This slideshow discusses our current era, what's come to be known as the Anthropocene. How did we get to this point, and why did it get that name? What will a sustainable future look like?

1. The Anthropocene
&
Beyond

2. Nature and the Self
Thomas Reuter’s “Nature and the Self: Liberal Individualism
Is the Problem, Not the Solution” (2016) is a response to a
position taken by fellow Anthropologist Helen Kopnina.
Kopnina argues that while neoliberalism (aka free market
fundamentalism) has violated the rights of the natural
world. Her solution is to extend the rights of humans (that
are at the root of the neoliberal ethos) to nature.
Reuter argues that this view stems from a false dualism.

3. Nature and the Self
René Descartes, the most prominent of the early dualist
philosophers argued that humans are separate from
nature—famously stating “I think, therefore I am.” Humans
exist as “subjects” on a “transcendental plane, detached
from the field of nature” (para. 2).
This Cartesian split firmly established the concept that
humans are separate from, and arguably above, nature.
This concept is deeply rooted in most Western cultures
from the mid-1600s on.

4. Nature and the Self
Neoliberalism and it’s philosophical underpinnings promote
an individualistic, rather than a collective, sense of identity.
Reuter argues that “this narrow view of human identity or
selfhood does not provide a moral foundation or a motive
for compassion, such as a broader sense of identity would”
(para. 6).

5. Nature and the Self
For Reuter, the “distinction between nature and humans is
patently false. Science has proven that human beings… are
utterly and eternally a part of nature” (para. 2).
Thus, trying to resolve the crises and rights violations with
Neoliberalism and it’s philosophical underpinnings is folly:
“Individualism has encouraged us to feel separated not only
from the field of nature, but also from each other. […] There
is no fundamental moral commitment to the whole in
liberalism” (para. 4).

6. Nature and the Self
Humans do not have the power to extend rights to nature,
but humans have the ability to recognize that those rights
already exist and have been ignored.
Instead, Reuter argues that society must cultivate “an
inner state of ‘feeling at one with the world’ that
accurately reflects the unitary nature of objective reality,”
“the unity of the Cosmos,” and the realization that “our
ultimate Self is in fact the world soul.”

7. Nature and the Self
Reuter believes that a broadened sense of identity, inspiring
compassion and solidarity with all of nature, human or non-
human, is slowly taking shape now due to:
1. Improved communication and mobility among human
societies that is breaking down boundaries between
“us” and “them”
2. Discoveries in biology and ecosystem studies “showing
that species are linked together by coevolution in a web
[of intricate] interdependences” (para. 9)

8. Nature and the Self
For Reuter, this transformed understanding of the cosmos
and humanity’s place in it is slow because of two things:
1. the “organized resistance” (para. 11) of those who have
profited most in the neoliberal economy—and don’t
want things to change
2. contemporary society’s massive inability to engage in
collective action.

9. Nature and the Self
Reuter believes this will change as human activity further
damages our life support systems (i.e. the Earth)
Humans will then embrace the “stewardship of, and service
to, this living planet as a whole, wherein lies our true
purpose as conscious beings” (para. 12).
In sum, Reuter argues that extending human rights to
nature is based on a dualistic fallacy and that effective
environmental change will be based on the recognition that
everything on Earth is interconnected.

10. Or, as Dr. Bronner’s Says…

11. “Sustainability–
Ethics, Culture, and History”

12. Ethics: The Anthropocene
Faustian Bargains (according to Wood, 2015):
1.0: Prior to the use of fossil fuels for energy, human
societies exploited slave labor for economic growth.
2.0: In the 1800s, slaves were replaced by machines running
on fossil fuels. Modern societies have sold out our future
(as Faust sold his his soul) in exchange for extraordinary
powers to satisfy our every desire.

13. Ethics: The Anthropocene
This Faustian Bargain ushered in the Anthropocene:
Coined by Noble Laureate Paul Crutzen to describe the last
200-year period of human industrialization, he argued that
human beings are the principal agents of change
superceding all other factors on the planet.

