cheering for the apocalypse? welcoming the end of humanity?

[Fi Webster]

Not sure where to post this, 'cause it's not current events, but there's a vein of thought I'm running into in different places, from different angles. It's on this month's cover of Harper's magazine, and today in a piece by Adam Kirsch in the Atlantic.

Kirsch opens with the famous finale of Michel Foucault's dense, magisterial, in places nearly unreadable The Order of Things (1966):

As Foucault writes in the book’s famous last sentence, one day “man would be erased, like a face drawn in the sand at the edge of the sea.” The image is eerie, but he claimed to find it “a source of profound relief,” because it implies that human ideas and institutions aren’t fixed. They can be endlessly reconfigured, maybe even for the better. This was the liberating promise of postmodernism: The face in the sand is swept away, but someone will always come along to draw a new picture in a different style.

He goes on then:

But the image of humanity can be redrawn only if there are human beings to do it. Even the most radical 20th-century thinkers stop short at the prospect of the actual extinction of Homo sapiens, which would mean the end of all our projects, values, and meanings. Humanity may be destined to disappear someday, but almost everyone would agree that the day should be postponed as long as possible, just as most individuals generally try to delay the inevitable end of their own life.

In recent years, however, a disparate group of thinkers has begun to challenge this core assumption. From, Silicon Valley boardrooms to rural communes to academic philosophy departments, a seemingly inconceivable idea is being seriously discussed: that the end of humanity’s reign on Earth is imminent, and that we should welcome it. The revolt against humanity is still new enough to appear outlandish, but it has already spread beyond the fringes of the intellectual world, and in the coming years and decades it has the potential to transform politics and society in profound ways.

This view finds support among very different kinds of people: engineers and philosophers, political activists and would-be hermits, novelists and paleontologists. Not only do they not see themselves as a single movement, but in many cases they want nothing to do with one another. Indeed, the turn against human primacy is being driven by two ways of thinking that appear to be opposites.

The first is Anthropocene anti-humanism, inspired by revulsion at humanity’s destruction of the natural environment. [...]

Transhumanism, by contrast, glorifies some of the very things that anti-humanism decries—scientific and technological progress, the supremacy of reason. But it believes that the only way forward for humanity is to create new forms of intelligent life that will no longer be Homo sapiens.

It's a long piece, referencing P. D. James, Alfonso Cuarón, and 21st century thinkers I'm not familiar with. Worth checking out, if it's not behind a paywall for you.

Kirsch concludes:

The apocalyptic predictions of today’s transhumanist and anti-humanist thinkers are of a very different nature, but they too may be highly significant even if they don’t come to pass. Profound civilizational changes begin with a revolution in how people think about themselves and their destiny. The revolt against humanity has the potential to be such a beginning, with unpredictable consequences for politics, economics, technology, and culture.

The revolt against humanity has a great future ahead of it because it appeals to people who are at once committed to science and reason yet yearn for the clarity and purpose of an absolute moral imperative. It says that we can move the planet, maybe even the universe, in the direction of the good, on one condition—that we forfeit our own existence as a species.

In this way, the question of why humanity exists is given a convincing yet wholly immanent answer. Following the logic of sacrifice, we give our life meaning by giving it up.

Anthropocene anti-humanism and transhumanism share this premise, despite their contrasting visions of the post-human future. The former longs for a return to the natural equilibrium that existed on Earth before humans came along to disrupt it with our technological rapacity. The latter dreams of pushing forward, using technology to achieve a complete abolition of nature and its limitations. One sees reason as the serpent that got humanity expelled from Eden, while the other sees it as the only road back to Eden.

But both call for drastic forms of human self-limitation—whether that means the destruction of civilization, the renunciation of child-bearing, or the replacement of human beings by machines. These sacrifices are ways of expressing high ethical ambitions that find no scope in our ordinary, hedonistic lives: compassion for suffering nature, hope for cosmic dominion, love of knowledge. This essential similarity between anti-humanists and transhumanists means that they may often find themselves on the same side in the political and social struggles to come.

I've been reading end-of-the-world novels since the 1960s, but this idea of celebrating the end of our species as intelligence transitions into something else, of viewing it as a moral imperative is, well except for Foucault, pretty new to me.

I'll be paying attention to this. I don't think it's very realistic, because there's eight billion of us. We're the real cockroaches on the planet. Our civilization may fall, but I expect that for eons to come there'll be sickly bands of us managing to survive by scattering away from the uninhabitable regions.

But these ideas are intriguing—as conflicting yet congruent philosophical principles.

