The Thought Forge

March 8, 2026

Eco-Animism, Spirit, and Magic

Hello again folks,

I want to jump right in to it today as this might be a bit of a long one, and I recently posted a full update post. I’ll admit straight out of the gate, this one is a bit of stream of consciousness. I’ve been working on fleshing out my spiritual philosophies more, and this is kind of the result. As I was writing it started to meander and loop in other topics, but the more I tried to “stay on topic”, the more context was lost. As such, I just let the tangents fly, so let’s get into it.

First, let’s get a few definitions out of the way. This post comes from my own personal philosophical and spiritual concepts and assumptions, and this is a place where religions and spiritualities across the world diverge and go into their respective camps. Just to get that all out of the way I consider my path to be; naturalistic (I don’t default to supernatural explanations), immanent (material and spiritual are the same), agnostic/polytheistic by proxy (open to the idea of god(s), but not my primary focus) as well as being a eco-spirituality, and nature religion. I’ve discussed a lot of things in the past on this blog. Maybe I am retreading some ground, but that’s something that can’t be avoided here.

I know that is a mouthful, which is generally why I just describe my path as animism. But sometimes you have break things out for people just so others know where you are coming from. My path is my own, though is strongly flavored by Finnish and Germanic/Norse ideas as well. I would even say there is some influence from native Great Lakes peoples (Anishinaabeg) in there, but please note I don’t consider my path indigenous or even European in any way. Inspired yes, but more deeply rooted where I am now.

As a naturalist, I am deeply driven by science and scientific explanations of the world. As such to me the changing climate and the ecological crises we are in is a fact, human driven and is worsening. There is no debate there for me, and those that are in the “denial” camp are wrong as far as I’m concerned. The data is in, and in good faith I am happy to point you to the sources. I’ve talked about it at length on this blog, and this post isn’t where I am going to revisit all of that.

Along the lines of imminence and being naturalistic, that means to me the ecological crisis we face are both a material and spiritual crisis. It is a crisis of nature for sure, but also a “mind, body, spiritual” crisis because the three are deeply intertwined and interconnected. We cannot deny the impact of ecosystem breakdown on our bodies (smog, smoke, pollution), minds (mental health and illness, depression, climate anxiety, existing on a sick planet), and of course our spirits. These challenges affect us as a deep personal level, as well as motivate to connect with something greater than ourselves (nature and the planet, in my case), and can motivate us to the betterment of all.

Let’s dig into this some more, by exploring the conception of the spirit in Finnish Paganism;

“The Finnic pagan belief about the soul dictated that the human soul is composed of three different parts: henki, luonto and itse. Each of the three were autonomous beings on their own…

Henki (translated as “life”, “breath” or “spirit”, sometimes also referred to as löyly) was a person’s life force, which presented itself as breathing, the beating of one’s heart and the warmth of their body. Henki was received prior to birth and it left at the moment of death. The word hengetön (lit. “one without henki”) can be used as a synonym for dead in the Finnish language even now. Henki share several similarities with the Norse idea of Andi (Ond) which carry almost identical basic meaning.”

Henki is first the literal spirit. When you google “Spirit in Finnish”, henki is what comes up. “Life, breath, spirit,” is the definition of the Latin “anima”, and thus animism in a nut shell. You could also look at the etymology of spirit;

“mid-13c., “life, the animating or vital principle in man and animals,” from Anglo-French spirit, Old French espirit “spirit, soul” (12c., Modern French esprit) and directly from Latin spiritus “a breathing (of respiration, also of the wind), breath;” also “breath of a god,” hence “inspiration; breath of life,” hence life itself.”

In addition, henki also covers the physical body (and thus the interrelation of the material and the physical), the biological and metabolic workings of our physical self. Sometimes referred to as the “little life mouse/bird” or “life engine” it is the physical manifestations that we are alive; breath, the beating heart and body heat. Without any of these things we are dead. Extending this out to the natural world, it is the physical and living bio-sphere of the planet Earth. And while we know of thousand of exoplanets, so far Earth is the only one we know of with life. It is our home, a living, breathing planet, and that alone is enough for it to be sacred and protected. Yet, the encroaching climate crisis is evidence that our relationship with the Earth, and life, is quite different from one I would consider sacred.

Löyly, as mentioned about, can also refer to the breath, but more deeply and specifically, it is the “The hot steam that forms when water is thrown on the hot stones of the stove. Also more generally the atmosphere or experience of the sauna.” Go outside on a cold day and breath out, and watch it condense. That is somewhat similar to sauna steam, and even hot baths. I hope the connection is obvious at this point. Sauna is strongly connected to Finnish culture and is a physical, mental, and spiritual practice. There are spirits associated with the sauna, rituals, as well as magic.

To expand this even wider, and bring in the basics of Earth Systems Science we can relate the story of the death of Ymir to the planet – the geosphere is the bones, the hydrosphere (and cryosphere) the blood, the biosphere the life (and spirit), and the atmosphere the breath.

Earth System’s Science, a representation

From the Poetic Edda;

“Out of Ymir’s flesh was fashioned the earth,
And the mountains were made of his bones;
The sky from the frost cold giant’s skull,
And the ocean out of his blood.”

“Luonto (translated as “nature”) was a guardian spirit or protector. Luonto has also been referred to as the haltija of a person. A strong willed, artistic or otherwise talented person was believed to have a strong haltija who granted them good luck and skills to complete their tasks well. A weak luonto could be strengthened by various spells and rituals. Luonto could leave a person’s body without the person dying, but its lengthened absence would cause problems, such as alcoholism and other addictions… Luonto share several similarities with the overlapping ideas of Hamingja (luck), Fylgja (follower, companion guardian spirit), Vörðr (warden, a protection spirit) and individual norn (a person’s fate goddess) in Norse belief.”

Luonto is what I interpret to be the spirit (haltjia) of the person. From Wikipedia;

“There are many different kinds of haltijas. One is the forest maiden, metsänneitsyt, inspired by the Swedish Skogsrå…
The haltija of a homestead is called maanhaltija (“land haltija”) or tonttu, which is the Finnish version of Swedish tomte. The words tonttu and Swedish tomt come from tontti (“building lot” and “building site”). In Swedish, such local spirits are also later referred to as a tomtegubbe (“old man of the homestead”). The kotihaltija (“home haltija”) or kotitonttu lives in every home. It takes care of the house and it is important to treat it with respect. The saunatonttu lives in the sauna and protects it but also makes sure that people do not behave improperly in it… When building a house to a new location, one had to bring offerings of water, bread, money and charcoal to the land haltija”

I might as well admit it, the Big Thing TM in my life right now is that my wife and I are building a new home. That is probably the reason a lot of this is on my mind. That said, luonto also overlaps a great deal with Itse, which we will talk about in a moment. Luonto in a lot of ways can be interpreted as the gifts you bring to the world, your unique talents, skills and abilities. Gift from your own hand, and gives from the land. Also perhaps gifts from your ancestors, your guardians, and an otherwise pretty wide net of other spirits. Writing is part of my personal luonto, my nature, my gift. I have a strong spirit in that regard, at least I like to think so. It has overlaps with both physical and mental health as well. I could use writer’s block here as an example of a “weak” luonto, and there are rituals I have to help with that. (Journaling, free writing and so forth.)

