Anthropic’s Economist in the Anthropocene

The shock of the anthropocene: the earth, history and us

Dissecting the new theoretical buzzword of the "Anthrop…

The problem of knowledge in the Anthropocene

In the twentieth century, debates about economic planning were largely shaped by arguments concerning knowledge and the acquisition of information. As the century drew to a close, the dispute was a...

Anthropocene Epistemology: Political, Ecological, and Economic Entanglements

This essay critically explores the connection between epistemology, political ecology, economy, and technological developments in the Anthropocene, understood a

Anthropic Economic Index: Insights from Claude 3.7 Sonnet

The second update from the Anthropic Economic Index

Economics for the future – Beyond the superorganism

Our environment and economy are at a crossroads. This paper attempts a cohesive narrative on how human evolved behavior, money, energy, economy and th…

‘Self-termination is most likely’: the history and future of societal collapse

An epic analysis of 5,000 years of civilisation argues that a global collapse is coming unless inequality is vanquished

How May the ‘Anthropocene’ Enable and Constrain Cybersystemic Governance? The ‘Anthropocene Problematique’

A growing awareness of the need for cybernetics and systems thinking (cybersystemic) in praxes of governance to improve human-biosphere relationships in the Anthropocene has become apparent. Nonetheless, mainstream governance informed by linear-causality seems to perpetuate an increasingly inadequate paradigm of dominant first-order/systematic thinking in governing complex interactions between humans and their natural environments. This conundrum is explored through the second-order lens of a systemic inquiry, using an integrative literature review. We discuss limitations of the Anthropocene metaphor and make the case for a reframing of our situation (humans’ co-evolutionary dynamic with the biosphere) as the ‘Anthropocene problematique’. This reframing as a systemic-duality offers more conducive affordances for trajectory-shifting cybersystemic governance to emerge. Aligning with a body of literature evidencing the influence of language on human cognition, we argue that by joining up the strengths of both ideas, ‘Anthropocene problematique’ may form a conceptual device amenable to changing worldviews and guiding practical action in governing human-biosphere relationships. We suggest a conceptual framework for practitioners to design and enact purposeful systems of cybersystemic governance with potential to improve situated Anthropocene problematiques. This framing and theoretical proposal are motivated by a need for shifts towards a social purpose of healing human-biosphere relationships in current governance systems in the Anthropocene-world.

The Gargantuan Lie That is Collapsing The World’s Climate

Thinking we have time left to address climate change, or that “Net Zero by 2050” will save us, is driving us toward full social collapse in ways that become more obvious with every new broken temperature record.

Beyond technofix: Thinking with Epimetheus in the anthropocene

The Prometheus myth has long now provided inspiration for those who envision solutions to environmental issues. Prometheus is the figure par excellence of human forethought and progress in the anthropocene. In this article, we introduce the concept of ambient Prometheanism to describe the way of thinking that foregrounds foresight and anticipation and advances technological solutions developed by capital and energy-intensive projects. We question this stance, arguing that ambient Prometheanism, with its emphasis on technofix, leads to the economisation and depoliticisation of planetary environmental issues. Following Bernard Stiegler, we recover from the myth the figure of Epimetheus, Prometheus’ brother, as well as his associated faculty, epimetheia to theorise what we call an ‘Epimethean politics’. Thinking the anthropocene from the perspective of ambient Prometheanism and Epimetheanism means to consider the role of technology in climate politics, and in particular to make the case for the importance of afterthought in face of unintended consequences and accumulated errors. To substantiate our argument, we outline the challenge posed by emerging solutions focussed on technological intensification (geoengineering) and socio-economic acceleration (green growth and accelerationism). An Epimethean politics of the climate requires to use reflexivity as a capacity to anticipate, but also to mobilise epimetheia to account for accidents and past mistakes. Such a politics builds from an alternative conception of technology, one that radically differs from ambient Prometheanism. Finally we read as actualisations of Epimethean politics contemporary eco-political struggles and their imperatives for multispecies living and convivial livelihoods.

The ultrasocial origin of the Anthropocene

The current geological epoch has been dubbed the Anthropocene—the age of humans. We argue that the roots of the Anthropocene lie in the agricultural revolution that began some 8000years ago. Unique human psychological and cultural characteristics were present in our distant hunter–gatherer past, but in terms of the biophysical impact of our species, agricultural represented an unequivocal and decisive evolutionary break. With the transition to agriculture human society began to function as a superorganism functioning as a single unit designed by social natural selection to produce economic surplus. Where environmental conditions were permitted, early human agricultural societies followed the same pattern as a few social insects and exhibited explosive population growth, complex and detailed division of labor, intensive resource exploitation, territorial expansion, and a social organization favoring the survival and growth of the supergroup over the well-being of individuals within the group. Similar economic forces lie behind ultrasociality in social insects and humans—increased productivity from the division of labor, increasing returns to scale, and the exploitation of stocks of productive resources. Exploring the evolutionary mechanisms behind ultrasociality offers insights into the growth imperative that threatens the stability of the earth's life support systems.

The Fallacy of Endless Economic Growth

What economists around the world get wrong about the future.

Towards the Symbiocene: Building an Eco-Civilisation with thought-leader, Jeremy Lent

Jeremy Lent is a long time friend of the podcast. His new book, 'Ecocivilization: Making a World That Works for All' is coming out at the end of April 2026 and so we got together to discuss what an Ecocivilisation is, why we so badly need to become one, and how we might get there.

Planetary carambolage: The evolutionary political economy of technology, nature and work

The following editorial introduces the special issue (SI) on “Work, Environment and Planetary-scale Computation in Political-Economic Evolution”. Here, however, we go beyond an outline of what each contribution to the SI addresses, and attempt to draw a more pronounced shared embedding of the arguments that have come to the fore. The original idea of this SI was to synthesize a range of contemporary global political-economic challenges, i.e. (1) technology (esp. digital transformation), (2) nature (esp. ecological crisis) and (3) work (esp. precarization via the evolving platform economy). The main argument developed in this editorial reflection focuses on the common ground and origin of those processes found in the complex evolution of capitalist development. We frame the latter by assigning it a new term, i.e. “planetary carambolage”.

Extinctiopolitics: Existential Risk Studies, the Extinctiopolitical Unconscious, and the Billionaires’ Exodus from Earth

One of the most prominent intellectual attempts to grapple with human extinction in recent decades is existential risk studies.