Tag Archives: capitalocene

Earth & Fire

Earth and Fire: Environmentalism and the Fall of Man

A class project, by Lala St. Fleur

Summary

In arguments over the technical terminology of referring to climate change, and its associated social and environmental crises, as anthropogenic (the fault of all mankind) or capitalogenic (the fault of modern industrial-capitalist institutions), my reflexive 21st century instinct is to blame capitalism for all of the problems of modern-day society, including environmental degradation. However, it also cannot be denied that there have been grave mistakes of the distant past that peoples of the immediate present and potential future are still paying for. I stand with paleoclimatologist William F. Ruddiman’s understanding of the Anthropocene as having started over 10,000 years ago, during the Agricultural Revolution, when mankind moved from nomadic hunter-gatherer societies to sedentary agrarianism (Ruddiman, 2003: 261). I disagree with the notion that the Anthropocene having started during the Industrial Revolution, as Paul J. Crutzen more popularly defined it.

Agricultural Revolution

Around the world, there are longstanding religious beliefs that the natural forces — or rather, nature spirits — of the earth itself are acting out in warning, protest or punishment against the decay of societies that have lost faith and not kept to the old ways of their forebearers. My research paper analyzes etiological and eschatological stories from ancient Greek and Abrahamic religions, that see certain elemental forces (Fire and Earth) and geological events (natural disasters) as manifestations of divine punishment against the wrongdoings of mankind. These stories are directly tied to the Agricultural Revolution.

Earth: The Agricultural Revolution

In the Book of Genesis’ story of Adam and Eve, the first man and woman were expelled from the Garden of Eden after eating the Forbidden Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. As punishment, God exiled Adam and Eve from Paradise, and so, stuck on earth, they had to work the land as farmers, toiling by the sweat of their brow for everything they ate. But the earth was now cursed, and by extension, so were the fruits of all their labor. This story can be seen as reflecting mankind’s transition from hunter-gatherers to agrarian societies.

Cursed is the ground for your sake;
In toil you shall eat of it
All the days of your life.

Genesis 3:17

The story of Adam and Eve’s sons, Cain and Abel, are also interpreted in my paper as allegorical, with Cain representing agrarianism and Abel representing pastoralism. In both Genesis stories, agriculture is directly tied to the sin of hubris. Adam and Eve sought forbidden knowledge. Cain thought his sacrifice of grain was better than Abel’s blood sacrifice of his first flock. In both stories, humans act against the will of God, and both mankind and the land itself suffer for it.

Cain and Abel, by Robert T. Barrett.

My paper connects these biblical stories with archaeological scholarship on Neolithic societies in the Fertile Crescent and Anatolia. Scholars either support or reject the notion that the Agricultural Revolution directly led to not only the formation of sedentary societies and the first cities, but also socio-economic inequality, and anthropogenic environmental degradation (Marcus and Sabloff 2008; Watkins 2006).

Fire: The Industrial Revolution

Rather than examining the Anthropocene through the modern Industrial Revolution of the 1800s, as Crutzen does, instead, my paper looks to ancient stories that describe the Fall of Man, related to technology, industry, and modernity.

In the apocryphal Book of Enoch, heavenly angels described as the Watchers descend to earth to breed giants with humans. They also taught humanity various corruptible knowledge, including, but not limited to warfare. Chief amongst them is Azazel, the Scapegoat.

Heal the earth which the angels have corrupted, and proclaim the healing of the earth, that they may heal the plague, and that all the children of men may not perish through all the secret things that the Watchers have disclosed and have taught their sons. And the whole earth has been corrupted through the works that were taught by Azâzêl: to him ascribe all sin.

Book of Enoch, 10:7-9

This apocryphal Abrahamic story serves as the segue into my segment on Greek mythology, which features another major etiological figure connected to human progress and punishment, the Titan Prometheus.

Prometheus’ punishment for stealing fire for mankind. 6th century BC, Vatican Museum.

My paper uses myths from the poets Hesiod and Aeschylus to highlight the ways that the mastery of fire, technological advancement and human innovation were considered the very foundations of civilized society, as early as the 8th-5th centuries B.C.

Hearken to the miseries that beset mankind how that they were witless before and I [Prometheus] made them to have sense and be endowed with reason.… Knowledge had they neither of houses built of bricks and turned to face the sun, nor yet of work in wood; but dwelt beneath the ground like swarming ants, in sunless caves.

Hesiod, Works and Days, 42-50.