On a wider look, this one is a little harder to interpret. It’s a little less precise than clearly physical issues, but has a lot of overlap as well. In my understanding (often subject to change) it is whether a given part of the planet can live up to its “nature”, or in other words can the gifts of nature be realized? Can the river flow, or is something blocked or polluted? Can the trees grow tall (and thus filter air and water to make food), or is something “off” with the soil? In this ecological sense luonto has a lot in common with ideas of equilibrium, health and balance. I think of the kodamas from Princess Mononoke, as a “sign the forest is healthy.” Let’s move on, shall we?

“Itse was a spirit received at the time of birth or a few days after. It was believed to define one’s personality and receiving itse made one a person. Like luonto, itse could leave one’s body without the person dying but long absence would cause illnesses and misery. Depressions, for instance, was seen as a result of having lost one’s itse. If a person was diagnosed to be itsetön or luonnoton (without one’s itse or without one’s luonto), a shaman or a sage could try locating the missing part of the soul and bring it back. Although itse and luonto were usually lost after a traumatising event, it was possible to purposefully separate one’s itse from their body. This was required if a missing part of the soul needed to be found. Itse could also leave the body to appear as an etiäinen (a sort of false arrival apparition). At the time of a person’s death their itse joined the other deceased of the family or, in some cases, stayed among the living as a ghost. Itse share many similarities with the Norse concept of Hugr (mind, thought, willpower, courage), and to some extent also Vörðr (especially the false arrival apparition).”

This one is “mind” in the mind, body, spirit breakdown. I think it is best embodied by the idea of one’s personality, the interconnection of one’s mind, experiences, and memories. It is self in the broad view, and is something that is dynamic and changes, develops, and reshapes over time. As trauma is specifically mentioned above, it can also be broken and damaged through life experience as well. That is why I think mind/personality are the best fit here, and this overlaps strongly with ideas of mental health, neurodivergence, and mental illness. It also encompasses ideas like imagination, thinking about others, revisiting memories, mental projections as well as memory-of-place after we die.

The Earth as a planet shaped by life is a complex system, and like many complex systems it has a memory. A deep memory. That is why we can find fossils of the long extinct, geological strata, as well as archaeological layering. These are the literal layers of the memory of the Earth. In addition, the Earth is the only living planet we know of and as such is processing a butt-ton of information at any one time between all the interconnected components. The capacity of that system makes up the itse of the Earth, and the uncomfortable fact that we as a species can create trauma on a planetary scale.

While we can’t crack planets open just yet (and probably shouldn’t), we can do plenty of damage to water, air and life systems that make it up. Deforestation, deep drilling and mining, ocean pollution. Ecological circles talk a lot about Ocean currents, and what might happen if they stop circulating, maybe something analogous to a mini-stroke on a planetary scale?

Hugr

I think a lot can be added to itse by touching on the hugr briefly. I hope the reader can see the overlaps pretty easily. Now, I’ve written on this concept in the past already, so I think only a brief quote will suffice;

“ In Scandinavian folk tradition the human soul is usually referred to as hug(r)…. it refers to the mental life of the individual – to personality, thoughts, feelings and desires. There are various and complex conceptions of the hugr imbuing the greater part of Scandinavian tradition…. It was believed that the hug could affect both animate and inanimate objects – including other people – either consciously or unconsciously. The deliberate manipulation of the hugr is the basis of all magic. The hug can manifest itself invisibly or can take on a shape (hamr). In some instances the shape assumed by the hug has developed into an independent supranormal being, as exemplified by the many traditions about the nightmare (mare).

Other important projects of the hugr include the vordr, which is a kind of presence accompanying the individual; the dream-soul, which leaves the body during sleep; the vardöger or fyreferd, a visual or auditory experience presaging a person’s approach; and the free-soul, which is the soul sent from the body in magic flight.” (Kvideland, pg 45.)

I’ll be honest, magic as a concept is not a word you will hear me mention a lot. The reason of course is the one stated above; that I’m more on the naturalistic side, and so I don’t like nor default to supernatural explanations. A quick look at the vast majority of the definitions of magic often invoke the supernatural, with the exception of the sleight-of-hand versions of magic.

“1a: the use of means (such as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural forces

b: magic rites or incantations

2a: an extraordinary power or influence seemingly from a supernatural source

b: something that seems to cast a spell : enchantment

3: the art of producing illusions by sleight of hand”

Yet, hugr in the above stated context gives us something a little different, and a definition that works in a very different kind of way. While there are still allusions to the supernatural/supranormal aspects, I think the key take away is that our thoughts and feelings, as well as our personality, can effect the world around us. The discussion on itse adds in other aspects such as the hugr being our “mind, thought, willpower, courage.” This leaves us with the fact that the “deliberate manipulation of the hugr” being deeply akin to being mindful of our own thoughts and desires, and how even our very presence and personality can affect others and our environment. I’d have to do a much deeper dive to cover more of this; but suffice to say it cuts across contemplative and meditative practices, as well as shamanism, trance work and alter-states of consciousness, and mental health, trauma, and illness.

It also has some resemblance to Crowley’s “The Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will”, but I also think the concept of the hugr is also much deeper and less superficial. I’ll also admit my bias in this regard, that while it is important to note the Crowley connection, I don’t really care for him or his work.

I hope the relationship between hugr and itse are obvious at this point, so I won’t spend more ink harping on it. The point to take away here is that when we combine these various ideas, not only do we have a model for individual spiritual work, but also an outline for planetary healing as well. I know I’ve meandered (and probably muddled a bit) my way through it, that is what makes this work an ECO-animism. Spiritual work doesn’t just include us, it includes the whole of the planet. I’m an animist and a pagan, and for me nature is the source of the sacred. We are part of nature, and deeply connected to it; our actions and choices reverberate from ourselves and into nature.

After all, Earth is the only planet we know that can be described as a living planet, and in an animistic sense, a person in their own right. A person that also doubles as our home and host, and the means of the survival of all life, including ourselves.

As always,

Thanks for reading!

Sources/References;

Kvideland, Reimund & Sehmsdor, Henning. Editors. Scandinavian Folk Belief and Legend. Pgs 41 – 64
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ymir
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltic_Finnic_paganism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haltija

Leave a comment | tags: Ancestors, Animism, ecology, Finland, Nature, Nordic, Norse, Pagan, Scandinavia, Spirits, spirituality, writer, Writing | posted in Ancestors, Animism/Shamanism, Anthropology/Archaeology, Environment/Ecology, Folklore, Heathenism/Paganism, Philosophy, Scandinavia, Science, Writing

February 14, 2026

February Updates

By Nicholas Haney

Hello again folks,

I just wanted to check in quickly and let you all know where things stand. I have finished the writing for my current manuscript, coming in at just under 55,000 words! Another one done! Oh, that is a good feeling. As there is already a lot coming up in the new year, I’m going to focus on smaller posts here until next winter. That way I can just work my way through everything, and maybe even have a little bit of room to breath. Scary, right?

