds collide; a multitude of faces and architectural styles, the moneyed and the poverty-stricken, all mingle together in cramped quarters. We become accustomed to these discordant collisions, passing them by every day as they blend into – and come to inform – our sense of normality. Nishino’s work reminds us that on an infinite number of levels, cities are peculiar, where chaos is the norm.

Nishino’s signature style remains constant throughout the series.  But where online maps present an unbiased version of the world seen through non-discriminatory satellite eyes, Nishino’s layered, surreal visions are founded on idiosyncrasies of the subjective experience. His process is inseparable from memory and personalised discovery, as each photo builds a human connection with the environment influenced by the people he meets, the voices he hears, and what happens to him along the way. We can also partially relate to these places, but they are simultaneously strange because we are viewing one person’s vision, something only the artist himself can fully understand at the time of composition.

Nishino’s work beckons us to rethink the ways in which we interact with our cities: perhaps technology can even facilitate a more creative and less convenience-led understanding of the urban environment, as apps such as Serendiptor seem to try to suggest (although they actually supply the user with even more parameters).  With or without smartphones, it’s the music we’ve heard, the art we’ve seen, the people we’ve encountered that bring shape to our own city map – it is a mental scrapbook which builds the more time we spend there. Places that were once forgotten often become significant when they are revisited, as the cold bricks and mortar hold memories we didn’t even realise we had. These are the things that validate our conception of the city, and it’s quite an overwhelming thought to realise that this varies infinitely from person to person. Nishino’s work shows us that there is room for unique versions of routes well-trodden.

I was fortunate enough to interview Sohei Nishino for The New Wolf’s recent publication, New Cartography.  In it, he describes more about his process, the inspiration behind his work, and muses on how we seek to understand the urban space.

“My work is often born by chance – it relies on events that occur in day to day life that for whatever reason have an effect on me, big or small. In it I am attempting to construct a narrative that gives the viewer a glimpse into my world, but more importantly reminds them of something from theirs. I don’t intend for it to be understood in a coherent rational way but rather to encourage certain levels of empathy in the viewer with the possibility of deeper meaning upon reflection.“

http://www.cutpaste.co.uk/

Sarah’s collages are on show alongside the work of Malcolm Tillis at The Willow Gallery, 56 Willow Street, Oswestry, SY11 1AE, until February 23.

The article was commissioned by The New Wolf for New Cartography – an IdeasTap-sponsored magazine.

Sale! 40% off! Buy one get one free! If shop fronts were vocalised they would sound like the desperate howl of a chancellor of the exchequer struggling to stimulate growth in a labouring economy.  They’ll do anything to get you inside, eyes wide, spending cash. Walk along any popular and busy high street and spectacular must-have items will steal your attention. They are at eye level, they are modelled by beautiful people and spit-polished like apples in an overpriced supermarket. Oxford Street and Regent Street, London’s most popular commercial avenues, with a Tokyo-style six-way pedestrian crossing and neon-lit facades, demand your attention. It’s difficult to look anywhere else but horizontally. But look up and there’s another world. Of architecture, statues, and traces of what once stood beneath.

The article was commissioned by The New Wolf for New Cartography – an IdeasTap-sponsored magazine.

This is also a part of a three-part mini series exploring the lost and forgotten residential areas of cities that when built were bold visions of a future. The series looks at their current state and maps out their future. See our feature on the Ferrier estate in London and our feature on Bijlmer in Amsterdam.

Zones Urbaines Sensibles (ZUS), Sensitive Urban Zones, mark the areas of France that are considered by the authorities to be regions of concern; sensitive because of crime rates, unemployment, state-dependency and religious groupings. These ‘no-go zones’ are not loosely drafted areas, hoops thrown over postal codes and arondissements, their ambits are cautiously drawn; they are demarcations that can foist special economic and enforcement measures on residents on one side of an avenue while sparing those living opposite.

In Paris, the zones delineate some inner city areas, but largely draw boundaries on the banlieues, the suburban extremities that are occupied by the HLMs, habitations à loyer modéré, or social housing; often large multi-storey tower blocks urgently built to house the immigrant communities and rural defectors entering Paris during Les Trente Glorieuses (the thirty years from the end of the second world war, during which France experienced a time of breakneck economic booms).

La Courneuve and Clichy-sous-Bois – positioned on the outskirts of Paris’s périphérique extérieur, the outermost orbital road that snakes through all that is too large or too unsightly to be contained within inner Paris: the industrial estates, freight terminals, national sport stadiums, oversized shopping malls and grand cemeteries – have a soured reputation owing to gang crime, the riots of 2005, a lack of social cohesion and a dearth of law enforcement.