It's also open to mockery: people who talk about being "uploaded after the Singularity" AKA "the Rapture of the Nerds." =laugh=

 

[Pyrephox]

This isn't all that new - there's been a 'planned human extinction' movement for a while, and even 70s-80s era SF played around with ideas of overcrowding or technological ennui leading to a voluntary or semi-voluntary human extinction (the book that sticks out in my mind is Eva by Peter Dickenson). Or a nuclear war or other massive semi-extinction event that was framed in a neutral to even semi-positive way.

Notably, this sort of thing mostly gets written/talked about in circles that are middle-class to wealthy, people who often feel overwhelmed by the stress and complexity of their lives and more than 'the end of humanity' really seem to be yearning for an ability to 'return to simplicity' that doesn't involve having to voluntary disengage from society or experience subsistence living in a society that doesn't value the impoverished or struggling. Rather, if you destroy society, then you never have to worry about keeping up with the Joneses OR having them look down on you for not keeping up.

You don't tend to see a lot of this sort of stuff in places and populations where survival is an actual, daily struggle, and human casualties are high.

 

[Fi Webster]

This isn't all that new - there's been a 'planned human extinction' movement for a while, and even 70s-80s era SF played around with ideas of overcrowding or technological ennui leading to a voluntary or semi-voluntary human extinction (the book that sticks out in my mind is Eva by Peter Dickenson).

You're right. After I posted that, I remembered John Varley's story "Overdrawn at the Memory Bank," which my husband and I read long ago in a paperback edition. We appreciated Varley's sense of humor. I seem to recall it was made into a movie starring Raul Julia.

You don't tend to see a lot of this sort of stuff in places and populations where survival is an actual, daily struggle, and human casualties are high.

Indeed.

 

[Pyrephox]

And the thing is, I don't necessarily think it's a mockworthy thing - I think it reflects a feeling of those higher order Maslow needs not being met. A search for meaning and self-actualization that isn't happening because yeah, trying to keep up with all the minutia of daily life even for people who are, objectively, pretty well off can be draining and unfulfilling in regards to pursuing your true passions or feeling like a meaningful part of the world. You don't have to worry about survival, but you don't really feel you're living, and all the things you could do to feel closer to being alive are things that might wreck your marriage, or abandon some responsibilities, or mean you'll lose that job that keeps you comfortable but exhausted, but hey, if society collapses, then you could surely have time to focus on The Important Things.

 

[Fi Webster]

And the thing is, I don't necessarily think it's a mockworthy thing - I think it reflects a feeling of those higher order Maslow needs not being met. [...] You don't have to worry about survival, but you don't really feel you're living, and all the things you could do to feel closer to being alive are things that might wreck your marriage, or abandon some responsibilities, or mean you'll lose that job that keeps you comfortable but exhausted, but hey, if society collapses, then you could surely have time to focus on The Important Things.

I agree. It falls into the loose category of "first world problems."

But I'm afflicted with a black sense of humor. The more badly something reflects on those of us with the luxury to worry about such things, the more deeply it depresses me with reflections on inequality and human suffering, the more eager I am to find a way to laugh. I think it was Albert Camus who dubbed it le jeu de l'absurde.

 

[Woollybear]

There are times I think some of us sit back and wonder at how beautiful this planet would be in the absence of the greed that underpins our civilization. I recall a moment sitting at the harbor and seeing a seal bobbing along, up and down, its head breaking surface every minute or two, and the sunset lighting the Topa Topa ranges pink. For a split second the world was devoid of humanity's touch. It was a remarkable and peaceful moment, if delusional for my momentary sense that there were no people here.

Humans bring something special to the world as well. We do have some remarkable qualities that are worth celebrating. But just imagine this world without us (because it isn't hard to do.) Imagine the great swaths of virgin forest and clean rivers, salmons spawning unimpeded, wolves roaming in the snow without a care of helicopter hunters, great herds of bison, balance, balance, balance, the carbon cycle stable, all of it. Birdsong instead of leaf blowers. Oceans without garbage. All of it. It would be a beautiful world, and the fact that we can imagine such beauty means we can work toward it, if we choose.

 

[Pyrephox]

There are times I think some of us sit back and wonder at how beautiful this planet would be in the absence of the greed that underpins our civilization. I recall a moment sitting at the harbor and seeing a seal bobbing along, up and down, its head breaking surface every minute or two, and the sunset lighting the Topa Topa ranges pink. For a split second the world was devoid of humanity's touch. It was a remarkable and peaceful moment, if delusional for my momentary sense that there were no people here.

