Anthropocene! Beyond the Natural (Oregon State University) 2017

“The Anthropocene! Beyond the Natural?” presentation at Oregon State University, March 16, 2017, at a book launch for Stephen M. Gardiner and Allen Thompson, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Environmental Ethics ( New York: Oxford University Press, 2017). Rolston was one of four contributors to the handbook who made short presentations at this event, followed by a panel discussion. Only the Rolston presentation is here, 31 minutes. Online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/181769

The print version of the article is online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/178714.

We are now entering the Anthropocene Epoch. So runs a recent enthusiastic claim. Humans can and ought go beyond the natural and powerfully engineer a better planet, managing for climate change, building new ecosystems for a more prosperous future. Perhaps the Anthropocene is inevitable. But: Rejoice? Accommodate? Accept it, alas? Perhaps the wiser, more ethical course is not so much "beyond" as "keeping the natural in symbiosis" with humans. Enter the Semi-Anthropocene! Basically Natural! Carefully!

A similar presentation was at the Fall 2012 Center for Collaborative Conservation (https://collaborativeconservation.org/) Seminar and Discussion Series, "Power and Ethics in (Collaborative) Conservation", August 28, 2012, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado. This series focused on the work that the CCC's Collaborative Conservation Fellows have been doing across the Western U.S. and around the world. Rolston's talk is online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/68177