All I can say is it’s going to a be a big year for me and my family. Most of that is personal stuff, but I may talk a little about it here. In addition, I have all kinds of drafts in the works; more posts on ecology, animism, ancestry, archaeology, paganism and more metal work are all in progress. No real timeline on any of that yet, but I am hoping to have something in the next few weeks.

Check out what’s going on with the recent manuscript and more below!

Below is the post from my Patreon

New year, new words, new progress. Or… something like that. Life is still pretty crazy, and again, I’m a bit behind compared to where I want to be. Not sure what happened to January, and this month made the point of kicking me while I was down. Flu is like that, so lost over a week there.

Probably the most important news: THE WRITING ON THIS PROJECT IS DONE!!!!!

The entire project is just shy of 55,000 words, and my words, does that free up some time. Of course, this is also just the first draft. Next up reviews, feedback, and the second draft rewrite. But, that can wait a bit, and I can think about something else for a while. The extra mental space will be a welcome break, especially as the snows start to melt.

Two new paid chapters are up (7 & 8), and I’m working away at 9 & 10 hopefully to post this month. That gets me back on track. An updated timeline is below;

~~January~~ February

~~Publish chapters 7 (July) and 8 (August) for paid members.~~
Publish chapters 9 (September) and 10 (October) for paid members.
Decided not to start another big project… You can watch my blog for (shorter) posts! (Fireiceandsteel.wordpress.com)

March and forward

Publish chapters 11, 12, and ending
New cover art for the Liminal Worlds novel?! (Subject to financials)

Please, considering supporting this project!

Thanks for reading,

Leave a comment | posted in Uncategorized

December 30, 2025

Space Engineers – Ship Design Mk II – Part 1

By Nicholas Haney

For fun, my shipworks in Space Engineers.

Hello again folks, also happy holidays and new year!

My post on Ship Design for Space Engineers continues to be very popular. Thank you for that! While that has been racking up views (and hopefully inspiring new ships!), I have been working away at creating an updated version of that post. There have been a couple of reasons for that. First, I have more up-to-date gaming PC, and that has allowed me to update my previous designs. I have made updates to class size, block count, and mass as a result. Second, A recent play through of Stellaris has inspired me to expand on my previous ideas.

As stated in my previous version of this topic, all my ships designs are inspired by Stellaris. The basic take away is that each class is twice the size of the one before it. Corvettes & Frigates are size “1” designs, and Destroyers are size 2, Cruisers size 4, and so on… The big addition to the previous post is that I have also started building new ships based on how Stellaris assigns weapons to different ship classes. This has given me the option to not only design new ships, but also “fill out” some gaps in my previous designs.

Expanded notes on Weapons in Space Engineers can be found in a previous post.

My ships are also built around the “iron triangle” of ship design. In short, the Iron Triangle is the trade-offs of any ship between Armor, Mobility, and Firepower. You can have a heavily armored ship, but this often comes at the expense of Mobility and Firepower. A really fast and high mobility ship will often sacrifice armor and firepower as a result. So on and so forth…

A quick note on weapons and designs in Stellars vs Space Engineers. These are NOT one to one comparisons, and Stellaris only informs the types of weapons and designs of my ships, not necessarily the exact details. Inspired by (not based on, nor exact duplicates) is the best way to frame it. I also hope that becomes more clear as I get into the details. Therefore, let’s get into it!

Corvettes – Size 1
SE: 500-750 blocks; dry mass ~ 750,000 Kg; PCU approx 3,000
Stellaris: “Interceptor” 3 Small weapons slots

The Corvette is the embodiment of a high mobility ship. Lightly armed and armored, they select for speed and agility above all else. Gatling turrets fit nicely as S slot weapons, akin to the Stellaris Autocannon. I design these ships to be cheap to produce and maintain which makes them ideal short range patrol and screening ships. In groups they are a real threat to be reckoned with, as they specialize in swarming and short range “knife fights”. Due to their short range, they are almost always based out of stations or larger ships in fleet groups.

Frigates – Size 1 (Maybe size 1.5?)
SE: Approx 500-750 (up to 1000?) blocks; dry mass ~750,000; PCU approx 3,000
Stellaris: “Torpedo Boat” 1x Small weapons slot, one Torpedo slot

There is not a lot a difference between the Corvette and the Frigate in Stellaris, aside from the position of the wings and combat role. The biggest difference is that the Frigate is a dedicated “Torpedo Boat”, swapping out small weapons for a guided torpedo bay. As such, for Space Engineers I used the same design as the Corvette, and then add the torpedoes – the basic version being an AI guided large grid kinetic weapon.

These weapons are slung under the main hull and compliment the gatling turrets, making the Frigate deadly to larger classes of ships. Frigates are slightly larger than Corvettes (mostly due to torpedoes), but operate much the same. Highly mobile and agile, they specialize in hit-and-run against larger capital ships and stations. Several in a swarm can release numerous torpedoes into the battle zone, and disappear just as quickly.

As another option, two rocket turrets can be mounted in place of torpedoes for a kind of “rocket bomber” load-out. Though it should be noted rocket ammunition is among the most expensive in the game, upping the cost to operate frigates.

Destroyers – Size 2
(Approx 1500 blocks; dry mass 1.5 million Kg; PCU approx 6,000)

Destroyer are the archetype gunships of Space Engineers and Stellaris. Their purpose is to bring more firepower to the fight without sacrificing too much in terms of mobility. Their armor isn’t the heaviest, but not the lightest either. The size and nature of these ships gives a lot of options for weaponry.

Destroyer are short to medium range vessels, usually built around defense from both larger and smaller ship classes. Agile enough to fight corvettes and frigates, and with enough punch to give larger ships something to think about.

Gunship Destroyer
Stellaris: Gunship Bow, Gunship Stern (2 medium, 2 small weapon slots)

For Space Engineers, see above for my version of this hull. These bring a good balance of small, fast firing weapons, and mid-range weapons for sustained heavier damage. My load-out on this type of destroyer would primarily feature a good balance of gatling and assault turrets, with perhaps some forward rocket launchers for that extra kick.

Artillery Destroyer
Stellaris: Artillery Bow, Gunship Stern (1 large, 1 medium weapon slots)

When compared to the smaller Gunship Destroyer, the Artillery Destroyer sacrifices small weapons for being able to punch above its weight. In Space Engineers I would drop most of the gatling turrets and replace them with either forward facing artillery or railguns. Assault turrets and/or rocket mounts could round out this build.

Cruisers – Size 4
(Light – approx 2500-3000 blocks; dry mass ~3 million Kg; PCU approx 12,000)
(Heavy – approx 3000-3500 blocks; dry mass ~4 million Kg; PCU approx 15,000)

Cruisers are my favorite class to design in Space Engineers. They are generally well balanced between mobility, armor and firepower, and as such have a huge range of mission roles. These are medium-long range ships, and are the first class that I install with jump drives for long hauls. Cruisers are useful for both individual patrols as well as leading larger battle groups into deep space. Their large hulls also give a lot of options for load outs.