Humans bring something special to the world as well. We do have some remarkable qualities that are worth celebrating. But just imagine this world without us (because it isn't hard to do.) Imagine the great swaths of virgin forest and clean rivers, salmons spawning unimpeded, wolves roaming in the snow without a care of helicopter hunters, great herds of bison, balance, balance, balance, the carbon cycle stable, all of it. Birdsong instead of leaf blowers. Oceans without garbage. All of it. It would be a beautiful world, and the fact that we can imagine such beauty means we can work toward it, if we choose.

I remember that at the beginning of the pandemic, when things were most tightly locked down on a global scale, the mildly awed news reports that happened about wildlife entering cities and commercial waterways again, about drops in global pollution level, etc. It definitely provoked a few thoughts in that direction for me, when you see so starkly just how even a reduction in human ACTIVITY could so profoundly (if temporarily) be reflected in the local environments.

 

[Roxxsmom]

This isn't all that new - there's been a 'planned human extinction' movement for a while, and even 70s-80s era SF played around with ideas of overcrowding or technological ennui leading to a voluntary or semi-voluntary human extinction (the book that sticks out in my mind is Eva by Peter Dickenson). Or a nuclear war or other massive semi-extinction event that was framed in a neutral to even semi-positive way.

Notably, this sort of thing mostly gets written/talked about in circles that are middle-class to wealthy, people who often feel overwhelmed by the stress and complexity of their lives and more than 'the end of humanity' really seem to be yearning for an ability to 'return to simplicity' that doesn't involve having to voluntary disengage from society or experience subsistence living in a society that doesn't value the impoverished or struggling. Rather, if you destroy society, then you never have to worry about keeping up with the Joneses OR having them look down on you for not keeping up.

You don't tend to see a lot of this sort of stuff in places and populations where survival is an actual, daily struggle, and human casualties are high.

I think this nails it. In some ways, death is more appealing than the prospect of living with deprivation and misery. Even living the way we did when I was a child and young adult has become almost unthinkable. I shudder to think how hard it would be to do my current job without personal computers and the internet, for instance, and quiver at the memory of how bored I could be sometimes, especially when I ran out of books to read and there wasn't even a web to surf. And you had to plan everything ahead of time, even heating up a frozen dinner. We managed, of course, but it's always harder to go back to something. But what about a life where we had to grow our own food and make our own tools and clothing? Where the only entertainment involved interacting with our fellow humans, listening to them sing or tell stories and watching them dance. Kill me now!


Imagine a world where the young people are rolling their eyes at the elder's wistful stories about how we used to have stories and games that involved moving images and disembodied sounds, and where we didn't have to kill and harvest our own food or take hours preparing meals.

"We could keep food cold and frozen for months, or years even, and dinner used to be ready within minutes!"

"What's a minute, Grandma?"

I have trouble seeing the entire human race going under, though, unless we render the Earth uninhabitable for complex, multicellular life. Even the most pessimistic climate models aren't predicting this. Currently, at least.

Even if things become really dire and we launch the worst kind of war that destroys civilization as we define it, I think pockets of humanity could cling in some places. People are innovative and adaptable. They may well be cultures that know how to live through periods of deprivation, though, and don't depend on technology for their daily lives. Humanity has likely survived population bottlenecks before.

If this is the case, and they become the nucleus of a new human diaspora, one only hopes they re-populate more wisely than we have.

However, in the long term, we will go extinct. All life forms do and will, at least as we currently understand life. The Earth won't be habitable forever, even without our abuse, and the universe as we know it will end some day. If we manage to get out into space and live there, I think selective pressures will be great enough to trigger some big evolutionary changes as well. In this scenario, our descendants could live for a long time, maybe even longer than the Earth will, but they won't be the same species we are now. I don't know if we will manage this, though, given how inwardly focused we have become. And of course if we treat any habitable planets we find (or create) the way we've treated the Earth, we could soon get into the same trouble we are in now.

 

[Fi Webster]

There are times I think some of us sit back and wonder at how beautiful this planet would be in the absence of the greed that underpins our civilization. I recall a moment sitting at the harbor and seeing a seal bobbing along, up and down, its head breaking surface every minute or two, and the sunset lighting the Topa Topa ranges pink. For a split second the world was devoid of humanity's touch. It was a remarkable and peaceful moment, if delusional for my momentary sense that there were no people here.

Humans bring something special to the world as well. We do have some remarkable qualities that are worth celebrating. But just imagine this world without us (because it isn't hard to do.) Imagine the great swaths of virgin forest and clean rivers, salmons spawning unimpeded, wolves roaming in the snow without a care of helicopter hunters, great herds of bison, balance, balance, balance, the carbon cycle stable, all of it. Birdsong instead of leaf blowers. Oceans without garbage. All of it. It would be a beautiful world, and the fact that we can imagine such beauty means we can work toward it, if we choose.

That's a lovely image. Thank you!

