Disciplines
Philosophy
Abstract
The new geological epoch we call the Anthropocene is not just a scientific classification. It marks a radical transformation in the background conditions of life on earth, one taken for granted by much of who we are and what we hope for.
The real-world consequences of climate change bring new significance to some very traditional philosophical questions about reason, agency, responsibility, community, and Man’s place in Nature. The focus is shifting from imagining and promoting the Good Life to the survival of the species. Deep Time, Dark Times challenges us to re-imagine ourselves as a species, taking on a geological consciousness. Drawing promiscuously on the work of Nietzsche, Heidegger, Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze, as well as the science of climate change, David Wood reflects on the historical series of displacements of both the privilege of the earth, and of the human, from Copernicus through Darwin and Freud to the declaration of the age of the Anthropocene. In these brief lively chapters, Wood poses questions centered around our individual and collective political agency. Might not human exceptionalism be reborn as a sort of hyperbolic responsibility rather than privilege?
David Wood is W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University.
Recommended Citation
Wood, David, "Deep Time, Dark Times [Table of Contents]" (2018). Philosophy & Theory. 19.
https://research.library.fordham.edu/philos/19