Prometheus bestowed fire to cavemen, teaching them how to master it, and thereby inspiring the development of everything from architecture to art and science. However, Zeus, king of the gods, was angered at humanity gaining access to heavenly fire. As punishment, Prometheus was imprisoned, to be tortured for all eternity, and mankind was given the all-gifted woman, Pandora, of “Pandora’s Box” infamy. Upon opening her jar or box, Pandora unleashed all evils upon the world, including disease, poverty, and warfare.

Up to the present day, Prometheus has been perceived as either a savior god of industrial creativity, or as the corrupting demiurge of industrial destruction (Beller 1984).

Prometheus sculpture at Rockefeller Center, NYC. Behind him is an inscription paraphrased from Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound: “”Prometheus, teacher in every art, brought the fire that hath proved to mortals a means to mighty ends.”

By synthesizing the lessons to be gleaned from the stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Azazel, and Prometheus, and analyzing their parallels with archaeological research, my class project attempts to stimulate an alternate way of thinking about certain things we take for granted: What does it mean for humanity to have evolved, developed, and progressed–even at the expense of the natural environment, and our own societal well-being?

World religions have long held people’s moral decay accountable for environmental decay. Regardless of whether or not climate change is the result of man’s faults in the anthropogenic past or capitalogenic present, the record still shows that it is essentially, fundamentally and ultimately humanity’s fault. The only arguments should be grounded in what we are going to do about it now, to save both the planet, and ourselves.

Resources

  • Aeschylus. Aeschylus, with an English translation by Herbert Weir Smyth, Ph. D. in two volumes. 1. Prometheus Bound. Herbert Weir Smyth, Ph. D. Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press. 1926.
  • Anonymous. The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White. Homeric Hymns. Hugh G. Evelyn-White. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd., 1914.
  • Beller, Manfred. “The Fire of Prometheus and the Theme of Progress in Goethe, Nietzsche, Kafka, and Canetti.” Colloquia Germanica 17, no. 1/2 (1984): 1-13.
  • Charles, Robert Henry. Book of Enoch: Spck Classic. SPCK, 2013.
  • Crutzen, Paul J. “The ‘Anthropocene’.” In Earth System Science in the Anthropocene, pp. 13-18. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, 2006.
  • Demos, Thomas J. “Against the Anthropocene.” Visual Culture and Environment Today (2017): 132.
  • Marcus, Joyce, and Jeremy A. Sabloff, eds. The Ancient City: New Perspectives on Urbanism in the Old and New World. School for Advanced Research, 2008.
  • Ruddiman, William F. “The Anthropogenic Greenhouse Era Began Thousands of Years Ago.” Climatic Change 61, no. 3 (2003): 261-293.
  • Steffen, Will, Paul J. Crutzen, and John R. McNeill. “The Anthropocene: Are Humans Now Overwhelming the Great Forces of Nature.” AMBIO: A Journal of the Human Environment 36, no. 8 (2007): 614-621.
  • Stoekl, Allan. “Marxism, Materialism, and the Critique of Energy.” In Materialism and the Critique of Energy,” edited by Brent Ryan Bellamy and Jeff Diamanti, 1-29. MCM, 2018.
  • Watkins, Trevor. “Neolithisation in Southwest Asia—The Path to Modernity.” Documenta Praehistorica 33 (2006): 71-88.

Discussion Questions

  • Why is it that more often than not, popular culture props Prometheus the Titan up, while castigating Azazel the Scapegoat, Eve (moreso than Adam), and Cain?
  • What is “progress”? Has humanity evolved, or devolved?
  • Is hunter-gathering or agriculture better for the environment? To what extent could modern man ever return to either model?
  • Is technology/industry worth moral & environmental decay?
  • What are we willing to sacrifice to make things right?

Against the Anthropocene

Against the Anthropocene, by Thomas.J. Demos

An annotated bibliography, by Lala St. Fleur.

Core Text

Demos, Thomas J. “Against the Anthropocene.” Visual Culture and Environment Today (2017): 132.

Summary

Demos’ 2017 book is firmly against using the term “Anthropocene” in reference to the ongoing concerns around climate change. In Demos’ view, it only foists the blame of the military-state-corporate interests off onto universal accountability held by all of humanity, rather than to those truly at fault or most responsible for the world’s mounting eco-catastrophes (Demos, 2017: 19). He also challenges the emphasis put on geoengineering projects as solutions to environmental problems. Because the authority to conduct such experiments inevitably favors an imbalance of power between individuals, governments and corporations, Demos is skeptical of anthropocenologists (i.e.: military-state-corporate agents) having the final say as to what measures should be taken to see positive change and real environmental improvement.