But I keep reading about things like the oceans not rebounding from their increased acidity for millions of years to come, or the Atlantic Meridional Oscillating Current not recovering any time soon. Global tipping points. The sixth report of the IPCC. My climate scientist husband is deeply and chronically depressed by his long career studying the decline in biodiversity, destruction of forests, etc. What's happened in the last 50 years is an eyeblink in geologic time, but a much more accelerated shift in lots of variables than in previous planetary shakeups.

I have neither the expertise to evaluate the validity of those doomladen projections, nor the imagination to envision what a "world without us" to come would realistically look like.

You write about climate change, Woollybear. Do you believe your vision is a possible future? I mean, in anything less than millions of years from now?

 

[Fi Webster]

Speaking of IPCC 6, I love the artwork they featured on their report: "A Borrowed Planet—Inherited from our ancestors, On loan from our children" by Alisa Singer. It's currently the lock screen on my iPad.

 

[Diana Hignutt]

Whether or not humanity goes extinct I cannot say, but civilization is collapsing around us now.

 

[dickson]

Whether or not humanity goes extinct I cannot say, but civilization is collapsing around us now.

I read somewhere that the average persistence of a species in the fossil record is about one million years, and have yet to hear a good argument for our kind being exempt. (The way the world is going, a million years would seem miraculous.) So, yes. We should prepare for our own extinction, but no, I’m not persuaded we should plan for that in the near term.

On an individual basis, mortality is the price all of us pay so that some of us can have children. It appears that how that plays out at the higher level of the what replaces humanity, once we’re all gone, depends on decisions to be made in the here-and-now. But quis custodiet? Who will decide? How do you tell the clearsighted prophets from the seductive nihilists? I personally would look very hard at anyone who volunteers to be Fearless Leader.

 

[Woollybear]

You write about climate change, Woollybear. Do you believe your vision is a possible future? I mean, in anything less than millions of years from now?

Have you read the book that maps out the absence of humanity? The World Without Us.

I've heard various estimates about when rebound can occur. It depends how you define rebound. There will always be evidence of mankind in the geological record--we've altered stable isotope ratios in atmospheric carbon and that will be a detectable layer in rock one day.

Most climate scientists have taken the red pill. We are all depressed as hell. Some of us have killed ourselves over it, and the rest of us understand why.

I believe if we vanished in a snap, the world would return to something 'far more balanced' way quicker than millions of years. I believe that evidence of our impact will be detectable for far longer. I believe millions of years is not very long. I believe the world will end in a supernova. I believe time is relative. I believe humans have some remarkably good qualities. We are the only species I'm aware of that actively tries to communicate its impact to one another and also actively tries to limit its footprint.

 

[dickson]

Have you read the book that maps out the absence of humanity? The World Without Us.

I’m reminded of one vision of how humanity ends: A. C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End.

 

[CMBright]

I have long believed that the biopshere will survive the worst we can do. The more I learn, extremophiles living in volcanic vents, deep in ice caverns a mile or more below the earth and so on, the more convinced I become that as destructive as we are capable of being, we just aren't willfully malicious enough to wipe out everything. I think it is unlikely that we will cause siginificant lost of terrestrial ecosystems, although it will take many generations for the dynamic equilibrium to find the new set points in a lot of areas.

How long will we be around? I don't know. I can definitely see the potential for a collapse of civilizations. Unless there are reasons why they can't, other nations will send help to rebuild those nations. If civilization collapses world wide, I can see pockets of humanity managing to survive. I would not want to be in a large city with imported food and water sources, infrastructure to remove and treat waste water, and so on if the infrastructure went down for an extended time, let alone permanantly.

 

[Fi Webster]

Have you read the book that maps out the absence of humanity? The World Without Us.

No I haven't. Thanks for the tip!

Do you have an opinion on any the end-of-the-Anthropocene books, like James Lovelock's Novacene?

Most climate scientists have taken the red pill. We are all depressed as hell. Some of us have killed ourselves over it, and the rest of us understand why.

Yeh, I think my husband would've offed himself long ago were it not for me and our cats.

I believe if we vanished in a snap, the world would return to something 'far more balanced' way quicker than millions of years. I believe that evidence of our impact will be detectable for far longer. I believe millions of years is not very long. I believe the world will end in a supernova. I believe time is relative. I believe humans have some remarkably good qualities. We are the only species I'm aware of that actively tries to communicate its impact to one another and also actively tries to limit its footprint.

That's actually pretty heartening. I feel better already. =smile=

 

[CWatts]

Whether or not humanity goes extinct I cannot say, but civilization is collapsing around us now.

I definitely feel like we're in the "mad emperor" phase - except the Romans, etc. didn't have nukes.