Learning to Die in the Anthropocene

Publisher's Summary

Coming home from the war in Iraq, US Army private Roy Scranton thought he'd left the world of strife behind. Then he watched as new calamities struck America, heralding a threat far more dangerous than ISIS or al-Qaeda: Hurricane Katrina, Superstorm Sandy, megadrought - the shock and awe of global warming.

Our world is changing. Rising seas, spiking temperatures, and extreme weather imperil global infrastructure, crops, and water supplies. Conflict, famine, plagues, and riots menace from every quarter. From war-stricken Baghdad to the melting Arctic, human-caused climate change poses a danger not only to political and economic stability but to civilization itself...and to what it means to be human. Our greatest enemy, it turns out, is ourselves. The warmer, wetter, more chaotic world we now live in - the Anthropocene - demands a radical new vision of human life.

In this bracing response to climate change, Roy Scranton combines memoir, reportage, philosophy, and Zen wisdom to explore what it means to be human in a rapidly evolving world, taking listeners on a journey through street protests, the latest findings of earth scientists, a historic UN summit, millennia of geological history, and the persistent vitality of ancient literature. Expanding on his influential New York Times essay (the number-one most-emailed article the day it appeared, and selected for Best American Science and Nature Writing 2014), Scranton responds to the existential problem of global warming by arguing that in order to survive, we must come to terms with our mortality.

Plato argued that to philosophize is to learn to die. If that's true, says Scranton, then we have entered humanity's most philosophical age - for this is precisely the problem of the Anthropocene. The trouble now is that we must learn to die not as individuals but as a civilization.

Roy Scranton has published in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Rolling Stone, Boston Review, and Theory and Event and has been interviewed on NPR's Fresh Air, among other media.

©2015 Roy Scranton (P)2016 Audible, Inc.

Critic Reviews

"In Learning to Die in the Anthropocene, Roy Scranton draws on his experiences in Iraq to confront the grim realities of climate change. The result is a fierce and provocative book." (Elizabeth Kolbert, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History)

"Roy Scranton's Learning to Die in the Anthropocene presents, without extraneous bullshit, what we must do to survive on Earth. It's a powerful, useful, and ultimately hopeful book that more than any other I've read has the ability to change people's minds and create change. For me, it crystallizes and expresses what I've been thinking about and trying to get a grasp on. The economical way it does so, with such clarity, sets the book apart from most others on the subject." (Jeff VanderMeer, author of the Southern Reach trilogy)

"Roy Scranton lucidly articulates the depth of the climate crisis with an honesty that is all too rare, then calls for a reimagined humanism that will help us meet our stormy future with as much decency as we can muster. While I don't share his conclusions about the potential for social movements to drive ambitious mitigation, this is a wise and important challenge from an elegant writer and original thinker. A critical intervention." (Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate)

A Lot to Reflect On

Very thought provoking book. It did not take quite the path I had hoped. But I recommend it heartily just the same.

This book deals with the topic of humanity coming to grasp with what might be the end of our civilization. An end that we have essentially brought on ourselves. There is nothing optimistic or hopeful in this book. The author sees no way out of the mess we have made of our planet and clearly believes that it is far too late to affect meaningful change and all of the "solutions" we have come up with to address the poisoning of our planet are too little, too late. He quickly dismisses most of the solutions that even now the eternal optimists among us promote - solar, wind and hyrdo power.

He shines light on many of the hypocritical events activists use to garner attention to their cause, and quickly explains why demonstrations, sit-ins, marches, etc. have absolutely no effect on the society they want to touch.

The author seems to have gone through the stages of grief and is now at the point of acceptance and asks the reader to join him there. Once we have accepted the inevitable, he believes, we can start discussing how humanity could and should work through the next steps, how we prepare, what and who we look to for guidance (not necessarily scientist, he thinks it is too late for them, but philosophers.) It is as if he wants civilization to think about how we can grow old gracefully and accept our fate without losing our humanity. Only once we get to this point, can we figure out if there is a path forward for at least some of us, so we can have some influence on the next civilization this planet creates.

It has been several days since read this and I find myself thinking about the book frequently. Very powerful.

5 of 5 people found this review helpful

Grief Counseling for Civilization

In this existential meditation, Roy Scranton is not setting out to get you to go solar, or ride your bike to work. He's trying to convince you to accept that global warming is changing the world and that life as we know it is unsustainable. That humanity's greatest threat is "not terrorism, not WMDs but the machine of civilization breaking down," and the sooner we collectively accept this and the better we can cope and adapt.

With the prognosis as it is, a book like this is long overdue. A grief counselor for humanity. Scranton writes of serving in the military, "to survive as a soldier I had to learn to accept the inevitability of my own death, for humanity to to survive in the Anthropocene, we need to learn to live with and through the end of our civilization." The only way forward is acceptance.

This is a rich and deep philosophy and necessary for thinking and sensitive people.

5 of 5 people found this review helpful

Eye opening!

When you realize its not about you and you alone. Open your gobal eyes people.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Just Environmental Threats 101

This is a good book, but if you are already informed (or took just 1 or 2 college courses) about the changing climate and other environmental threats, you won't find anything new.

This is a great book.

The writing is concise and beautiful. The lessons about living, being, working and dying are profound, and they are no preachings. it will speak to you if you're wondering about our state of affairs, our borders and walls, our inability to find together, blablabla. Please read it. Have a nice day.

Audacious Humanities

I recommend this meditation to all who reflect deeply and wish to practice liberating awareness.

cosmic perspective, personal road map

leads you from the present, through t he roots of culture, to a perplexing but meaningful way to attach personal crisis to cultural maturity at the end of an age.

The most depressing book ever written?

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

Give some ray of hope that humanity is not going to end in a heap of rubble. I realize we are in a great deal of trouble, but this makes one feel there is no reason to even bother trying to fight climate change or the many environmental problems we face.

What do you think your next listen will be?

Steve Pinker's Enlightenment Now which is a much more hopeful book.

How could the performance have been better?

The voice was a monotone, which is probably appropriate for a doomsday book, but together, the voice and the content were too much.

0 of 1 people found this review helpful