There is a rising conscience of the effects of humans on the planetary system. A new book Altered Earth: Getting the Anthropocene Right by Julia Adeney Thomas, Ed. Cambridge University Press, 2022, contains 12 essays by 19 scholars, that seek to set out the scientific evidence and the “human terms”’ that define the Anthropocene. Between Harari's Homo Deus and Thierry Gaudin's "planetary gardening" (see The world in 2025: A challenge to reason (fiuc.org) the search for appropriate planetary governance is on.
In a review of Altered Earth in the journal Science, E C.Ellis and M Maslin (https://www.science.org/doi/ full/10.1126/science.abq1474) comment: "Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this book is what is left out.... Where is the essay on defining the Anthropocene in relation to the wealthiest people on Earth—those most responsible for climate change? Where are the billion black Anthropocenes (A Billion Black Anthropocenes or None — University of Minnesota Press (umn.edu)) and the communities who suffered as a result of European colonialism? What of the Indigenous peoples who have sustained Earth’s biodiversity for millennia? In Altered Earth, this fertile and important ground for discussion is left to others.
