Here’s a video of an inspirational project run by Andy George, where he makes his own sandwich. From scratch. It cost him $1,500 and took six months, as he went right back to basics for every element of the meal. He grew his own wheat, ground to flour and baked the bread, extracted salt from seawater, milked a cow for cheese and butter, and killed a chicken. This is a brilliant example of peering into the fundamentals of everyday life actually works and links very nicely into The Knowledge. Have a watch of the incredible video here, and be sure to explore George’s other How to Make Everything videos on his YouTube channel.

(Also see my post on Sarah Bearchell’s wonderful project in working with school children to make their breakfast from scratch)

Want to read more about the behind-the-scenes fundamentals of how our modern world works, and how you could reboot civilisation if you ever needed to...? Check out The Knowledge - available now in paperback, Kindle and audiobook.

The latest issue of the beautifully-produced Ernest Journal is now out. And it includes an article by me on how to make glass from scratch. As I explain in The Knowledge, glass has been utterly crucial for the building of our modern lives. We use this wonder material not just for windows and wine glasses, but also for all the tools for understanding how the world works: grinding lenses for the microscope and telescope, making test tubes for chemistry, and the thermometer and barometer for studying temperature and pressure. The three main ingredients for glass can in principle all be collected off the same beach — sand for silica, seaweed for soda, and chalk, coral or seashells for lime — the ultimate Robinson Crusoe experiment!

You can subscribe to Ernest here

Want to read more about the behind-the-scenes fundamentals of how our modern world works, and how you could reboot civilisation if you ever needed to...? Check out The Knowledge - available now in paperback, Kindle and audiobook.

One of the possible hazards that could collapse civilisation is an asteroid impacting the Earth. This June I was involved in the launch of Asteroid Day, an international effort to raise awareness and begin a measured discussion on the potential threat posed by asteroids. The event at the Science Museum in London was organised by Grigorij Richters and also included Lord Martin Rees, Brian May, Stuart Clarke, Sir Crispin Tickell, Prof Richard Crowther, Prof Alan Fitzsimmons, and Debbie Lewis. In this guest blog post below, we have Debbie Lewis discussing how it is possible to survive a Near-Earth Object (NEO) impact event. Debbie is a Fellow of the Emergency Planning Society and a Director for Resilience Preparedness.

Continue reading →

Want to read more about the behind-the-scenes fundamentals of how our modern world works, and how you could reboot civilisation if you ever needed to...? Check out The Knowledge - available now in paperback, Kindle and audiobook.

Every morning, after I’ve stumbled out of bed and through the shower, I make some breakfast to fuel myself through the morning. I often simply have toast with butter. I explain in The Knowledge the fundamental reasons why humanity eats bread and why butter is so useful.

But how many of us actually make breakfast from scratch? I mean really from scratch – growing your own wheat and making butter out of milk fresh from a cow?

Well,  Dr Sarah Bearchell (Facebook page: Sarah’s Adventures in Science) has run a project doing exactly this with school children. Working with a group of pupils from a primary school in Oxford she showed them how to cultivate their own wheat, harvest, thresh and winnow the grain, and then mill into flour for baking a loaf of bread, as well as using their own simple butter churn.  This is a wonderful education project on the basics of how things we take for granted are actually done. Read here about the project in Sarah’s own words:

Continue reading →

Want to read more about the behind-the-scenes fundamentals of how our modern world works, and how you could reboot civilisation if you ever needed to...? Check out The Knowledge - available now in paperback, Kindle and audiobook.

My talk about The Knowledge is The Guardian newspaper’s top pick for events this week! I’m talking today at the Buxton Literary Festival – do come along if you’re nearby! The rather stern-looking picture was the photograph I created from scratch

Want to read more about the behind-the-scenes fundamentals of how our modern world works, and how you could reboot civilisation if you ever needed to...? Check out The Knowledge - available now in paperback, Kindle and audiobook.