Earth in Human Hands

by David Grinspoon

  Who Is This “We”?

  A friend of mine recently wrote online, “We definitely have the ability to run a clean planet. It’s annoying beyond words to not be doing it.” To which I responded, “Depends on what we mean by the words ‘we’ and ‘ability,’ doesn’t it?” After all, if we have the ability, why aren’t we doing it? If we are talking about viable technical solutions for our energy and climate problems, I believe that humans can easily devise them. In this sense we have the ability. Yet does global humanity have the ability to implement them? It’s not simply a question of what choices we should make. There is also the question: can we make choices?

  This book and all our conversations about the Anthropocene, climate change, and the human future are rife with prescriptions for what “we” must do to solve “our” problems, to survive and prosper. We must end our addiction to fossil fuels. We must change our behavior or expand our ways of thinking. But just who is it that is supposed to be making these changes and learning how to run this planet well? “We,” the people reading this book, the voting public, the rich people in developed nations with more choices, the entire human race, the biosphere, or the planet itself? Who is this “we”?

  When I say that humanity is gradually becoming more aware of our global role, I am fully aware that not every person on Earth is, and that knowledge and conversations are diverse and culturally specific. When I say that we are responsible for getting ourselves in this mess, I acknowledge that many people have not had the information, freedom, or power to make choices that affect our global environment. There is a convoluted and shifting geography of responsibility. Yet it is not meaningless to speak of humanity as a whole, something that is new to Earth and having an unprecedented effect. There is an important sense in which we (the human race) are facing challenges that can only be addressed on a global level. It is essential that we search for, and cultivate, a planetary identity with which to respond to planet-level threats.

  This kind of talk rubs some people the wrong way. Some object strenuously to the notion of humanity as a collective entity, in any sense sharing agency, responsibility, and destiny, facing common choices and needing to make collective changes. With its new prominence in scientific circles, the concept of the Anthropocene has diffused far beyond the scientific community and into numerous fields of the humanities. It is also escaping the walls of academia, spreading to humanity at large, where it might really do some good. Various academics from such fields as critical theory, philosophy, environmental ethics, postcolonial studies, and economics are taking potshots at the Anthropocene, subjecting it to critical scrutiny—as well they should. One popular view is that by representing humanity as a single, monolithic entity, we are glossing over various histories of oppression and inequity, and letting the rich peoples and nations of the world off the hook.

  In the humanities, compared to the sciences, there is more awareness of the fraught history of claims of the universal made by Europeans, sometimes used to cover over racist assumptions. As literary scholar Ursula Heise explained it, at the Symposium on Longevity of Human Civilization that I organized at the Library of Congress in September 2013,

  The assumption that humans are somehow one entity, because of their biological species, tends to come very easily to scientists, but it’s an extremely difficult assumption for a humanist… [A] lot of humanists are very cautious about using terms such as “humanism,” “humanity,” “mankind,” because of the lousy track record these terms have in Western history. A lot of us look at histories of imperialism and colonialism where it was very common to say, “Oh, we stand for the universal human,” and the universal human is French or the universal human is British.6

  Several writers have suggested that the “species view” or “species talk” is inherently oppressive. Listening to Ursula, I better understand the source of this concern, but I worry that this viewpoint sets regional, national, or identity politics against the global view, and I’m concerned that this could itself have an oppressive effect, hampering our ability to care for future generations.

  This is not to belittle questions of justice and responsibility and blame. There is a legitimate critique of simplistic species-level thinking. Is climate change a threat to the whole species? Certainly, yes. But certain places will bear the brunt, and the global poor are most at risk. Has climate change been caused by the whole species? Not equally. A privileged few are wreaking disproportionate havoc, and so those of us with any influence whatsoever—and that probably includes most people reading this—are especially obligated to try to mitigate this. An obvious and deserved target is the fossil fuel industry. Some with vested financial interest in perpetuating our current energy infrastructure are doing great damage and endangering all our futures. These same industries have supported a successful effort to sow doubt and confusion about climate change. In the end, this smokescreen will not succeed in obscuring the truth. It is already wearing thin, but it has been a successful delaying tactic, preserving profits for one generation at the expense of others, and has set us on a more perilous course. Is it all the fault of the CEO of ExxonMobil? No. Most of us drive cars, most of us vote. So blame is distributed, but in this analysis, it does not extend to those in poor countries who have neither a car nor a vote.

  However, it is sometimes economic disadvantage that leads people to harm their environments. For example, in some places, deforestation and desertification advance as a consequence of the fact that people have no choice but to gather wood for cooking. A huge amount of deadly particulate air pollution comes from the cooking fires of those too poor to use anything but the wood and dung and peat that is available to them. They damage the land, the air, and their lungs because they have to.

