Over the past two centuries, especially since the 1950s, a dramatic shift has been unfolding in how we understand humanity's place in the universe. This article explains. (4,500 words)
No doubt that these scenarios stoke fear in the hearts of those (mostly unconsciously) steeped in Western philosophy and worldviews (especially scientific materialism). Perhaps this is your intended audience, but many other cultures and traditions (notably those from Asia because they left plenty of written records, but also those that have been rendered physically extinct by or assimilated into "Western civilization") have always considered life (and humanity) to be cyclical/transitory and also "unpindownable."
"Humanity" is a conceptual construct, a product of mind, not something found "out there"--it, like any other concept, does not withstand analytical and empirical deconstruction, as Buddhist philosophers like Nagarjuna and Vasubandhu have demonstrated. That's not a nod to nihilism--on the contrary!--but a plea not to take concepts too seriously because doing so invariably creates mental halls of mirrors from which it becomes very difficult to escape.
Fascinating. I agree about "humanity" being a construct -- my approach, at least so far (and you're welcome to criticize this!) -- is to straightforwardly define the term as denoting our species. There's a debate right now in philosophy circles about whether our notions of humanity go beyond this -- Elizabeth Finneron-Burns wrote a paper about this. Without a doubt, there definitely are normative definitions of humanity. But I've opted to go with the biological conception because I think it makes discussions of "human extinction" much, much clearer. Does this make sense?
Also, yes, I'm specifically focused on the Western tradition -- I don't have a very good understanding of non-Western traditions, which I think is a flaw of my scholarship. Despite my book being quite long, it's astonishing how narrow the focus is: Western thinkers (most of whom are white dudes!). Thanks so much for your comment!
Thank you for your response, Émile. As a biologist by training, I concur that the biological species concept makes great sense within the natural sciences. But step outside it, and great trouble looms. Untold harms (and misuse) can come from that narrow definition (as you no doubt well know).
All notions of "species" become more fuzzy and cloud-like when looked at more closely, even (or especially) with the razor-sharp instruments of modern science. Other traditions have intuited this much better than the present and prevailing one that largely relies on reductionism (and utilitarianism).
I suppose there is debate as to whether or not Buddhism is a religion, but this essay reproduces my pet peeve of equating Christianity with religion as such (and it treats Christianity as a kind of monolith, but that's another issue). But Buddhism puts impermanence at the center of its worldview and develops spiritual practices to help us come to terms with it. So there is at least one religion that has a kind of extinctionism - and an acceptance that extinction is better than the suffering that attends existence - that is central.
Great point! Except that Buddhism posits a cyclical eschatology, whereby some humans always survive the cycle, entering into a new phase ad infinitum. There is an interesting question about whether humanity would continue to exist if everyone were to attain nirvana. I discuss this a bit in the book!
Re: Christianity and religion, I'm specifically focusing on the Western tradition -- which I could have made clearer! I also completely agree that there are *many* interpretations of Christianity. This is also something I discuss in the book, but decided to leave out above because the article was already quite long!
Thanks so much for reading, and sharing your thoughts here. Really appreciate it!
I appreciate your writing and assigned the TESCREAL essay you wrote with Timnit Gebru to my class. You just stumbled into something that always makes me testy! Thank you for the generous response.
There's a kind of tension between that essay and this one I'll be contemplating, but my thoughts on the tension between "accepting extinction" and "critiquing eugenics" are really half-baked.
Ah, fascinating! What exactly do you mean by that "tension"? I'm genuinely very curious! My apologies if I'm just not getting it. :-) Thanks again for your comment -- re: testy, I have a headache, and actually worried that my response might come across as a bit pissy. I hope that wasn't the case!
It wasn't! Looks like we both did a good job of letting civility override mood. :)
I'll need to think about the tension more - every time I tried to elaborate, I just wrote nonsense, so maybe I'm going down a dead end. I'll touch base if it gets clearer!
I get so worried about the climate crisis and societal collapse that I completely forget about the possibility of a super volcanic eruption :D I thoroughly agree with your perspective that while full-blown human extinction is unlikely in the near future, civilization as we know it is not going to survive the 21st century. And I think humanity will see many different post-apocalyptic scenarios, a bit like in The Last of Us: some communities will live under dystopian, totalitarian, militarized regimes, some will create fundamentalist cults, some will try to live in isolation, others will build anarchist communes... My view is that reality usually ends up somewhere in the middle between our best and worst expectations.
I think me personally I have never seen the idea of humanity eventually going extinct through natural or unnatural processes as a bad thing, mainly because I view it as a natural process. Additionally, there is comfort that when the heat death of the universe (or whatever end to the universe one believes) occurs other civilizations and species will have gone extinct over the course of
trillions of years.
I take comfort in the fact that humanity isn’t alone in the journey to the end of the universe, and that other species will join and hop off along the ride. And then in the end we’ll all meet up in the restaurant at the end of the universe and share our stories…sorry if that got a little strange there :).
Oh also Émile two things: I said you an email the other day (new one) that I was wondering if you could check that out. And the other is that I wondering if I could ask you something in like a DM or other email so let me know if that’d be possible.
