I’m delighted to announce that Trends in Ecology and Evolution (TREE) is publishing “The Anthropocene Biosphere: Supporting ‘Open Interdisciplinarity’ through Blogging,” an article about the Anthropocene Biosphere Project that appeared on the blog earlier this year. Continue reading
“Climate, Environment and Early Human Innovation: Stable Isotope and Faunal Proxy Evidence from Archaeological Sites (98-59ka) in the Southern Cape, South Africa”
CITATION:
Roberts, P., C. S. Henshilwood, K. L. van Niekerk, P. Keene, A. Gledhill, J. Reynard, S. Badenhorst and J. Lee-Thorp. 2016 PLoS One 11(7):e0157408.
ON-LINE AVAILABILITY:
ABSTRACT:
The Middle Stone Age (MSA) of southern Africa, and in particular its Still Bay and Howiesons Poort lithic traditions, represents a period of dramatic subsistence, cultural, and technological innovation by Continue reading
“How humans drive speciation as well as extinction”
CITATION:
Bull, J.W. and Maron, M. 2016. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 283: 20160600.
ON-LINE AVAILABILITY:
ABSTRACT:
A central topic for conservation science is evaluating how human activities influence global species diversity. Humanity exacerbates extinction rates. But by what mechanisms does humanity drive the emergence of new species? Continue reading
CRISPR as Niche Construction: an Aristotelian View
CRISPR (pronounced “crisper”) is part of a system, noticed in certain bacteria, by which a cell can make changes in strands of DNA. This mechanism appears to be a proto-immune system: it enables a bacterium to recognize Continue reading
Cities as Human Niches: Against the ‘Natural City’
We welcome to the blog Nir Barak, of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, for the next in our series on Environmental Political Theory.
The city is in some sense our niche; we belong there, and no one can achieve full humanity without it. (Holmes Rolston III[1])
In this post, I want to turn our gaze to cities as the paradigmatic embodiment of niche construction in the Anthropocene. I wish to outline Continue reading
Stewarding the planet? The Anthropocene and nondualist ontologies
We welcome to the blog Luigi Pellizzoni, of the University of Trieste, for the next in our series on Environmental Political Theory.
The ontological claims embroiled in the notion of the Anthropocene have so far attracted less attention than other issues. However, as I will try to show, it is important to engage in a thorough reflection on them—which I hope to kick start with the following contribution. Continue reading
Interdisciplinarity as conversation
This blog is premised on the need for an interdisciplinary approach to the Anthropocene—indeed, to the general question of human beings’ relationship with their environment. And it aspires to embody a certain conception of interdisciplinarity—one which uses conversation as a model for the interaction among people from diverse intellectual backgrounds. Continue reading
The French Lake Dam Fish Ladder and the Temporality of Usefulness
French Lake Dam Fish Ladder (photograph: Larry Smith)
Governance in the Anthropocene: The Role of the Arts
We welcome to the blog Marit Hammond, of Keele University, for the next in our series on Environmental Political Theory.
The sea around the Brindisi industrial zone is contaminated with toxins and carcinogens, threatening the sea urchin and mussel populations that are farmed in this area. © Cerano Power station outflow, from the No Al Carbone series, Environmental Resistance, 2015.
Dispatch from London: Sunken Cities
Even on a quiet day the British Museum in London is full, but on a rainy day during the summer it is positively packed, with a long line of visitors winding around the corner. Adding to the popularity at the moment is Continue reading
The Anthropocene Idea: Janus-Faced and Interdisciplinary
We welcome to the blog John Meyer, of Humboldt State University, for the next in our series on Environmental Political Theory.
I’m very pleased to contribute to this collection of posts about the challenge of the Anthropocene for environmental political theory (and vice versa). I want to reflect upon two widely espoused Continue reading
Historicizing the Anthropocene: A Peek at Paris
Historians love questions of dating and chronology, and there are two questions about dating the Anthropocene. First, stratigraphy and other sciences have been searching for physical evidence for when Continue reading
Decolonialism and democracy: on the most painful challenges to anthroponomy
In my last post I argued that anthroponomy should be our regulative ideal in our collective responsibility as humankind for our planetary environment.[1] Now I want to ask what major obstacles stand in its way. The ones that are most familiar in environmental political theory are, Continue reading
“Advances in restoration ecology: rising to the challenges of the coming decades”
CITATION:
Perring, M.P. et al. 2015. Ecosphere, 6(8): art. 131.
ON-LINE AVAILABILITY:
ABSTRACT:
Simultaneous environmental changes challenge biodiversity persistence and human wellbeing. The science and practice of restoration ecology, in collaboration with other disciplines, can Continue reading
A moral cartography for the Anthropocene
We welcome Manuel Arias Maldonado, of the University of Malága, as a guest on the blog . . . click for his bio, or go to the “Who we are” tab. This post summarizes an argument in his recent book Environment & Society: Socionatural Relations in the Anthropocene (Springer, 2015).
If the Anthropocene were just a scientific category dealing with natural phenomena, we would not feel so concerned about it. But, as Mike Ellis and Zev Trachtenberg have rightly argued, the Anthropocene is not Continue reading
Surviving the Anthropocene Part 2: Of Omega Points and Oil
My previous post lamented the flawed presentation of climate change at the David Koch-funded Hall of Human Origins and suggested that a spiritual-scientific ideology, traceable in part to Teilhard de Chardin, infuses the Smithsonian’s Human Origins initiative and related events. In this follow-up, I take a closer look at this ideology and its connection to broader currents in contemporary evolutionary thought and the Anthropocene. Continue reading
Surviving the Anthropocene: Big Brains and Big Money at the Smithsonian
We welcome Lisa Sideris, of Indiana University, as a guest on the blog . . . click for her bio, or go to the “Who we are” tab. This is the first installment of a two-part post; please come back again Friday for the conclusion.
In late May this year, two related attractions drew me to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in D.C. One was an ambitious-sounding Continue reading
