The Anthropocene

In 2000, Nobel prize-winning chemist Paul Crutzen coined the geological term Anthropocene to describe our current era, succeeding the Holocene, as a period in which humans dominate the Earth's biological, chemical and geological processes and become responsible as stewards of the planet. In his foreword, Crutzen remarks that our 200 years of industrialisation are testimony to our power of innovation and creativity, while at the same time demonstrating more perilous powers of degradation and destruction. He calls for us to recognise our opportunity to build a long lasting, viable, creative and freedom-loving human civilisation. In this sense, to become aware also to become responsible and ultimately an active participant in creating a new form of sustainable civilisation. With his journalistic eye, the author takes the reader on a tour of planetary processes and trends including agriculture, forests, the seas and coral reefs, all the time suggesting a middle way between current policies and visionary environmentalism while at the same time avoiding doomsday scenarios as ultimately self-defeating. Having added the techno-sphere to the geosphere and the biosphere, we are now in a position to implement what he calls bioadaptation rather than exploitative biotechnology; this also calls for a new eco-economy of symbiosis rather than exploitation and an exclusive focus on economic growth. He rightly maintains that this will involve a new form of education, especially at the MBA level. The future depends on the action potentials of all kinds of groups, not just governments. The author proposes his own scenario where China plays a critical role and proper monitoring systems, for instance of the oceans, are set up to protect them from overfishing and pollution. At the end of the book, he relates a conversation with Crutzen, part of whose hope for the future results from of our better understanding of our own negative effects on the biosphere. His hope is that self-awareness and empathy will catch up with our technological prowess.