14. Ethics: The Anthropocene
Without a single law being passed, industrialization has led
to the transfer of Earth’s sequestered carbon reserves from
inside the earth into the atmosphere and oceans.
For many, the transition to a sustainable, low-carbon global
economy (one that doesn’t impoverish billions of people in
the process) is the Great Cause of the 21st century.
This could be the greatest challenge humanity’s ever faced.

15. Case Studies
Both the case of bee colony collapse and the BP oil spill
demonstrate the complexity of systems: it is impossible to
find a simple, definitive cause.
The advanced industries that have developed around crop
pollination and oil extraction involve highly complex
interactions among technological, governmental, economic,
and natural resource systems.

17. Agriculture and the
Global Bee Colony Collapse
Humans depend on pollinated fruits, nuts and seeds for a
third of our caloric intake
Roughly 80% of the foods we eat are to some degree the
products of bee pollination (this is 1/3 of total agricultural
output)
In the spring of 2007, hundreds of thousands of colonies in
the United States did not survive the winter: 30% of all
honeybee colonies died

18. Agriculture and the
Global Bee Colony Collapse
CCD is largely caused by the combination of a virus and a
fungus, but is also due to many other factors long in the
making.
Since 1950, the U.S. bee population had already declined by
1/3 due to various viral and mite infestations and major
changes in bee habitat and lifestyle.

19. Agriculture and the
Global Bee Colony Collapse
Humans have radically affected the ways bees interact with
the world:
 vast suburbanization and pesticide use has destroyed
bees' natural wildflower habitats
 they are trucked around the U.S. to pollinate one
monocrop after another, limiting their diet
 human, chemical intervention in the lifecycle of bees has
“selected” for a more vulnerable bee

20. Agriculture and the
Global Bee Colony Collapse
Complex systems, such as bee pollination and colony
maintenance , are not characterized by linear development,
but rather by sudden, nonlinear changes of state
These changes are called tipping points, in which sudden
deterioration overtakes a population beyond its ability to
rebound

21. Energy and the BP Oil Disaster
BP was drilling under risky conditions: the ocean floor was a
mile below the surface and the oil field was three miles
below that.
Over three months in early 2010, two hundred million
gallons of crude oil poured into the Gulf of Mexico before
the technological means could be found to seal the
undersea well.

22. Developing an Ethics of Sustainability
The Great Cause of developing an ethics of sustainability
aims to shift society toward a more systematic and
ecological perspective and away from the “cornucopian”
worldview of endless growth: that the earth guarantees a
perpetual growth in goods and services.
There is a wide spectrum of opinion in the sustainability
field: one end of the spectrum holds to a cornucopian
optimism, while the other extreme sees an apocalyptic
future of resource scarcity and chronic conflict.

23. Developing an Ethics of Sustainability
Wood (2015) argues that Western society does not value
nor reward multigenerational thinking.
The world’s dominant powers have no established
regulatory system or body of law that enshrines the idea
that we act under obligation to future generations
(although many believe that we must).
Indigenous peoples around the world, on the other hand,
recognize sustainability in principles of governance.

24. Developing an Ethics of Sustainability
Remote Responsibilities: our moral obligation to consider
the impact of our actions on those distant from us
1. As consumers we are embedded in a global web of
commerce (with an ethical responsibility to those who
extract and manufacture the goods we buy)
2. As human forebears, we have an ethical contract to
maintain the world for future generations

25. Developing an Ethics of Sustainability
Common but Differentiated Responsibilities:
While the mitigation of global warming is a shared
responsibility, it assumes that the wealthy, industrialized
countries of the North (the beneficiaries of carbon-based
development) should accept a greater burden for:
1. reducing global carbon emissions
2. providing developing nations with the technology and
economic means to modernize in sustainable ways

26. Developing an Ethics of Sustainability
The precautionary principle:
In the face of high risk to ecosystems and/or insufficient
data, the priority should lie with ecosystem preservation
rather than industrial development and market growth
But I like to call it: “Don’t do stupid shit”
after President Obama’s unofficial foreign policy doctrine

27. Developing an Ethics of Sustainability
Sustainability ethics is a hard sell: “It is a philosophy of limits
in a world governed by dreams of infinite growth and
possibility” (Wood, 2015)
Sustainability may be an ethic of the future,
but we need it now