Light Cruisers
Stellaris: Broadside Bow, Torpedo Core, Broadside Stern (3 Medium, 2 Small, 2 Torpedo weapon slots)

Light cruisers select for lighter armor, decent firepower, and higher mobility than their heavier brethren. I find a good load-out for this variant of cruiser to be several assault turrets, secondary gatling turrets, and a compliment of torpedo and/or rocket mounts. The small caliber/high fire rate guns are good for screening against smaller ships and fighters, whereas the mid range weapons and torpedoes still pose a significant threat to larger hulls. These light cruiser hulls make good solo patrol craft, or part of larger battle groups.

Heavy Cruisers
Stellaris: Artillery Bow, Artillery Core, Broadside Stern (2 Large, 2 Medium weapon slots)
Alt: Broadside Bow, Artillery Core, Broadside Stern (1 Large, 4 Medium weapon slots)

AB – AC – BS Heavy Cruiser (Aesthetically, not my favorite)

The heavy cruiser drops the torpedoes and small gatling turrets for large caliber forward mounted artillery and/or railguns and midship artillery turrets. The variant above could have assault turrets on the bow and artillery turrets midship. Forward facing weapons could be clustered for large amounts of damage towards slower, well armored, and stationary targets. It also gives up some speed for extra armor and protection. These can be somewhat vulnerable to smaller, faster craft, so they are usually found within battle groups as opposed to alone. For this reason I tend to build more light cruisers, as they are more “well rounded”, and leave the heavy pummeling and artillery work to the battleships.

Advances in Modular Engineering

Just as a small tangent. Taking my inspiration from Stellaris means each ship class consists of a number of sections that can be interchanged for different designs. That’s how I got the different types of destroyers and cruisers above, by using different Stellaris sections. This was a fun experiment in Space Engineers, as I designed sections and slapped them together in order to make complete hulls. I look forward to more mixing and matching in the future.

In the next part of this post I will talk about the largest ship designs; battleships, battlecruisers, and Titans oh my! I just need more time to finishing fleshing out those hulls, The bigger they are… The more time the take. Oy!

As always,

Thanks for reading!

Notes/References:

Lunar Kolony Ship classification
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu9wpgx79u4

Stellaris Wiki
https://stellaris.paradoxwikis.com/Stellaris_Wiki

Space Engineers Wiki
https://spaceengineers.wiki.gg/wiki/

Leave a comment | tags: Corvettes, Cruisers, Destroyers, For Fun, Frigates, Gamer, gaming, Sci-Fi, ship design, Ships, Space Engineers, Stellaris | posted in Science, Uncategorized, Writing

December 21, 2025

Universal Healthcare for Michigan

By Nicholas Haney

Hello again folks,

There is not much in the form of updates today. My Michiganii non-fiction project is still in motion, and coming to an end in the next couple of months. At least for the first draft, and the culmination of a mutli-year process. Oooof! The Big Life Thing continues to move forward and that is exciting!

There are a lot of blog drafts in the works, so there is plenty more to come here. At least, as I can find time to get it all done. I’m looking forward to pivoting back to fiction writing and blogging in the new year. Non-fiction is a very different sort of challenge, and I’m ready to put it down for a bit. At least the long-form version… So you can look forward to more animism, just for funsies, and even a new “Walking With the Ancestors” post!

For today, I want to talk about something more serious and on the political side. There has been a lot of talk lately about healthcare and the costs of such at the US Federal Level. The long and short of it is that many Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) subsides are coming to an end in 2025, unless Congress happens to act to change that. So far, there doesn’t seem much hope for that. When these subsidies end, healthcare premiums for ACA backed plans are likely to sky-rocket, or otherwise switched for lower premium/high deductible plans. The long and short is that people will pay more for healthcare, in a system that is already the most expensive in the world.

Chart comparing 2008 health care spending (left) vs. life expectancy (right) in OECD countries

Brief Overview

The long and short of it is that US healthcare system. is a bit of a hodgepodge of various layers that have been added and modified over the years. Instead of large systemic reforms, we often get small, incremental tweaks that change things around the edges. At the core, it is a heavily privatized insurance system that has high costs that leaves out large segments of the population. Wikipedia sums it up nicely;

“Healthcare in the United States is largely provided by private sector healthcare facilities, and paid for by a combination of public programs, county indigent health care programs, private insurance, and out-of-pocket payments. The U.S. is the only developed country without a system of universal healthcare, and, as of 2023, 7.9% of the population does not have health insurance. ” Wikipedia

The last part is among the most important, as the US is the only wealthy, industrial country in the world without any form of universal healthcare. You will encounter various excuses across the board, from”Socialism!” (usually followed by various forms of screeching) to “The US is bigger/has more people than any European Country”, but yet somehow most of Europe as a whole has some form of universal healthcare, even largely without central guidance from the European Union. While it true the US is a larger land mass, the fact is that the EU has about 450 million people compared to the US’ 350 million. The US has a higher GDP than the EU, at about 30 Trillion vs 21 Trillion (nominal). Yet somehow, most of the EU, again, can afford healthcare, and the US “can’t”… Won’t is more likely, with our politicians taking bribes… I mean lobbying and “free speech” donations from large private insurers to maintain the status quo. Maybe if we spent a bit less on being a military empire and little less padding the profits of corporate goons…

Either way, the closest the US gets to any form of universal healthcare is tied up in Federal programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and the VA. While those like Bernie Sanders suggest Medicare for All by simply dropping the age requirement of the program, I find it unlikely that we will get any real movement on any form of universal healthcare from the federal level. As such, we will largely set aside Federal programs as part of this discussion.

Critiques of the US healthcare system

There a a host of reasons to be critical, and I would strongly recommend you listen to this episode from Dan Carlin; Unhealthy Numbers. While it is a bit of an older podcast at this point, it does a superb job of exploring everything I am about to list. And I do mean list, because it would take far too many words to cover all these critiques in any detail.

The United States spends more on healthcare than any other country, both in absolute terms and as a percentage of GDP; however, this expenditure does not necessarily translate into better overall health outcomes compared to other developed nations. (1)
Private spending on health care is highest in the U.S. (High individual payments like co-pays and deductibles) (2)
Despite spending more on health care, Americans have fewer hospital and physician visits. (2)
The U.S. invests the smallest share of its economy on social services. (2)
Despite its high spending on health care, the U.S. has poor population health. (2)
The U.S. performs well on cancer care but has high rates of mortality from heart disease and amputations as a result of diabetes. (2)
“A 2019 issue brief by the Commonwealth Fund concluded that “people in the United States experience the worst health outcomes overall of any high-income nation” and that “Americans are more likely to die younger, and from avoidable causes, than residents of peer countries.” (1)
“A 2014 study by the private US foundation Commonwealth Fund found that although the US healthcare system is the most expensive in the world, it ranks last on most dimensions of performance when compared with Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the UK. The study found that the US failed to achieve better outcomes than other countries, and is last or near last in terms of access, efficiency, and equity.” (1)
And even though we tried to overhaul the system via the ACA, politicians including Obama and Biden “Ultimately, a single-payer healthcare (a form of universal healthcare), sometimes called “socialized medicine”, was not adopted in the final ACA.” (1) So instead, we got government subsidies for private insurers, which did bring down premiums, but was more of the same “socialize the risk, privatize the profits” style of US public-private partnerships, AKA the worst of both worlds…

(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_the_United_States
(2) https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2015/oct/us-health-care-global-perspective

The Nordic Model, a Model for Michigan

“According to a 2020 study published in The Lancet, a single-payer universal healthcare system could save 68,000 lives and $450 billion in national healthcare expenditure annually, while another 2022 study published in the PNAS, estimated that a universal healthcare system could have saved more than 338,000 lives during the COVID-19 pandemic in the US from its start until March 2022.” – Wikipedia

Absent any foreseeable movement on universal healthcare from the federal level of the United States, could we see any actions for the individual states? Barring interference from the Federal government (which is a whole other post), recall what I said above; that the individual nations of the EU have their own versions of universal healthcare large without central regulations from the Union. As such, all we have to do is find a comparable model, or two, that could serve as a template for my home state of Michigan.