Because the “Anthropocene” holds all humans accountable for global climate change, Demos argues that it disavows the unequal distribution of resources, aid, and responsibility between parties who either suffer or benefit the most from its causes and effects. It is the “underlying heteropatriarchal and white supremacist structures” whose fossil fuel industries are the worst perpetrators of environmental abuse, (Demos, 2017: 53). Meanwhile, disenfranchized and poor minorities are most severely affected by the slow violence of government policy, corporate interests, and climate impact. But the consolidated efforts of grassroots activism inside those very communities are also in a position to resist such pressures and hold corporations accountable for their harmful operations. In place of “Anthropocene,” Demos proposes the adoption of the term “Capitalocene” instead. Demos sees this as a “more accurate and politically enabling geological descriptor” for more precisely putting the blame on corporate globalization and industrialization as the main culprits of unchecked climate change (Demos, 2017: 54).

Demos’s methodology involves looking at the utilization of photo imagery circulated by the media and academia, as visualizations that either help shed light on climate crises that corporations would otherwise see silenced (local activism against fracking or development in communities; the victims of marine pollution and oil spills); or help divert attention away from environmental concerns by glorifying mankind’s dominion over nature (incredible mines seen from space; the downplay of the effect of said oil spills; etc.).

Teaching Resources

  • Crutzen, Paul J. “The ‘Anthropocene’.” In Earth system science in the anthropocene, pp. 13-18. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, 2006. Atmospheric chemist Paul J. Crutzen is the scholar who popularized the use of the term “Anthropocene,” in 2000. In this 2006 article, he doubles down on his notions that the current Anthropocene age (starting with the Industrial Revolution) is distinct from the Holocene’s epoch of pre-industrial human activity. Despite Earth’s cycles and systems of global change, Crutzen argues that anthropogenic activity has gone far beyond the bounds of natural atmospheric, chemical, and geological fluctuations.  
  • Stengers, Isabelle. In catastrophic times: Resisting the coming barbarism. Open Humanities Press, 2015. In this rapidly changing epoch, Stengers’ book acknowledges the sense of impotency that the climate crisis can often put in the mindset of people today, who can be informed and educated about the causes of and effects of climate change (and capitalism) yet still participate in overbearing systems that perpetuate it. Stengers challenges the notions of progress and barbarism in the context of modern capitalist structures.
  • Stoekl, Allan. “Marxism, Materialism, and the Critique of Energy.” In Materialism and the Critique of Energy,” edited by Brent Ryan Bellamy and Jeff Diamanti, 1-29. MCM, 2018. Though Stoekl’s article focuses on Marxist concerns of capitalist fetishism that turns both people and nature alike into commodities, he ultimately argues that “merely changing the name of the Anthropocene (to Capitolocene or whatever) would not solve the underlying social and material contradictions” of today’s climate crises (Stoekl, 2018: 55). Market-based approaches to environmental issues only serve to abstract, invert, obscure, and detract from the root problems inherent within fossil duel industries and corporate interests. Geoengineering solutions, therefore will only be protracted over millennia, “effectively implicating dozens of future generations” in an ongoing climate crisis that might never be resolved (Stoekl, 2018: 59).

Discussion Questions

  1. Beyond Crutzen’s interpretation, there are various other understandings of when the Anthropocene began, and what its catalysts were. Is the Anthropocene indeed the product of the Industrial Revolution of the 1800s, or is it instead a far older culture we inherited from the Agricultural Revolution and the rise of the first major civilizations, over 10,000 years ago?
  2. Stengers’ book focuses a light on the issue of capitalism not being all that is was cracked up to be. In the face of the various problems of modernity (climate change being only one crisis of many), what is progress, and what is barbarism? Is it progressive or barbaric to keep pushing forward with technological advancement, even at the cost of environmental decay? Or, is it progress or barbarous to actively try to dismantle institutional systems that have proved ineffective, and even dangerous to humanity and Gaia’s (the very world’s) well-being?
  3. What does a world without capitalism look like, and is it at all possible as long as people continue to be reliant on carbon-based technology? To what ends would any geoengineering models benefit the environment, so long as the earth’s natural resources are commodified and exploited for fuel?