The red lines of the Sensitive Urban Zones drawn on the Ministère de la Ville’s Atlas maps, sketch around and between neighbourhoods like the chalk lines of a homicide. In La Courneuve, other than a few digressions, the zone follows five major roads: Route de la Courneuve, Boulevard Pasteur, Avenue Henri Barbusse, Autoroute du Nord and the périphérique extérieur. This outline gives it the appearance of a Formula One track with long straights and the odd unexpected chicane.

Along the circuit starting from La Courneuve – Aubervilliers RER station the route is surrounded by other no-go zones and private land; industrial estates and office parks, a Mercedes Benz service centre, and Fort de l’est – a former garrison constructed to protect Paris from external invasions. ‘Attention Travaux’, barbed wire and high fences are scattered widely inside and outside the zone.

Disclosures charting the progress of the demolition of the Balzac tower – one of the towers of ‘les 4000’, so nicknamed to reflect the number of units that were built there at the end of the 1950s – are posted onto temporary fences: one warns of the length of the demolition, another details the proposed redevelopments. The changes to the area are in keeping with other recent attempts to destroy the HLM stigma by having less of them.

New plans to rehabilitate problem areas like La Courneuve prefer multiple smaller units, less social housing and more opportunity for private ownership. This is displacement, like the original centrifugal movement of impoverished communities in the fifties, but more incremental and inconspicuous. Do it quietly and no one notices.

Towards the north of the zone and edging closer to Paris’s outer periphery the area becomes visibly more neglected; debris and clutter lean against tree trunks and lampposts, overturned shopping trollies are abandoned miles from supermarkets and old, broken tube television screens stare up at the sky. A car with its windows shattered and its tyres removed remains in its parking space held aloft by paint pots, whilst blackened and discoloured walls behind the spaces tell of a recent history of regular incineration.

A more sanguine message is spread through the estate’s graffiti. One claims that ‘le parc est à nous’, the park is ours. This suggestion isn’t territorial it simply alludes to the neighbourhood’s appeal for more responsibility. Another finely illustrates an open hand with doves being released from it. The drawing uses only English words, all evoking ideas of freedom and salvation – written in another language it calls to outsiders for help. Like Verlan, the inverted slang spoken widely in the banlieues the words  imply a separate identity to the rest of urban Paris, and a community that hasn’t integrated or struck up a discourse with other city dwellers.

Distance

Several kilometres east of La Courneuve, Clichy-sous-Bois lies isolated from the rest of the city, fifteen kilometres away from the centre and 3.2 kilometres from the nearest train station. Approaching the northern end of the vast ZUS that accounts for most of the habitable area of the region, equal in size to the large forest that borders much of the east side of the zone, the avenues are named after recognisable and inspiring names from history, each inappropriate and condescending: Avenue President J.F. Kennedy, Winston Churchill, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile Zola.

And then the descent into the colossal maze of hodge-podge social housing designs. The uniformity of the Les Bosquets towers, after some successful demolitions, has since given the area a chaotic quality; more and more ripostes to earlier design failures are dotted around, turning the mega-ghetto into a collection of further more modest failures. Littered in the streets are, again, broken televisions and burned-out cars, all ignored by the locals due to their ubiquity. Those of the monolith tower blocks that still remain, rise into the distance- all unoccupied, they continue to cast enormous shadows over the area.

These Sensitive Urban Zones are full of inconsistencies. As the red boundary line traces the edge of the tower blocks in Clichy-sous-Bois it meanders through smaller roads into Montfermeil and onto Rue Henri Barbusse where the landscape transforms again into a charming but simple high street with bakeries, restaurants, and an artisan charcuterie. All this is no more than a 5-minute walk from the emaciated form of a Les Bosquets tower that withers waiting idly to be dismantled.

The article was commissioned by The New Wolf for New Cartography – an IdeasTap-sponsored magazine.

The Diorama series has been shown all over the world to a warm reception from critics and audiences alike. Why do you think people are so attracted to your work?

Historically, I think people have looked at and used maps as a way of understanding and gauging the distance between themselves and their destination, or between where they are, as opposed to where everyone else is in the world; they are used functionally.
My work is not something that works like a normal map, but something which is created using my own memory and perspective. When people see my work, I think they also recall their own memories and experiences. I believe it is the viewer’s opportunity to engage with my work that is its attraction.

The series is a kind of homage to cartographer Ino Tadataka, who mapped Japan on foot in the nineteenth century. How important was it for you to use the same method of walking through the cities?

I have always been inspired by Ino Tadataka, and I greatly admire his passion, pioneering spirit and his patience. I would like to create a map of Japan using a similar method to his but fundamentally, what he did and what I do is quite different. He tried to create a precise map using specialist equipment, whilst I create subjective map-like representations of my journeys.