Those models are Sweden and Finland. Here is a brief table on the comparisons to Michigan, and why I think Sweden is a great full size model, and Finland is a half size model. The information below is sourced from Wikipedia for each entry.

	Population	GSP/GDP (PPP)	Land Area	Largest City	Government	Climate
Michigan	10,140,459	$725.89 billion	96,716 sq mi (250,493 km²)	Detroit – pop 639,111	Constitutional Republic/Semi-direct democracy* – bicameral	Temperate/Continental
Sweden	10,588,230	$799.68 billion	450,295 km² (173,860 sq mi)	Stockholm – pop 996,264	Constitutional monarchy, parliamentary republic – unicameral	Temperate
Finland	5,635,971	$373.16 billion	338,455 km² (130,678 sq mi)	Helsinki – pop 689,758	Parliamentary Republic – unicameral	Boreal

*Not only does Michigan vote to elect representatives (representative democracy) we can also directly initiate new legislation and constitutional changes via petition and voting, thus semi-direct democracy.

Aside from the difference in government type, Stockholm being a very large city, and the Nordic countries being much larger in land area; Michigan is very comparable to both of them. As we are talking about human healthcare, land area and climate really isn’t relevant here except as a comparison. GDP and population size are the more important factors when it comes to the ability and capacity to provide healthcare to a population. Let’s have a look at things in a little more depth.

Swedish Healthcare

Sweden has a primarily public system of universal healthcare that covers all Swedish citizens. It is decentralized and financed through a mix of national, regional and local tax systems. Counties and municipalities make up the bulk of this tax revenue. There is also a small private sector for health insurance, which Wikipedia has this to say;

“…at the end of 2017, 643,000 individuals in Sweden were fully covered by private health insurance, which is 6.5% of the population of Sweden.” Wikipedia

As “long wait times” are common (mostly conservative) criticisms of universal healthcare systems; Sweden ranks well here too. Better than the six months I had to wait for a PCP visit, that’s for sure!

“Urgent cases are always prioritized and emergency cases are treated immediately. The national guarantee of care, Vårdgaranti, lays down standards for waiting times for scheduled care, aiming to keep waiting time below 7 days for a visit to a primary care physician, and no more than 90 days for a visit to a specialist.” – Wikipedia

Finnish Healthcare

Finnish health is very similar in many ways to Sweden’s. It is also highly decentralized, with three levels of funding and administration and a very small private sector (3-4% of the population). The three levels of funding are the state, 21 regional hospital districts (Finnish: sairaanhoitopiiri, Swedish: sjukvårdsdistrikt; literally “healthcare district”), and local municipal units just like Sweden. This allows Finland to maintain a system of universal primary care, as well as specialist secondary care and more advanced care at university research hospitals.

Finland also requires employers to provide occupational healthcare services to their employees, another layer of the Finnish system. Below is a breakdown of all revenue streams into the various layers of Finland’s healthcare system.

Sources of financing of Finnish healthcare

Universal Healthcare for Michigan

It is hard to even begin to describe the patchwork of public, private, and largely – employer based healthcare that makes up the US, and Michigan’s, healthcare system. While researching for this post, I did come across some older data that may be able to put some things in perspective without too many words;

“In general, employers have been the dominant source of health insurance for individuals since the late 1940s and 1950s. This can be at least partially attributed to the income tax exemption granted to employers for payments made toward health insurance for employees. The second major sources of health insurance are the state and federal governments, which jointly provide Medicaid for low-income individuals while the federal government sponsors Medicare for the elderly and disabled.” – Ballotpedia
The table below is also from the same source as the above, which gives a broad overview of funding sources for Michigan and neighboring states;

Health insurance coverage by source, 2013
State	Employer	Other private	Medicaid	Medicare	Other public	Uninsured
Michigan	53%	5%	16%	15%	1%	11%
Illinois	50%	8%	17%	12%	1%	11%
Indiana	52%	6%	14%	14%	1%	12%
Wisconsin	55%	5%	13%	17%	N/A	9%
United States	48%	6%	16%	15%	2%	13%
Source: The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, “State Health Facts”

With that limited overview in mind, the last and main question of this post; What would a universal healthcare system in Michigan actually look like? How would it be financed, and how would it work?

Putting aside Medicare and Medicaid, any kind of universal healthcare at the state level would include a massive change to state and local taxes. I’d start with a progressive income tax at the state level, instead of our current flat-tax system. In addition, I would overhaul our system of local property taxes, ideally skewing those costs away from homeowners, and towards counties and regional units. When we add in the fact that workers already pay taxes for Medicaid & Medicare, and premiums for insurance along with employers I’d think we’d be sitting on a substantial pool of money for statewide healthcare.

Such a restructuring could control costs through government regulations of this new system, shift healthcare costs away from employers (maybe higher wages instead?), and overall bring down the cost for individuals as it does in almost every country with universal healthcare. After all, the whole point of insurance is to lower costs by spreading the risk across a wide pool of members. By going from a patchwork of private insurers, to one large state and local administration, that cost can be reduced even further for all citizens of Michigan.

You often hear “taxes are too high!” in countries with universal healthcare, but it is difficult to make direct comparisons to US states. The simple reason is because we pay so much more, but from a variety of sources. Yes, by the numbers it can be said Sweden and Finland pay more in taxes than us Michigan folk, but by the time you add up our premiums, out of pocket expenses, overpriced pharmaceuticals, deductibles, lost pay from illness… I would argue we likely pay more through more complex means than taxes alone. Look at the chart at the beginning of this post again. We pay more for lower standard healthcare than almost every country with some form of universal care.

Most European nations are in fact mixed healthcare systems, meaning that private healthcare and insurers still exist to some degree. Any universal system for Michigan would likely be the same kind of mix. First, because for-profit entities across the board will fight to the death to protect their bottom lines through ad campaigns, donating to “friendlier” candidates, lobbying and so forth… Second, because even in countries with robust universal healthcare systems, there is still often a place for “supplemental” and/or “platinum/Cadillac” that may help to fill in public health gaps or provide additional coverage for people that want/can afford that kind of thing.

This would shift the public insurance finance system to look more like the table for Finland above, a largely public funded model with elements of employer and private about a 75% – 25% mix. We could do the state/regional/local decentralized system like Sweden and Finland. Michigan is a home-rule state after all. In addition, by shifting to a public system price-caps and profit-driven pricing could be reduced – meaning cheaper prices on prescriptions as well as all healthcare services.