  If you’re in a boat and you realize that the current is pulling you dangerously close to deadly rocks, it is a good idea for everyone to row like hell in the opposite direction. Maybe some of the passengers are more responsible for getting you in that situation. Some are sitting in drier, safer, more comfortable parts of the boat. Some have been well fed while others are too hungry to do any rowing. Nonetheless, you all had better pull together now. Sure, the strongest rowers or those holding the biggest oars should do the most, and those too hungry or tired won’t be of much help. A discussion over fairness is vital for running a better boat and avoiding the rocks the next time. If everyone had been consulted and well cared for, and if there were not so many people crammed on the damn boat, you might not be in this situation. But with the sound of the surf crashing on the rocks and waves breaking over the bow, it’s best to put your energy into pulling toward safety. This may be promoting a “boat view” that distracts from the issues of fairness and responsibility, but still, it’s best to row while you work things out.

  Or let’s grow this analogic boat into a luxury liner and imagine it as the Titanic. It’s true those in steerage got a raw deal, but everyone went down. Well, most did. While the rich, and the women, survived disproportionately, I don’t think any of the crew or passengers had a great night. From a “ship view,” everyone would have been much better off avoiding the iceberg.

  A species view makes more sense when we consider a deep-time, evolutionary perspective. A million years hence, our time will have been a moment at which life redefined its relationship with the planet, a juncture in the evolution of the biosphere, one caused by a single species. This doesn’t mean that these changes happened all at once, everywhere, caused equally by every human being, but from this distant view, you would not be aware of these complexities. You would see human civilization as something that suddenly came along and had a major effect on the planet.

  Surely during other important evolutionary developments there was inequity and injustice. In chapter 5, I describe how we narrowly avoided extinction and survived a genetic bottleneck back when we all were living in southern Africa. At the time, there were surely cultural complexities, inequalities and tragic unfairness. Yet we can describe this now as part of our c
ollective story, as an evolutionary event that the human race endured and survived. We. Humanity. We did not get together and vote that in a certain year we would all give up hunting and gathering, start agriculture, and move into villages. We can describe these historical events meaningfully with a “species view” even though, in detail, they must have been much more convoluted. When we say that humans left Africa and populated the rest of the continents, we are imposing a species narrative on something that was undoubtedly culturally complex. Only some humans left. Maybe only the elites got to go. Or maybe the elites got to stay behind and others were forced to leave. There’s so much we’ll never know. There are details glossed over, responsibilities not assigned, and injustices left unaddressed when we simply say, “Humans left Africa and peopled the rest of the planet.” Yet this is a true statement, just as it is now a true statement that the human species is altering planet Earth in an unprecedented way. The granular does not invalidate the general, or vice versa.

  Humanity is one thing right now, a differentiated and conflicted thing that is having an unprecedented effect on our planet. We are not a harmonious, coherent entity. That’s the problem, but that does not obviate the value—no, the necessity of taking a species-level view of ourselves. In fact, you could argue that even the species view is still too narrow and self-centered. We can draw back farther and ask, “What is the biosphere doing to itself right now with this strange cephalization and self-torture, and why is the planet behaving like this?” It’s fine to assert the importance of difference, of complexity within the human superorganism, but to deny the validity of a parallel and conjoined species level global narrative is regressive, and ultimately runs counter to the needs and aspirations of all peoples.

  This is one of those false dichotomies, amplified by binary political thinking, that interfere with sensible approaches to our global problems.7 People love to find a villain and to map the climate crisis into their preconceived political notions. They want to blame it on capitalism, colonialism, racism, elitism, or other -ism schisms. All these have some grains of truth. The error is to assume we can’t be concerned about humanity at multiple levels simultaneously. We need the ten-thousand-year view alongside awareness of the daily struggle. We must see both the local and the global if we are going to get anywhere. Those who refuse to do so are asking us to pit survival of global humanity against the survival of, and justice for, local cultures. That is a lousy choice, and one that need not be made if we allow room in our minds for both views. One hallmark of maturity is to be able to see two seemingly contradictory viewpoints simultaneously. I’m not advocating that we deny or downplay the need for regional climate justice. It’s clear to me that in addition to cutting back on fossil fuel use and hastening alternatives in developed nations, the other essential component in ensuring a sustainable future is to work for a more equitable world. People, women in particular, who are educated and not in poverty have smaller families and more freedom of choice as to how and what they consume. As awareness and opportunity spread, population growth slows and poverty declines. As nondestructive choices are made more available, local concerns align with global needs.

  The global view has historically been a source of compassion for the less fortunate. Identification with everyone on Earth includes our brothers and sisters in poor and struggling regions. Thirty-six years before the word Anthropocene became a subject of scientific debate, economist Barbara Ward, who coined the term Spaceship Earth, explicitly connected care of the planet with justice for the poor, writing, “the careful husbandry of the Earth is sine qua non for the survival of the human species, and for the creation of decent ways of life for all the people of the world.”

  Don’t dull your appreciation of the evolutionary significance of our time and the global nature of our struggles, responsibilities, and tasks by focusing exclusively on our internecine struggles. In the absence of alien invaders or some other outside threat, we have to find it within ourselves to recognize that we are all in the same boat. If we really want to address climate and the other problems that threaten our future, what we need is a human identity politics. I don’t offer this in opposition to any particular identity politics, but in addition to these. Wise women and men have always understood that fighting for the rights of their people is not counter to, and indeed ultimately requires, a vision of the dignity and common purpose of all people.