What gave you the impetus to map so many world cities in this way?

The original idea arose from a desire to trace and document my steps when I embarked on “Ohenro”, a journey of self-discovery that involved me visiting a total of 88 temples.
Since then I have continued with my passion of photography and mapmaking, realising quite early on, that I wanted to create these photographic maps for a living. Indeed, I find the experience of visiting so many cities around the world, and discovering myself within these cities very thought-provoking and inspiring.

Do you plan your route around the city before you go out and photograph it, or do you wander without a particular route in mind?

I try not to think about, or research a city before visiting. I want to capture an impression of each city only when I’m there. What I don’t want is to be prejudiced towards it beforehand, to be forced into thinking from someone else’s point of view.
Normally, when I get to a city I begin by walking around it, spending time familiarising myself with its size. The way I walk depends on where I am, it’s as if I’m absorbing the energy of each individual city.

Over how many days do you photograph a city? Do you strike up relationships as you go, or is it quite a solitary experience? 

Normally, I shoot in each city for about a month. I try to communicate with local people as much as possible. I think knowing about the people that live there is important for an understanding of the city itself. This has been the biggest change in my creative processes of late.
When I first started these projects, I did all the research and shooting alone without communicating with anyone. Because most of the early works were shot from an elevated view my pieces focused on architecture. Although I still don’t think negatively of this method, as I continued I soon realised that the city, as a whole, is like a person and that I needed to be communicating and interacting with people to understand it.

Approximately how many images do you take, and how many do you use to create the maps?

As I started to communicate more with people, the amount of photos increased. But it always depends on the city. For my latest project in Bern I used about 6,500 pieces to create the whole work; almost 5-6 times bigger than my first map of Osaka. I use almost all of the photos I take. I do this so that the map reflects the entirety of my memories made in that particular place.

What kind of thought processes do you go through when you arrange the photos? Do you experience the city twice, the first time physically and the second time through memory?

When I arrange each photo on the board I try to recall the memories I made there. I don’t usually think too much as I do it; it’s quite quick and rather impulsive. Since I experience the entire process – the shoot, the processing of the film, developing the photos in the dark room, cutting the pieces, arranging the photos by hand – it’s not particularly difficult for me to bring back my memories of that place. So I agree, I experience the city twice: once physically, and again when I am part of the artistic process.

Many have commented on the sense of disorientation that your work throws up – that your maps are somehow recognisable, yet convoluted and confusing. Do you think this effect is similar to people’s experience of the city as a space, where they are both at home and disoriented on a daily basis, physically and psychologically?

Yes, I think so. I arrange the pieces symbolically according to the emotions I experienced in each place, which makes the shape of the map quite convoluted. I’m not particularly conscious of this when I’m shooting, but after processing and printing the film, I can see what I was really fascinated by at the time.
When we get lost in a city, we hastily try to find our way again, and it is these situations that stick in our minds. It’s almost quite a surreal sensation when compared to our normal levels of perception. The act of arranging the fragmented pieces of my memory is the culmination of both a mental and physical process, so when people look at my work they also re-experience what it feels like to get lost or feel disorientated.

Is there something in cartography which allows you to bring order to chaotic cites?

I think contemporary cartography has become rather mundane. I normally refer to the old maps when I’m working. The ancient maps were very decorative and abstract, like the Hereford map or ancient Japanese Tengiku map.
I think those maps had a strong relationship to people’s religion and way of life, as well as their ideologies; but they’ve gradually been excluded by modern civilisation. I’m not objecting to this, but I am trying to present a new mode of spatial awareness through my work, discovering, in the process, something about the nature of humanity and the countenance of each city.
In this I follow the lead of artists such as Hieronymus Bosch.

You’ve photographed cities all over the world, as well as in Japan. Did you find the Japanese cities you already knew more difficult to re-imagine?

Not really. Of course, the more familiar the city is, the easier it is to navigate. But I think if we open ourselves up to an encounter with a city, there are always new discoveries to be made, whether it’s a familiar place or not. When local people help me with a shoot, they often say that they’ve discovered elements of the city they didn’t realise were there before.
I’m considering making a map of Tokyo again next year, as it will be ten years since I made my first. I would like to see how my recognition of the city, in relation to its physical reality, has changed over the last decade.

How did your experience of London compare to that of the other cities you photographed?

I must say, it was very tough. I had quite a few problems along the way, including a cold like I’ve never experienced before! But against the odds I was able to really devote myself to London, both physically and mentally, and more so than most other cities.

The article was commissioned by The New Wolf for New Cartography – an IdeasTap-sponsored magazine. 