Healthcare is a human right, and the data from countless other developed countries has shown that universal healthcare is cheaper, and often of better quality than the patchwork US system. Without any federal changes in the foreseeable future, maybe it is time for the states to take the lead. It would take a lot more to turn this idea into policy, but I think universal healthcare for Michigan is the right course. Lower costs, better health, and a longer-healthier life for the people. Good health and well-being is a public good and benefits everyone and society. We can do better, and who knows, maybe a state by state approach based “The Michigan Model” might just catch on…

A man can dream…

As always,

Thanks for reading,

Sources/References

https://www.dancarlin.com/product/common-sense-314-unhealthy-numbers/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/14/aca-obamacare-expires

(2) https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2015/oct/us-health-care-global-perspective

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affordable_Care_Act

(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_the_United_States

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_health_insurance_option

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_health_care

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10810293/

https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/article/us-health-care-non-system-1908-2008/2008-05

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Finland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Sweden

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_system#International_comparisons

https://ballotpedia.org/Healthcare_policy_in_Michigan

Leave a comment | tags: ACA, Finland, Health, health-insurance, healthcare, insurance, Medicare for All, Michigan, Nordic Model, Obamacare, Politics, Sweden, Universal Healthcare, US Health System | posted in Culture, Great Lakes Region/Midwest, History, Michigan, Scandinavia, Science, Writing

November 27, 2025

November Updates

By Nicholas Haney

Hello again folks,

Life is insanely busy right now, and I’ve fallen a bit behind. October went by like a flash, and now we are staring down the end of year holidays. As the saying goes, sometimes life gets in the way. Big Life Thing TM continues to make progress. Lots of other projects continue to move along.

As far as this blog is concerned, there are a few drafts in the works. An update on ship designs for Space Engineers (for fun), some animism, and some politics. They will appear as I am able, as the big projects are eating up most of my time right now. You can see some details on that below!

Happy holidays, folks!

The below post is from my Patreon. I’m not the kind of person that likes to advertise myself all the time, but if you want to support me and keep up with more of of my work…

“I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.” – Douglas Adams

In an effort to keep myself on track through the next few months, here is the very tentative and subject to change schedule for the coming months;

November

Publish chapters 3 (March) and 4 (April) for paid members.
Finish writing chapter 10 (October) <—- Behind
Cover art for this is project in process!

December

Publish chapters 5 (May) and 6 (June) for paid members.
Finish writing chapter 11 (November) <—- Still Behind. Hopefully the time off around the holidays allows me to catch up a bit.

January

Publish chapters 7 (July) and 8 (August) for paid members.
Finish writing chapter 12 (December) <—- Maybe finish Michiganii? MAYBE
Start a fiction project (next book in Liminal Worlds, this is my break from Michiganii)

February

Publish chapters 9 (September) and 10 (October) for paid members.

March through Whenever

Publish chapters 11, 12 and such
New cover art for the Liminal Worlds novel?!

Things get kind a vague after that, and increasing busy. Anyways, that’s the update for now. Consider supporting this project!

Thanks for reading,

Leave a comment | tags: Animism, Busy, Fiction, help, Non-Fiction, Patreon, Still Alive, Updates, writer, Writing | posted in Writing

October 25, 2025

Space Engineers – Weapons

By Nicholas Haney

Hello again folks,

This is just another “for fun” post while I work on other projects. One of the many, many things I love about Space Engineers is that it strives for a realistic image of the future. In game it is about the year 2077, so late 21st century. As such, many of the technologies have real world analogies, things that in fact exist today. As we are talking about weapons today, that realism also applies.

When talking about weapons there are several different factors we need to have in mind. Consider these factors the “methods behind the madness” for this post. First, we have to keep in mind that Space Engineers is a creative sandbox game, so there is no limits on what you guns you can put on ships. Corvette with artillery, done. Battleships built with all Gatling turrets, sure why not. You can build whatever, however you want. They are really no limits. That said, when we look at the history of ship construction in the real world through World War II and into modern times, there have been certain limitations that just make sense. For example, smaller guns go on frigates, and bigger ones go on battleships, and so on.

Which is a way to say, when building ships in game, there are certain weapon arrangements that make more sense than others. This is more a personal opinion, and “you do you” applies here. Still, for purposes of this post, I’m going to organize my thoughts along those lines. First, for each weapon I discuss, I’ll talk about modern analogs. Second, I will discuss how I think each “fits” on various sizes of ships. Not necessarily in that order…

Lunar Kolony, on Youtube, also has a great videos on ship classification.

For the “fit” of each weapon type, I am using the game Stellaris to organize my thoughts. Recently I created a lithoid (rock people) play through called the Allgunna, which used All Guns (see what I did?) on their ships. In other words, all kinetic and explosive weapons. I found the play through inspiring as useful crossover and point of comparison. So back to the shipyards of Space Engineers I went, and started laying down new ships. More on that in a future post!

Stellaris has small, medium and large weapon slots. What this means for this post is that ship weapons will be classed as Small, Medium, or Large, with some nuance for each. In addition, Space Engineers allows for custom turrets. Those will be outside the scope of this particular post because they bring in too many variables. Maybe in the future, we will see.

When talking about modern analogs, Space Engineers is a hard science game, so many of the weapons are informed by things that exist today. But I also admit a lot of this will be guesswork, as I am not a military weapons expert by any means. I still think it will be a fun exercise all the same. Today, I’m only covering large grid weapons and blocks. As I play Space Engineers I mostly use small grids for fighters, rovers and utility vehicles. As such, when compared with Stellaris, small grids often occupy positions like strike craft, construction vessels, or many of the “unseen” craft that are just assumed to exist outside of proper navies in Stellaris. (Civilian merchants, transports and so forth.) Let’s get into it!

Gatling Turrets

Type I and Type II (DLC)

The Gatling Turret mounts a rotary autocannon, and fires a lot of projectiles in a short amount of time. They are family cheap to build, and very cheap in terms of ammunition, which requires only iron, nickel and magnesium to produce. This is a short range weapon (800 meters) that is great against fighters and engineers alike. In Stellaris terms, I would consider this weapon an Small slot weapon, making them perfect for corvettes and frigates as primary systems, and as secondary weapons on larger classes

For the ammo, the Wiki states: “This item used to be called “25x184mm NATO ammo container”. The munition’s real-life counterpart is used in some naval weaponry.” Which gives us a great point of reference on this weapon.

Wikipedia gives us a whole set of comparable weapon systems in 25mm, most notably the 25×137 MM GAU-12 Equalizer made by General Dynamics.

Or watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Oz66PDE8w8

Rocket Turrets and Launchers

Let’s start with the rocket turrets. From handheld rocket launchers to any of these systems, all use the same ammunition. The rocket is a area-effect unguided projectile. The kicker with rockets is that they are the most expensive ammunition type in the game, requiring both platinum and uranium. With that in mind, they are devastating weapons against anything that is relatively lightly armored, as well as critical ships systems when they get through the armor. These are also short range, with rockets exploding after 800 meters. In Stellaris terms I would classify rocket turrets as a Medium slot weapon, mostly due to the high cost of the ammo. This makes them perfect for destroyers and larger ships as turret platforms.

