I agree humanity per se is not the problem - it's corporations, the market-driven systems, and their resulting egregores. Interesting to see this syntax in your title. No, the planet does not want to be governed. What? the planet has a will? has preferences? Well, yes - why not? Why not assume that the planet 'calls the shots' for the whole biosphere - and we don't. What humans are doing is ruinous, but I feel the existential threat is to ourselves, not the planet. I expect Gaia will do what it must to survive in reaction to our egregious deviation from the program.
James Lovelock's Gaia Hypothesis never got its due. As a scientist he took pains not to go beyond the evidence and suggest the earth was a sentient, purposeful being. But reading between the lines, I think there was a unifying principle around which humanity might have rallied. David Abram, a deep ecologist and author of "Becoming Animal" said with intuitive confidence: "We live immersed in intelligence, enveloped and informed by a creativity we cannot fathom." Mystery abounds - yet perhaps we could have fathomed Gaia, and even learned to cooperate with it, if fifty years ago our institutions had taken the idea seriously, and poured research into the full extent of the self-regulating systems of our planet. Lovelock probably only scratched the surface. Only the maverick Lynn Margulis dared push the envelope a bit further, against the current of "acceptable" science.
Anyhow, thank you Jonathan for all you do to articulate these issues and promote responsibility in the sense-making space.
Thanks Bill. It occurred to me after writing that the extension of the current “rights of nature” movement, which is usually about protecting rivers and trees(etc) and is not really about rights as such but more about agency, could extend in principle to the planet. As you say, the Gaia hypothesis may need a closer look. 👀
Nicely put, sir. Perhaps Brits see the globe more clearly than we Americans. Might that be based in memory of actually staffing a global empire in the field, rather than just sending in the occasional army and touring musicians? Or perhaps a British fondness for gardening?
Very cool. I found myself bouncing between pragmatic responses—like, the need for collective bodies that have organized structures to them (ie. governance) to disseminate or utilize reformed concepts—and philosophical responses—like the beauty, art, power of concepts themselves; their evolution and ability to pinpoint a complex landscape. Love the critique of Anthropocene and alternative options. Hope the lecture goes well!
As we excellerate engagement with AI - the Aggregated Intel of all 'our best thinking that got us here', we may have forgotten EI - the Earth's Intel, Natures Wood-Wide-Web (hard to count money if you can't breathe)
Biology and data - we are EI code. Could be time (another illusion) to remember, recover and re-Story the EI+AI=O Origin Intel All we need to thrive in whatever 'eposcene' we find ourselves. Profit-Sharing with Earth is the investment with the greatest ROI
Very interesting post, Jonathan. What if not only does it not want to be governed but, also, that it *can't* be? Without care and stewardship there's only, ultimately, the uncontrolability of the world (Hartmut Rosa). Does the problem stem, then, from the desire to control/govern?
Really don't think one can talk about governance unless one addresses capitalism (planetary extraction, global mines) since it undermines notions of the collective good, long-term perspectives, local affection and mutuality/interdependence.
The reason for the need for global governance is the answer you posed in your essay: "we simply do not have an operative collective agency commensurate with the challenges of our times? "
That's right, we do not. "We" are homo sapiens, the apex predator on planet earth. "We" need a new conception of how to get along to survive and thrive on this planet or some of us will do us in during the time of human flourishing before extinction, aka the anthropocene.
However, arriving at global governance requires a new awareness or consciousness regarding our predicament, and that is what is missing. Without that, we will not arrive at a sustainable global governance nor will we really seek it. The United Nations was our most recent and feeble attempt after WWII and the advent of Nuclear Weapons. We now have bio-weapons, genetic engineering, and Artificial Intelligence, but are still mostly at the same level of consciousness as we were in 1945. Uh oh.
To the extent it is possible, and many have debated this and written about it, we need an acceleration of the advancement of our consciousness, but perhaps others can weigh in on whether that is at all possible or occuring sufficiently to meet the challenges of the present moment.