No doubt that these scenarios stoke fear in the hearts of those (mostly unconsciously) steeped in Western philosophy and worldviews (especially scientific materialism). Perhaps this is your intended audience, but many other cultures and traditions (notably those from Asia because they left plenty of written records, but also those that have been rendered physically extinct by or assimilated into "Western civilization") have always considered life (and humanity) to be cyclical/transitory and also "unpindownable."
"Humanity" is a conceptual construct, a product of mind, not something found "out there"--it, like any other concept, does not withstand analytical and empirical deconstruction, as Buddhist philosophers like Nagarjuna and Vasubandhu have demonstrated. That's not a nod to nihilism--on the contrary!--but a plea not to take concepts too seriously because doing so invariably creates mental halls of mirrors from which it becomes very difficult to escape.
Fascinating. I agree about "humanity" being a construct -- my approach, at least so far (and you're welcome to criticize this!) -- is to straightforwardly define the term as denoting our species. There's a debate right now in philosophy circles about whether our notions of humanity go beyond this -- Elizabeth Finneron-Burns wrote a paper about this. Without a doubt, there definitely are normative definitions of humanity. But I've opted to go with the biological conception because I think it makes discussions of "human extinction" much, much clearer. Does this make sense?
Also, yes, I'm specifically focused on the Western tradition -- I don't have a very good understanding of non-Western traditions, which I think is a flaw of my scholarship. Despite my book being quite long, it's astonishing how narrow the focus is: Western thinkers (most of whom are white dudes!). Thanks so much for your comment!
Thank you for your response, Émile. As a biologist by training, I concur that the biological species concept makes great sense within the natural sciences. But step outside it, and great trouble looms. Untold harms (and misuse) can come from that narrow definition (as you no doubt well know).
All notions of "species" become more fuzzy and cloud-like when looked at more closely, even (or especially) with the razor-sharp instruments of modern science. Other traditions have intuited this much better than the present and prevailing one that largely relies on reductionism (and utilitarianism).
I suppose there is debate as to whether or not Buddhism is a religion, but this essay reproduces my pet peeve of equating Christianity with religion as such (and it treats Christianity as a kind of monolith, but that's another issue). But Buddhism puts impermanence at the center of its worldview and develops spiritual practices to help us come to terms with it. So there is at least one religion that has a kind of extinctionism - and an acceptance that extinction is better than the suffering that attends existence - that is central.
Great point! Except that Buddhism posits a cyclical eschatology, whereby some humans always survive the cycle, entering into a new phase ad infinitum. There is an interesting question about whether humanity would continue to exist if everyone were to attain nirvana. I discuss this a bit in the book!
Re: Christianity and religion, I'm specifically focusing on the Western tradition -- which I could have made clearer! I also completely agree that there are *many* interpretations of Christianity. This is also something I discuss in the book, but decided to leave out above because the article was already quite long!
Thanks so much for reading, and sharing your thoughts here. Really appreciate it!
I appreciate your writing and assigned the TESCREAL essay you wrote with Timnit Gebru to my class. You just stumbled into something that always makes me testy! Thank you for the generous response.
There's a kind of tension between that essay and this one I'll be contemplating, but my thoughts on the tension between "accepting extinction" and "critiquing eugenics" are really half-baked.
Ah, fascinating! What exactly do you mean by that "tension"? I'm genuinely very curious! My apologies if I'm just not getting it. :-) Thanks again for your comment -- re: testy, I have a headache, and actually worried that my response might come across as a bit pissy. I hope that wasn't the case!
It wasn't! Looks like we both did a good job of letting civility override mood. :)
I'll need to think about the tension more - every time I tried to elaborate, I just wrote nonsense, so maybe I'm going down a dead end. I'll touch base if it gets clearer!
I get so worried about the climate crisis and societal collapse that I completely forget about the possibility of a super volcanic eruption :D I thoroughly agree with your perspective that while full-blown human extinction is unlikely in the near future, civilization as we know it is not going to survive the 21st century. And I think humanity will see many different post-apocalyptic scenarios, a bit like in The Last of Us: some communities will live under dystopian, totalitarian, militarized regimes, some will create fundamentalist cults, some will try to live in isolation, others will build anarchist communes... My view is that reality usually ends up somewhere in the middle between our best and worst expectations.
I think me personally I have never seen the idea of humanity eventually going extinct through natural or unnatural processes as a bad thing, mainly because I view it as a natural process. Additionally, there is comfort that when the heat death of the universe (or whatever end to the universe one believes) occurs other civilizations and species will have gone extinct over the course of
trillions of years.
I take comfort in the fact that humanity isn’t alone in the journey to the end of the universe, and that other species will join and hop off along the ride. And then in the end we’ll all meet up in the restaurant at the end of the universe and share our stories…sorry if that got a little strange there :).
Oh also Émile two things: I said you an email the other day (new one) that I was wondering if you could check that out. And the other is that I wondering if I could ask you something in like a DM or other email so let me know if that’d be possible.
Also great article as always.