  So I reject the notion that species talk is inherently dismissive of the needs of oppressed people, but there is indeed a problem with our uncritical use of collective terminology. When we, as we always do, use that term we to talk about what we humans need to do, we are often invoking a sense of ourselves that is quite different from the way we are. We are individuals acting with certain values and desires. Yet, collectively, we behave in ways that do not reflect the desires and values of some of us, or perhaps even any of us. Most of us are not consciously choosing to endanger the elephants or melt the polar ice. But we get down on ourselves. We talk about what horrible, selfish, destructive creatures we are. Yet we are not. We are just confused. There is a great divide between the clear desires of talented and compassionate individuals and the perplexed actions of the collective. We conceive of ourselves, humanity, as a whole, and talk as if we were, collectively, a decision-making entity. This comes naturally when we discuss threats that are global in nature, and we don’t always realize the disconnect. So we ask, “If we have the ability to run a clean planet, why aren’t we doing it?”—not recognizing that we are talking about two very different wes in the same sentence. This identity crisis is at the core of the Anthropocene dilemma.

  Global problems require global responses. When we use this language “In order to survive and thrive, we must…” change our habits, cut down our emissions, intensify agriculture, and so on, we are actually describing planetary changes of the fourth kind, the desire to take action globally, collectively. Yet have we, as a species, as a global civilization, ever made a decision or deliberately undertaken any kind of action? Is this even possible? Yes, indeed we have, and it is. In chapters 4 and 5, I give several examples. While excessive nationalism and tribalism are a hindrance to planetary changes of the fourth kind, and thus a threat to our survival, our world is, over time, being knit more closely together. Globally, we are not as isolated from one another as we were as recently as a century ago, and our communications with, and connections to, one another are greatly enhanced. This will be even truer for our kids, who are digital natives. Online discourse does not stop at borders. Even those societies that try to stamp it out and control it are fighting a losing battle. They provoke a reaction, a desire to join. History and changing technology are with those seeking wider connection.

  Worldwide Mind

  Referring to the global “we,” do we make choices? Are we conscious? Seriously, what are the properties of consciousness, and can you say that we have them? We have economic models of our behavior, assuming that each of us acts and responds in some predictable way. We have models that tell us world human population will peak at about ten billion later this century. It’s almost as if we don’t have any say in the matter, but are just fated to play out the projections. What if someone told you a model predicted you and your family would move to Texas? You’d say, “No, we are going to stay right here. We don’t even like barbeque and line dancing.” Yet you can’t argue in the same way with a model that predicts that a certain number of people from California are going to move to Texas. It’s as if in groups above a certain size we are not conscious actors, or even if we are, we’re as predictable as inanimate objects.8

  I’m always struck by the language we use to describe markets, or “the market,” as if it were a metaphysical creature with a mind of its own. Just to pick one typical article at random from the New York Times, we learn that “If the market really believed there was a high probability of default, you would see a much more negative reaction,” “The markets are sending this complacent message,” and “markets have
been relatively sanguine.” The market has beliefs, moods, and feelings. It exhibits behavior and sends us signals that we try to interpret. We read about the market being spooked, the market feeling confident, the market reacting emotionally to this or that event; we speculate endlessly on what the market will decide to do.9 These seem to be slightly more than metaphors. The market really seems to have a mind of its own, but is this perception just a bit of magical thinking? Maybe not. Perhaps financial markets really are some sort of primitive, collective global mind that is evolving.

  I notice something similar in the way we talk about “humanity.” Within our family or our team or department or company we feel some agency, but when we discuss the actions of humanity, it is often as if we’re describing some large external agent beyond our control or responsibility. Are those disasters caused by humanity caused by us? Or are they like tornadoes and asteroid impacts? Is humanity something we are in charge of? Or is it like the market? Is our global human civilization capable of acting with conscious intent? As individuals or in small groups, we’re capable of taking in new information, making decisions, changing plans, and acting accordingly. We can adapt our behavior to unforeseen and unprecedented circumstances. Yet, globally, we seem more akin to what we would consider a primitive organism, acting unconsciously with a much simpler, less adaptable nervous system.

  To consider the source of planetary changes of the fourth kind, of global-scale intention, we need to have some understanding of consciousness and intentionality on an individual level, but the question of where and how intentionality arises is deeply mysterious.10 How does it happen that one group of atoms (you), built into cells, organized into a human brain, can anticipate the future, desire to change things in your surroundings, and then actually do so? We are so used to this we don’t see how profoundly weird it is. We think that telekinesis, the ability to move external objects just with one’s mind, is impossible, and that to believe in it is some kind of flaky woo that breaks the rules of science. Yet every time you do something as mundane as raising your cup of coffee to your lips, something nearly as strange happens. How can one assemblage of matter, your brain, decide to move another assemblage of matter, your arm and hand, and cause yet another object to move? Other matter doesn’t behave this way. I don’t recommend thinking about it too deeply before you’ve had any coffee or after more than four cups.*