However, the rocket launcher, as opposed to the turret is a bit of a different case. It is scalable, as you can put anywhere from one to YES in forward firing positions. As such I would argue the launcher could be S,M,L or even an X slot weapon depending on how many you use in one array. Obviously, the number scales the expense of construction, maintenance, and ammo. As such, one or two launchers would be perfect on a frigate, with more on larger ships, especially artillery ships. A dozen or so mounted forward on a battleship makes pretty good case for a spine mounted (X slot) weapon system.

Per the Space Engineers wiki: “This ammunition originally used to be called “200mm missile container”, was then shortened to “Missile”, and was finally renamed “Rocket” in Version 1.202.” This is a smart move, because broadly rockets are unguided as in this case. Missiles are a bit different, and we will discuss those a bit later.

The most comparable weapons system I found based on the above is the BMD-20, an old Soviet Era multi-rocket launch system that used 200mm rockets.

Assault Turrets

I’ll be honest right off the bat, assault turrets are among my favorite weapons in Space Engineers. While not as large of caliber as Artillery, the faster movement speed and fire rate makes these superb mid-range weapons with a max range of about 1400 meters. The ammo is also relatively cheap, making keeping these guns feed a breeze. That makes these perfect mounts on destroyers and light cruisers as primary weapons, and as secondary weapons on heavy cruisers and battleships. That makes these Medium slot weapons in Stellaris terms, and incredibly versatile in Space Engineers.

For real world analogs, I had to employ a fair bit of guesswork, and also play some Ultimate Admirals: Dreadnoughts. I just needed a little more inspiration, so sue me. That game classifies guns by their bore diameter as small (below 9 inch) and large (above 9 inch). As such, I settled on this as a small gun, and went with a median size of about a 5-inch gun*. Which gives me the 5″/54 Caliber Mark 45 as a modern comparison, mounted on US navy destroyers like the USS Forrest Sherman shown below.

*Though the 6-inch/47 gun matches the SE shell mass at 60 kg.

**USS *Forrest Sherman* (DDG-98)** is an *Arleigh Burke*-class (Flight IIA) Aegis guided missile destroyer. Firing the 5″ Mark 45.

Now we get into the big guns…

Artillery Turrets and Cannons

This is a long range, heavy caliber gun in both a forward facing cannon and a turret form. It has the second longest range in the game at 2,000 meters, and more than enough punch to knock down the heaviest armor on capital ships. The shells for these require uranium and can be expensive to produce.

It is not as good against smaller, faster ships as it has a long reload time and the turret has slow tracking.I would rate the turret as a Large slot weapon, equivalent in many ways to Stellaris’ Kinetic Artillery.

The cannon, like the rocket launcher, can be grouped as forward-facing weapon arrays. As such, I think the cannon when grouped can range from a Large weapon for primary use on Artillery Destroyers, Heavy Cruisers and Battleships/Battlecruisers, or to an X slot spine mounted weapon array on Battleships and larger.

In real world term, I would put this about a 10-inch naval gun* that saw use in the early 20th century. For example like on the USS Washington pictured below.

*Though the ammo weight is closest to about an 8″ naval gun.

Railguns

The Railgun in Space Engineers has the longest range of any weapon, and consists of a high-speed single shot sabot round that can blow through several layers of armor. It does an absurd amount of damage with any one round. However, both the weapon and the ammunition are expensive, and firing the weapons requires large amounts of electrical power as well. Given the bulk, damage, range and expense of the rail gun I consider it a Large slot weapon.

Also, like the artillery cannon, this one can be built in mass arrays like this from Zer0’s Legion. I can hear the PC’s weeping as they melt down… As such, another L to X slot spinal mount for the larger Battleships. Yes, you can put one on a corvette too ala The Expanse, but I tend to reserve these expensive guns for larger ships.

Railguns are being experimented with by several navies, with varying (and debatable) results. In the real world, they are expensive, power hungry, and hard to maintain, among many other issues and are up against many other competing weapons systems like guided missiles and even lasers.

(U.S. Navy photo by John F. Williams/RELEASED)

ATLA 40mm railgun, Japanese Navy

Missiles/Torpedoes
I don’t think this post would be complete without a brief mention of missiles and torpedoes. In Space Engineers, and especially since we got the AI movement/combat blocks, there is nearly infinite variety on these. Last Stand Gamers has a tutorial here if you want to see what I am talking about. You can download so many different builds from the workshop alone, as well as build your own. That is the nature of Player Built Weapons (PBWs).

For purposes of this post, I again turn to Stellaris. In that games Torpedos are slow moving, heavily armor high damage weapons fired from frigates and cruisers. Missiles, are smaller and faster, but generally do less damage. They also come in single shot, and swarm varieties. These are only Small slot weapons, but that means they can be mounted on most ships.

Have some modern missiles;

As this post got a lot longer than expected, there is going to be a follow-up where I talk more about ships and weapons. So you have that to look forward to.

As always,

Thanks for reading!

Sources/References:

https://spaceengineers.wiki.gg/wiki/

1 Comment | tags: Blog, Blogging, Fiction, For Fun, games, gaming, Guns, Ships, Space Engineers, Stelarris, video-games, Weapons, writer, Writing | posted in Science, Writing

October 5, 2025

Anatomy of Bad Policy

By Nicholas Haney

Hello again folks,

I am going to jump right into it. Today I want to discuss what I think makes for bad policy for Michigan. Here in Michigan, we are a semi-direct democracy; in addition to electing representatives we have the ability to directly propose legislation by petition.

Recently, one of these petitions proposes to Ax MI Tax; in other words this ballot petition proposes to eliminate Michigan property tax. This is a terrible proposal for several reasons. Before we get into that, let’s look a little deeper. According to MLive ;

“1. The proposal would eliminate $20.32 billion in revenue with limited replacement funding“

“The Ax MI Tax would cut about $20.32 billion in annual property tax revenue that funds schools, libraries, parks, garbage collection, emergency services, transit, roads, senior programs, community colleges and other government services.”

Our property taxes go to these vital services and infrastructure. Every year I get a property tax bill, and these items are itemized. In addition, these taxes almost all go to local treasuries. This is a massive hole in the operational budgets of all local communities. Strike one. But it gets worse… Public schools would be hit the hardest;

“Michigan’s public education system would be hit the hardest by the tax elimination, losing about $11.64 billion in annual funding. This represents about 57.3% of all property taxes collected in the state in 2024 and includes both the state education tax and all local school taxes for operations, construction, repairs and debt payments.”

Yes, the proposal would shift some funds from the state level to make up some of this loss, but nowhere near enough, and with significant restrictions on how that money is used. Schools and libraries would close, and public infrastructure would be significantly hampered. This not only hurts children and efforts towards an educated population, but also plays right into the those like the Devos family that have tried for decades to destroy public schools and privatize the same with for-profit schools.

Our infrastructure already struggles for sustainable funding, in 2023 Michigan got a C- from the Infrastructure Report Card; which states;

“For too long, Michigan’s infrastructure suffered the impacts of chronic underinvestment.” Though some progress has been made in recent years.

