Abundant Earth: Toward an Ecological Civilization

317 Pages·2019·1.797 MB·English

by  Eileen Crist

Abundant Earth

Abundant Earth
Toward an Ecological Civilization
EILEEN CRIST
The University of Chicago Press Chicago and London
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2019 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced
in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except
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Published 2019
Printed in the United States of America
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ISBN-1 3: 978- 0-2 26-5 9677- 8 (cloth)
ISBN-1 3: 978- 0-2 26-5 9680-8 (paper)
ISBN-1 3: 978- 0-2 26-5 9694- 5 (e-b ook)
DOI: https://d oi. org/ 10. 7208/c hicago/9 780226596945 .001. 0001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Crist, Eileen, 1961– author.
Title: Abundant Earth : toward an ecological civilization /
Eileen Crist.
Description: Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press,
2019. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifi ers: LCCN 2018017666 | ISBN 9780226596778 (cloth :
alk. paper) | ISBN 9780226596808 (pbk. : alk. paper) |
ISBN 9780226596945 (e-book)
Subjects: LCSH: Biodiversity conservation. | Human-animal
relationships. | Human-plant relationships.
Classifi cation: LCC QH75 .C735 2018 | DDC 333.95/16—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018017666
This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48– 1992
(Permanence of Paper).
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction 1
PART ONE The Destruction of Life and the Human
Supremacy Complex
1 Unraveling Earth’s Biodiversity 11
2 Human Supremacy and the Roots of the Ecological Crisis 44
3 The Framework of Resources and Techno-M anagerialism 66
PART TWO Discursive Knots
4 Is the Human Impact Natural? 83
5 The Trouble with Debunking Wilderness 113
6 Freedom, Entitlement, and the Fate of the Nonhuman World 137
PART THREE Scaling Down and Pulling Back
7 Dystopia at the Doorstep 167
8 Welcoming Limitations 185
9 Restoring Abundant Earth 214
Epilogue: Toward an Ecological Civilization 243
Notes 249 References 275 Index 301

Acknowledgments
I thank my good friends and colleagues, from whom I
have learned so much and with whom I have enjoyed
instructive conversations over the years: David Abram,
Marc Bekoff, Joe Bish, Tom Butler, Phil Cafaro, Matthew
Calarco, Martha Campbell, Bryce Carter, Lauren Coo-
per, Chris Cox, Patrick Curry, John Davis, Marcia Davitt,
Dominick DellaS alla, Adam Dickerson, Eric Dinerstein,
Anne Ehrlich, Paul Ehrlich, Robert Engelman, Tim Filbert,
Dave Foreman, Joe Gray, Donna Haraway, Brian Hen-
ning, Sandy Irvine, Wes Jackson, Dale Jamieson, Derrick
Jensen, David Johns, Paul Keeling, Christopher Ketcham,
Lierre Keith, David Kidner, Helen Kopnina, Lisi Krall, Jenn
Lawrence, Harvey Locke, Damien Mander, Jerry Mander,
Richard Manning, Douglas McCauley, Bill McKibben,
Stephanie Mills, George Monbiot, Camilo Mora, R oderick
Nash, David Nibert, Richie Nimmo, Reed Noss, David Orr,
Stuart Pimm, Luke Philip Plotica, H. Bruce Rinker, Wil-
liam Ripple, Callum Roberts, Holmes Rolston, Deborah
Bird Rose, William Ryerson, Ken Smail, Michael Soulé,
Gary Steiner, Alfred Tauber, Bron Taylor, Doug Tompkins,
Kristine McDivitt Tompkins, Jack Turner, Will Tuttle,
Thom van Dooren, Sacha Vignieri, John Waldman, Haydn
Washington, Don Weeden, Tony Weis, Alan Weisman, Ian
White, Bryn Whiteley, Terry Tempest Williams, E. O. Wil-
son, and George Wuerthner. I also want to acknowledge
a huge debt to my undergraduate and graduate school
teachers, most especially Mark Gould, Michael Lynch, Jeff
Coulter, Lynn Margulis, and Frederick Wasserman.
I wish also to express my gratitude to all my colleagues
vii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
in the Department of Science, Technology, and Society at Virginia
Tech—one could not wish for more supportive and warmhearted peo-
ple to work with. Also a big thank- you goes out to the Department of
Environmental Studies of New York University for hosting me as a visit-
ing scholar in 2014–1 5. I am indebted to funding from the Foundation
for Deep Ecology and the Don Weeden Foundation, which made my
research year in New York City possible. I would like to thank my Uni-
versity of Chicago editors, Christie Henry, Miranda Martin, and Mark
Reschke, for their enthusiasm, professionalism, diligence, and support.
I also thank Pascal Pocheron of Polity Press for generous feedback on
an early draft of my book proposal.
I am forever grateful to the guiding lights in my life, Dr. Robert E.
Svoboda, Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, Alejandro Chaoul, Marcy Vaugn,
Dharma Mittra, Krishna Das, Sharon Gannon, and David Life. I am
also deeply grateful to my parents, Robert Crist and Despina Lala- Crist,
who raised me on nature and poetry, and to my beloved brother Ray
Crist who is an original thinker and practitioner in his own right. I ex-
tend my heartfelt gratitude to my second family, Cynthia and Dennis
Patzig, Joanna Patzig, Zach Patzig, and Alice Lee, for their love and sup-
port. Last, I thank my husband, Rob Patzig, for being in my life, for his
compassion, strength, and illumination. I dedicate this work to him.
viii
Introduction
Cosmologist Brian Swimme relates a personal story that
captures the conundrum of life’s crisis in our time. Af-
ter hearing the announcement of a meeting of lead-
ing life scientists that humanity’s impact is heading the
biosphere toward a mass extinction, he went to bed that
night deeply disturbed. First thing in the morning, he
reached for the New York Times to see how this earth-
shattering news was reported in the media. Page after
page there was nothing. Finally, on page 26 he found a
terse report of the announcement. Swimme’s shock at the
media’s under whelming reception was spot on: The New
York Times found twenty- fi ve pages of more important re-
porting than the news of a human-d riven mass extinction
on the horizon.
The Earth has indeed come upon hard times. With
an estimated extinction rate one thousand times higher
than the natural rate of extinction, a mass extinction
event looms. Species and subspecies are disappearing,
most before we get to meet them. Huge declines in pop-
ulations of wild animals and plants, as well as the de-
struction of wholesale ecologies, are occurring across the
board. Phenomena of biological abundance, like animal
migrations and wildlife spectacles, are disappearing. Two
recent fi ndings speak volumes. In the last fi fty years, more
than half the Earth’s wild animals disappeared. In the
last forty years, 10 percent of Earth’s already contracted
wilderness was destroyed. Without a profound shift in
humanity’s historical course, the biosphere will soon be-
come completely dominated by human beings, domestic
1