I agree humanity per se is not the problem - it's corporations, the market-driven systems, and their resulting egregores. Interesting to see this syntax in your title. No, the planet does not want to be governed. What? the planet has a will? has preferences? Well, yes - why not? Why not assume that the planet 'calls the shots' for the whole biosphere - and we don't. What humans are doing is ruinous, but I feel the existential threat is to ourselves, not the planet. I expect Gaia will do what it must to survive in reaction to our egregious deviation from the program.
James Lovelock's Gaia Hypothesis never got its due. As a scientist he took pains not to go beyond the evidence and suggest the earth was a sentient, purposeful being. But reading between the lines, I think there was a unifying principle around which humanity might have rallied. David Abram, a deep ecologist and author of "Becoming Animal" said with intuitive confidence: "We live immersed in intelligence, enveloped and informed by a creativity we cannot fathom." Mystery abounds - yet perhaps we could have fathomed Gaia, and even learned to cooperate with it, if fifty years ago our institutions had taken the idea seriously, and poured research into the full extent of the self-regulating systems of our planet. Lovelock probably only scratched the surface. Only the maverick Lynn Margulis dared push the envelope a bit further, against the current of "acceptable" science.
Anyhow, thank you Jonathan for all you do to articulate these issues and promote responsibility in the sense-making space.
Thanks Bill. It occurred to me after writing that the extension of the current “rights of nature” movement, which is usually about protecting rivers and trees(etc) and is not really about rights as such but more about agency, could extend in principle to the planet. As you say, the Gaia hypothesis may need a closer look. 👀
Nicely put, sir. Perhaps Brits see the globe more clearly than we Americans. Might that be based in memory of actually staffing a global empire in the field, rather than just sending in the occasional army and touring musicians? Or perhaps a British fondness for gardening?
Very cool. I found myself bouncing between pragmatic responses—like, the need for collective bodies that have organized structures to them (ie. governance) to disseminate or utilize reformed concepts—and philosophical responses—like the beauty, art, power of concepts themselves; their evolution and ability to pinpoint a complex landscape. Love the critique of Anthropocene and alternative options. Hope the lecture goes well!
Powerful questions. Jonathan. Thank you for posting this. 🙏🏻
As we excellerate engagement with AI - the Aggregated Intel of all 'our best thinking that got us here', we may have forgotten EI - the Earth's Intel, Natures Wood-Wide-Web (hard to count money if you can't breathe)
Biology and data - we are EI code. Could be time (another illusion) to remember, recover and re-Story the EI+AI=O Origin Intel All we need to thrive in whatever 'eposcene' we find ourselves. Profit-Sharing with Earth is the investment with the greatest ROI
Very interesting post, Jonathan. What if not only does it not want to be governed but, also, that it *can't* be? Without care and stewardship there's only, ultimately, the uncontrolability of the world (Hartmut Rosa). Does the problem stem, then, from the desire to control/govern?
Really don't think one can talk about governance unless one addresses capitalism (planetary extraction, global mines) since it undermines notions of the collective good, long-term perspectives, local affection and mutuality/interdependence.
Thanks for the reminder of Rosa in this context. 🙏
Spot on, Jonathan👌
Thanks Jonathan.
The reason for the need for global governance is the answer you posed in your essay: "we simply do not have an operative collective agency commensurate with the challenges of our times? "
That's right, we do not. "We" are homo sapiens, the apex predator on planet earth. "We" need a new conception of how to get along to survive and thrive on this planet or some of us will do us in during the time of human flourishing before extinction, aka the anthropocene.
However, arriving at global governance requires a new awareness or consciousness regarding our predicament, and that is what is missing. Without that, we will not arrive at a sustainable global governance nor will we really seek it. The United Nations was our most recent and feeble attempt after WWII and the advent of Nuclear Weapons. We now have bio-weapons, genetic engineering, and Artificial Intelligence, but are still mostly at the same level of consciousness as we were in 1945. Uh oh.
To the extent it is possible, and many have debated this and written about it, we need an acceleration of the advancement of our consciousness, but perhaps others can weigh in on whether that is at all possible or occuring sufficiently to meet the challenges of the present moment.