End Times

We Need Tech — and Even More So Wisdom — to Solve the Extinction Crisis

For too long, human beings have used technology to pillage the planet. With limits approaching, we must find a better way.

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Asteroids, supervolcanoes, nuclear war, climate change, engineered viruses, artificial intelligence, and even aliens — the end may be closer than you think. For the next two weeks, OneZero will be featuring essays drawn from editor Bryan Walsh’s forthcoming book End Times: A Brief Guide to the End of the World, which hits shelves on August 27 and is available for pre-order now, as well as pieces by other experts in the burgeoning field of existential risk. But we’re not helpless. It’s up to us to postpone the apocalypse.

Dwindling biodiversity and escalating climate change are powerful disturbances to life on Earth that shake the human soul. There are lots of reasons to be hopeful that technology will be a force for good in this crisis. But we need to reorient our identities toward protecting the planet with our full humanity if we’re going to stand a chance.

Having studied conservation biology, philosophy of science, written a book on de-extinction, and interviewed hundreds of scientists, ethicists, and ecological thinkers, I can…