Our Home in the Anthropocene

What do we call the age we live in? After realizing that humans had recomposed Earth's chemistry and overwritten its face, the chemist Paul Crutzen and his colleague Eugene Stoermer floated the label Anthropocene, or “the recent age of man." Minus the very deep trenches of the oceans wilderness of the world is largely gone in its "pristine" or "untouched" states. But even the chemical composition of the deep waters of the world are changing as the developed people of the world change the earth's surface and climate.

Over the last few years, more people are advocating shifting our epoch's label from the Holocene to the Anthropocene. From environmentalists like Vandana Shiva to mainstream publications National Geographic (image at right), the Economist, the New York Times, the term is taking off. It's even in the scientific literature.

But the merit of the Anthropocene is contested. To get a sense of why, you can get a rundown at Breakthrough Journal where Erle Ellis argues for it and others, like Bill McKibben, respond. There are some, like Ellis or Bjorn Lomborg who see the Anthropocene as an age of technological advance, discovery, and growth. They see progress. Ellis writes, "our unprecedented and growing powers also allow us the opportunity to create a planet that is better for both its human and nonhuman inhabitants. It is an opportunity that we should embrace." But McKibben and Shiva (who writes elsewhere) see unchecked technological advance and growth as the problem. There are limits. Shiva writes,

"If we continue to understand our role in the old paradigm of capitalist patriarchy based on a mechanistic world view, an industrial, capital centered competitive economy, and a culture of dominance, violence, and war and ecological and human irresponsibility, we will witness the rapid unfolding of increasing climate catastrophe, species extinction economic collapse, and human injustice and inequality."

Whether they like it or not, they agree that humans are the primary ecological force on the planet.

What if Paris floods from climate change?

Since Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth came out a few years ago, people in the United States have idly entertained the idea that Miami or New Orleans could flood. In worst-case scenarios, New York City could be submerged - a story made morbidly fascinating in Alan Weisman's The World Without Us. But in the world of history and culture, few cities hold water (no pun intended) like Paris.

What if it floods from climate change? This is a scenario eerily represented in this video.



As TreeHugger notes:

More than 100 miles from the Atlantic, Paris is safe from rising sea levels for the foreseeable future, but coastal cities around the world aren't as lucky. The entire population of the nation of Kiribati, in the Maldives, is relocating to Fiji as its 32 islands disappear under the water. They are not the first rising-sea refugees, either.

To put the video's version of Paris in perspective, the best case scenario for this century is a 50cm rise in global sea levels. New reports show things will likely be worse.

Rising seas not only make coastal areas uninhabitable, they compromise drinking water supplies. The use of Paris, the famously beautiful city, as the potential victim could bring attention to a climate issue that is largely ignored.

Where would the art go? Berlin? Basel? Vienna? I have to admit a certain fascination and interest in such a problem. What kind of transition of culture would have to occur? I'm envisaging a modern version of the Irish monks of the medieval period who preserved so much in their cloistered corner of the world while Europe's powers plundered one another. Imagine the contingencies for the Mona Lisa. What about what's in New York's Museum of Modern Art? What future scenarios will there be besides A World Without Us or John Carpenter's campy Escape from New York?

A lot of people will argue New York is safe for a long time. And they may be right. The pumps that free the subways (and all of the island from the daily deluge of water that made the island a meadowland) run, more than likely, on coal. Coal, left unchecked, will power our machines for a long time. Maybe nuclear power fuels them. Maybe it will more. Maybe tidal will one day do it. But if its coal, and coal is left unchecked, that means an escalation of climate change. A real double bind. And one that makes for great apocalyptic story telling. I'm not saying the stories will necessarily or really won't happen. I don't know.

Right now, they're just stories. But each day with more coal dumping millions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, the more traction the doom scenarios will get more traction and the more the Mad Max fans will say that thunderdome is on its way. Others will watch this video and think, there must be a different way to do things so that doesn't happen.

Water is Rising

Penn State's Center for the Performing Arts will be showing Water is Rising on November 8th. Water is Rising brings together thirty-six artist from the smallest countries in the world - Kiribati, Tokelau and Tuvalu (population 1000, 1,500 and 12,000 respectively). With elevations of only 2-3 meters above sea level, life on coral atolls requires a deep respect for the forces of nature. Their survival depends on communal values and cooperation; music and dance are a key to developing and expressing these values.

The synchrony and joy of group performance speaks to their collective solidarity, empathy, self confidence and self-awareness of these Pacific Islanders. Gracious gestures describe the abundance of their ocean; forceful movement shows the vitality of a seafaring life; and poems speak of a heroic past. As they tour the U.S. for the first time, these artists will share stories of atoll life amid climate change and rising sea waters.

Their world is threatened by climate change. As ice caps and glaciers melt and oceans rise because from more and warmer water, nations like Tuvalu and Maldives and their cultures in their homelands will probably disappear.

Following the film, a panel will discuss the film's meaning and ramifications. The panelists include Anne Clements from PSU School of Music, Jamison Colburn from Environmental Law and Policy, and former Sustainability Now guest Don Brown of the Rock Ethics Institute and blogger at Climate Ethics.

Queen of the Sun

Bees matter. A lot. Find out how and why this week by going to see the film Queen of the Sun at the State Theatre in State College. It is a film about the history of beekeeping, the way that bees have been used in industrial agriculture, and the crisis of Colony Collapse Disorder - a pandemic threatening to extinguish honey bees worldwide - and what we can do to harmonize how we do things.

The last showings are tonight, August 1st, at 4 pm and 7 pm.