Next Nature's must reads

Simulations are now more meaningful than the reality they represent. Media technologies play a fundamental role in our construction of meaning. This is not necessarily a bad thing, nor is it entirely new. Yet, it has consequences for our understanding of virtual and real. Baudrillard uses the concepts of the simulacra - the copy without an original - and simulation. These terms are crucial to an understanding of the postmodern,  addressing the concept of mass reproduction and reproducibility that characterizes our electronic media culture. Do we still have genuine experiences at all, or are we living in a Society of Simulations?

Get Simulacra and Simulation here.

Geographical and environmental factors have undeniably shaped our modern world. The developments in agriculture paved the way for writing, technology, governments and organized religions. Yet, how  has human history unfolded so differently across the globe? Diamond shows how basic agricultural differences between early societies magnified over time leading to the vast differences between societies’ health, technology, and social structure. This progression in certain parts of the world, mixed with the desire for power, led to the conquering and decimating of preliterate cultures; with this, the spreading of nasty germs and weapons of war. 

Get Guns, Germs, and Steel here.

100,000 years ago, at least six human species inhabited the Earth; today there is just one: Homo sapiens. In retelling the human story, Harrari walks  us through the evolution of humanity. Framed around four key milestones and summarizing the development of the human psyche, the book starts with the cognitive revolution around 70,000 ago, which kick started our history, and traces it all the way to the agricultural revolution around 12,000 years ago which speeded it up. Each stage of evolution is deconstructed to examine humanity’s  tenancy on  the planet, our belief systems and what the world will be like in the millennia to come.

Get Sapiens here.

For multispecies feminist theorist Donna J. Haraway, “it matters what stories make worlds, what worlds make stories.” She studies the current age as the Chthulucene (chthon, meaning “earth” in Greek), rejecting the doomsday rhetoric of the Anthropocene,  an era in which the human and nonhuman are inextricably linked. For Harraway, learning to stay with the trouble means existing on a damaged Earth, and to find the means to build a more livable future. The book offers proactive ways in which we may reimagine our relation to Earth and all its inhabitants, “making kin” with the species we share the planetwith and interacting from a multispecies perspective. 

Get Staying with the Trouble here.

Technology is a living, evolving organism with its own needs. A wild system that is compared to the processes of biological evolution. The term “technium” is used to describe the growth of the globalized, interconnected technological world we live in today. Kelly gives insights to a new theory of technology, offering three lessons. To listen to the desires of technology in order to prepare ourselves for what tech is to come, to adapt principles of proaction and engagement to steer technology to its best role and lastly, to align ourselves with long term necessities of this superorganism so we can truly capture its full gifts.

Get What Technology Wants here.

At the age of fifty, Lovelock presented his Gaia hypothesis, exploring how all living matter is connected; a superorganism that optimizes conditions for life on Earth. At the age of 100, Lovelock introduces a new theory about the future of all life on Earth. After the Anthropocene, a Novacene unfolds. Lovelock argues that artificial intelligence, cyborgs and other technological organisms will have a greater impact on Earth than human beings. He  teaches us that nature is not static but dynamic. What we see today as artificial and unnatural will in time form a new phase for life on Earth. Both human and artificial intelligence is the only hope Earth life has to survive the sun's burnout in five billion years. Lovelock's philosophy shows that we will not be unprepared. We still have time to mend this existential catastrophe.

Get Novacene here.

"People don't actually read newspapers – they get into them every morning like a hot bath.” For philosopher Marshall McLuhan, the medium of communication, as opposed to the content that they carry, is the focus of study. When McLuhan states "the electric light is pure information," it is the lightbulb itself creating an environment by its presence. Read today, the internet is the medium that creates the environment. He suggests that the medium affects the society through its characteristics, rather than its content. The medium is the message in the global village we find ourselves in.

Get The Medium is the Massage here.

Envision a future of sustaining life on a fragile planet from the lesson of a rare mushroom and weed: the Matsutake. The mushroom grows in human-distrubed forests across the northern hemisphere, nurturing trees and helping life grow in daunting places. Tsing uses this to explore what manages to live in the ruins humans have made. Through exploring the unexpected corners of capitalism, fungal ecologies and forest histories, Tsing helps us to better understand the promise of cohabitation in a time of massive human destruction. A prerequisite for continuing life on earth, the book relates to capitalist destruction and collaborative survival within multispecies landscapes.

Get The Mushroom at the End of the World here.

Technology has infiltrated our intimate spaces. Now more than ever, across the globe, we look towards simulated relationships instead of the real thing. The online world offers a veil of companionship, connectivity and sociality. MIT professor Turkle discusses the impact on our inner selves, with this omnipresent connection leading us into a deep solitude. Alone Together analyzes the impact of our technology on our emotional selves, examining the unsettling relations between our loved ones, friends and family. Is our relationship with technology altering what it means to be human?

Get Alone Together here.