September Update

By Nicholas Haney

Hello folks,

I just wanted to post briefly to let you all know I am still among the living. There is a lot going on right now, and as I’ve said before it is impacting most of blogging time. I am still writing every week especially on a big project. I’m not the “Like, Subscribe and Share” kind of creator, but if you want updates on that project I’d recommend seeking out my patreon.

In addition, there are several draft posts being worked (slowly) in the background. I’m hoping to have them published by years end.

Upcoming blog posts include;

Eco-Animism, and the climate crisis
Universal Healthcare for Michigan
Anatomy of Bad Policy (More politics)
Ecology as a Spiritual Model
Space Engineers – Weapons (Just for Fun)

There are a few other drafts I’m playing around with as well. I don’t know if they will make the “publish” list or the trash pile, that remains to be seen. In addition, I also have a short story that has been submitted for an anthology. I am also hoping to start the next book of the Liminal Worlds series this winter. I’m kinda feeling a noir/detective vibe for that one. There are also the assorted contracts for art and other work ongoing.

So yeah, not dead. Very busy.

As always,

Thanks for reading!

Leave a comment | tags: Art, author, Blogging, Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories, Updates, WIP, writer, Writing | posted in Writing

July 19, 2025

Ranked Choice for Michigan

By Nicholas Haney

Hello again folks,

Not a lot of updates today, as most of these have been posted in regards to my Patreon. It is a great resource to keep up of my various projects. So let’s jump right into it today.

Back in June, Rank MI Vote passed the hurdles needed to start collecting petitions for a new ballot initiative. I have posted on this blog many times how I support better democracy and voting measures, expanded representation, as well as how I consider Michigan to be a semi-direct democracy. I think ranked choice is a good step in the right direction, and I’ll be on the prowl for a petition to sign.

In other words;

“On June 27, Rank MI Vote cleared a procedural hurdle to get its proposal on next year’s ballot when the Michigan Board of Canvassers approved the amendment language and the 100-word summary the group’s volunteers will use for gathering signatures. The group must now collect at least 446,198 signatures for its proposal to officially qualify for the ballot…

Rank MI Vote’s proposed constitutional amendment would implement ranked choice voting for most federal and statewide elections in Michigan. Alaska and Maine are the only two states that use ranked choice voting; dozens of U.S. cities do as well”

If the petition gets enough signatures, ranked choice voting would become part of Michigan’s Constitution.

You would be fair to be wondering what is “ranked choice voting’, and how does it work? How is it different than our current system, often called “first past the post“?

Well, first our source from Michigan Independent describes ranked choice as;

“With ranked choice voting, voters rank candidates in order of preference, regardless of party affiliation: first choice, second choice, and so on. If no single candidate wins the majority of first-choice votes, the candidates that receive the smallest number of votes are eliminated, and a runoff round begins. If a voter chose an eliminated candidate as their top pick, their vote will then go to their second-ranked candidate. The winner is decided after one candidate receives more than half of the votes.”

That is a lot of words, and if you prefer visual media this is my personal favorite;

Naturally, the State Repbulicans almost immediately moved against ranked choice; saying;

“Ranked choice voting would “disenfranchise people” because it’s “confusing,” argued state Rep. Donni Steele, a Bloomfield Hills Republican who is co-sponsoring the new legislation to bar the voting method. ”

This is to be expected, as Republicans are consistent in their opposition towards anything that undermines their power. Democrats are often against such measures as well, and that is one of the few areas of “bipartisanship” between the two major parties. Both are consistent in their efforts to make sure third parties don’t threaten the duopoly of political power in the US. I will be watching closely to see what kind of support the ban on RCV attracts.

There are some valid criticisms of RCV, but overall I think it is a good thing for Michigan. Ranked choice will get us on the right course towards a better democracy, and towards a democracy that represents we the people more accurately and proportionally. Two parties cannot and do not represent the the spectrum of ideologies necessary for a healthy democracy. As an example Sweden is very comparable to Michigan in population and GDP. The Michigan legislature (House & Senate) has a total of 148 elected officials in Red or Blue. The Swedish Riksdag has 349 across 10 parties.

For the record, if I was able to vote through Ranked Choice voting with multiple parties – I wouldn’t vote for either Democrats or Republicans. While Democrats are closer to my values, I would be in the red and green areas of the Swedish Parliament. That isn’t the case in the US, or in Michigan.

This is one of the scenarios where the perfect is the enemy of the good. Plus, I don’t think there is, or likely will ever be, “perfect” in anything with humans involved. We are messy and chaotic, but we can always strive to do better. I think Ranked Choice is one of those cases where we can do better, for our values, for our communities, and for the future of democracy.

As always, thanks for reading!

Leave a comment | tags: Democracy, elections, Finland, Michigan, news, Politics, Ranked Choice Voting, Sweden, Voting | posted in Culture, Great Lakes Region/Midwest, Michigan, Politics, Writing

July 16, 2025

Patreon Updates 1

By Nicholas Haney

This post is publicly available on my Patreon, and is a repost. Consider supporting the development of my work!

Beyond a doubt the most original title for an update post…

Hello again folks,

Passing along a few updates for you!

First, the “animism manuscript” and the primary focus of this Patreon has a title!
Michiganii: Towards a Great Lakes Animism

This title started as a joke. I was doing some reading on various Celtic and Germanic tribes, and noticed a lot of them ended in “ii” like Parisii, Averni, Boii and so forth. I’m sure a big part of this was Tacitus writing in Latin.. but I digress.

You see, I’ve never really liked the official demonyms for the people of Michigan; either Michigander (a goose!) or Michiganian, which just sounds stuffy and snobbish to me. So I was joking around with friends on social media as ones does, and Michiganii fell out. I liked it, and ran with it.

Michiganii. Big Water People. As a loose translation of mishi-gami, “large lake/water.” This could also be spelled Miishi’ganii, with a little more “indigenous” flair. Either way sounds good to me. All the same, that is how the title came to be.

Second, another short story is off and submitted to the publisher. That’s a win for me. Also new cover art in progress soon, so another win!

Third, you might be wondering what the heck is that weird THING attached to this post? Surely, a four year old threw up color all over a paper! Well, first I’d have you know I’m a little older than four, and that is early concept art for the title of the Michiganii book. That’s right, that’s the calendar this entire book is built around. It tracks seasons, moons and average temperatures throughout the year. Yes, it’s an early concept and I make ugly things for fun. Sue me, David.

You also might be wondering why 2013? Well, the short answer is I have versions for about every decade or so, and this is the most recent that isn’t covered with notes and new elements that I don’t want to reveal just yet…. Spoilers.

I’m using the 2024 version of this calendar for the manuscript, because it’s SPECIAL. But, you might have to give me money to see more details on that.

My first paid post is coming real soon, and not only will I talk a lot more about the image above, but also be sharing the introduction for the Michiganii project that explains so much more about the details of this image, and why it will eventually be the cover art!

Stay tuned, and thanks for reading!

Leave a comment | tags: Animism, Patreon, Projects, Updates, writer, Writing | posted in Animism/Shamanism, Culture, Great Lakes Region/Midwest, Writing

Eco-Animism, Spirit, and Magic

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