Peter Kafka for Elisabeth’s 16th Birthday

Together with Hans-Peter Dürr and Carl Amery, among others, Peter Kafka shaped the ecology and anti-nuclear movement and also developed into a sharp, witty and charming critic of capitalism. He described the crises of capitalism as a „global acceleration crisis“ which, driven by the primacy of returns, is driving people into an ever faster innovation frenzy. As a system theorist, he saw the fundamental principle of creation as missing, that complexity and development need time, time to prove itself in contexts. He saw genetic engineering, nuclear energy and agricultural monoculture as the fate of „simplicity and haste“ as well as the collapse of small communities and social complexity. He countered this with the postulate of “diversity and leisureliness”. He preached the limits of growth and knew how to reconnect the great questions of humanity and the fundamental questions of the system and to give thinking new directions.
He died on December 23rd 2000. Two days before his death, the city of Munich presented him with the “Munich Shines” award.

At the invitation of the Munich Adult Education Center (Volkshochschule) – Pasing Branch – Peter Kafka gave a lecture for their group of lecturers in 1992. The recording of his lecture came to me through a friend. I edited it slightly audio-technically and divided it into 21 chapters. The recording begins with his – incomplete – introduction of a disappointing meeting to found an academy for the 3rd millennium…

Lecture in Munich 1992

1 Die Symptome der Krise 9:37

2 Über das Erdklima 4:42

3 Über das Artensterben 7:26

4 Evolutionsgeschichte, Grundgesetze des Universums 10:11

5 Aufstieg zu höherer Komplexität 9:03

6 Entstehung des Lebens 2:50

7 Über das Weltall und das menschliche Gehirn 11:02

8 Über das Wirken der Menschen in der Welt 4:55

9 Wie neue Ideen entstehen 5:58

10 Vielfalt und Gemächlichkeit statt Einfalt und Raserei 6:09

11 Pause