At the Crossroads

The theme of Chapter 8 encompasses the current crisis and the theory that human dominion is killing the planet and humans with it rather than protecting it. Denial of climate change and the belief that nature needs human intervention to survive instead of the reverse suggest the species is not fit to be the steward of its world. Human beings seem to view the conquest and extirpation of nature as a sort of progressive and inevitable victory over their savage past . . . even though the human species was once in awe of the natural world. These days, the species hominin seems more savagely eager to transform that awe into salable goods and global power. Perhaps the answer to saving the planet is not more sovereignty, but more faith.