A map of Paris is overlaid onto a map of London. Corresponding in scale, the maps are centred on each city’s most recognisable symbol, the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben. From this conceptual and physical location, a tourist route through Paris is followed through the streets of London, and at points where famous landmarks or monuments are indicated on the map, the corresponding surroundings in London are documented.

The idea was that by walking this route it would be possible to explore the dynamic between the distinctive and the uniform, ascertaining connections and disjunctions that may exist in scale, layout, architecture and experience. Taking cartography out of its specific context not only provides a new way of exploring the space we inhabit but also begins to highlight how a particular city’s apparently unique qualities might be replicated with striking similarity in another. Questions are thus raised and afforded some illumination: how influential are the unspoken conventions of city planning, and at what point does a specific city become unspecified cityscape?

The article was commissioned by The New Wolf for New Cartography – an IdeasTap-sponsored magazine. 

Sociologist W.I. Thomas (1863-1947)

December 21st 2012. The date looms, the new era beckons. For a vast number of people spread around the globe this is a significant date signalling the beginning of the end. End of the world narratives are not uncommon in our collective imagination – indeed, the apocalypse has been speculated over for millennia. From Judgement day to astronomical predictions of destruction people have been fascinated by humanity’s annihilation. Human history has witnessed numerous periods of mass hysteria caused by a collective belief that everything as we know it will end. During the early period of the Spanish Conquest as the result of popular astrological predictions in Europe people feared that a second Great Flood would wipe away their civilisation in 1524. In living memory we remember the hype surrounding the ‘millennium bug’ when our computers would cease to work and we would be plunged into a new dark age.

In modern times however, the phenomenon is uniquely prevalent and potent because it can reach an unprecedented amount of people. There is little doubt that “2012”’s reach and impact would not have been so widespread if we didn’t have the web which has enabled this belief to span the globe. Thousands of websites are dedicated to ‘revealing the mystery’, with suggestions of what will occur and ‘what to do next’. It’s hard to gauge the public reaction to all this material but a poll by Ipsos of 16,000 adults in 21 countries found that an average of 8 per cent had experienced fear or anxiety over the possibility of the world ending in December 2012, with a response as high as 20 per cent in China.

Everyday NASA’s website receives hundreds of enquiries about 2012 asking them to dispel the anxiety, to persuade them that all will be well. Some queries are decidedly dark as concerned parents and animal lovers wonder if they should save their children or pets from a potentially catastrophic and violent death by doing it themselves in a peaceful and stealthy way! So far there have been a few suicides directly related to the prophecy.

Being able to access such a wealth of information has had a profound effect on our outlook. The Internet is the closest version of a common consciousness as exists. It has the power not only to generate but also to harness the collective imagination. On the other hand it has the power to misinform and rattle cages and misinterpreted information can rile people to extreme thought and behaviour.

The user-led element of the Internet is the reason why so much ‘propaganda’ about 2012 exists; it is a bastion of free speech doesn’t determine what should be listened to. The wealth of information is staggering: type ’2012 prophecy’ and Google search returns almost 100 million results – and this by no means an unusual figure for a two-word search term. People can create whatever information they want, free from censors and beamed around a global network.

The open source nature of the internet and its ability to provide access to information, instantly, no matter the locale, has undoubtedly inflamed a 2012 hype culture. And on that hype – on the back of those fears of impending doom – a vast industry has been built. Property developers have practically sold out of converted bunkers and missile silos. ‘Preppers’, a term used to describe people who have taken preparation for Armageddon seriously, have single-handedly caused a surge in the sale of long-life products, often canned food with a shelf life of thirty years. Some of them have become so adept they even sell their advice to others. Even Hollywood capitalised on the global hype, of course, with the disaster film ’2012′.

In an information society enough people can connect to ideas in spite of the preoccupations of national media, social groups and cultural boundaries. And so 2012 prophecies extend from being the preserve of the fanatical to reach and influence the mainstream.

It’s hard to know how many people will act directly on the basis of their 2012 beliefs. This prophecy, however, is being played out against the background of the continuing conditions of economic instability, political fallacy and environmental deterioration. These have accrued to create a sense of anxiety which can all-too-readily attach itself to other concerns.

Anthony Aveni an American anthropologist states the “2012 narrative is a product of a ‘disconnected’ society unable to find spiritual answers to life’s big questions within ourselves, we turn outward to imagined entities that lie far off in space or time that just might possess superior knowledge”. Being ‘disconnected’ in the most ‘connected’ era of human life is an anomaly I’d like to further explore but it doesn’t explain why end of the world narratives become so popular in common thought. It seems unlikely we will ever quench our thirst for the sensational, morbid and probably misguided excitement stimulated by these kinds of prospected events.