Thinking Through Climate Change

In this creative exploration of climate change and the big questions confronting our high-energy civilization, Adam Briggle connects the history of philosophy with current events to shed light on the Anthropocene (the age of humanity).

Briggle offers a framework to help us understand the many perspectives and policies on climate change. He does so through the idea that energy is a paradox: changing sameness. From this perennial philosophical mystery, he argues that a high-energy civilization is bound to create more and more paradoxes. These paradoxes run like fissures through our orthodox picture of energy as the capacity to do work and control fate. Climate change is the accumulation of these fissures and the question is whether we can sustain technoscientific control and economic growth. It may be that our world is about change radically, imploring us to start thinking heterodox thoughts.

Auteur

Adam Briggle is Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at the University of North Texas. He is the author of A Rich Bioethics (2010) and A Field Philosopher's Guide to Fracking (2015).

Contenu

Preface

1. Introduction

Part I: Energy Paradox

2. The Unnatural Growth of the Natural

3. Walrus Guts and Snake Brains

4. From Virtues to Volts

5. Trespassing 6. I Kant Believe You

Part II. Energy Orthodox

7. First World Problems

8. Factor M

9. Putting Descartes before the Horse

10. Convenience

11. Decoupling

12. Prometheus 2.0

Part III. Energy Heterodox

13. Look at the Beaver Looking

14. Invention is the Mother of Necessity

15. E, Neutrality, and Democracy

16. Magic, Machines, and Markets

17. The Honey Badger in the Coal Mine

18. Love, Death, and Carbon

19. Conclusion: Climate Change and the Future of Humanity

Index