Alien Newsletter #10: The Simultaneous Rise and Fall of the Anthropocene
In Which Our Alien Considers a Race Moving Backwards and Forwards at the Same Time
Network Note: The previous year has thrown issues of climate change front and center within the wealthiest populations, from an ongoing pandemic perhaps fueled by zoonotic origins to forest fires stretching from Siberia to South Lake Tahoe. These human ordeals have seemed to caught the attention of the alien, as the transmissions we’ve intercepted appears it’s decided to go a little meta in its commentary by contemplating such global changes within the theoretical framework of the Anthropocene. And just as we humans would, the alien places this matrix within its own fundamental understanding of nature’s eternal cycles of decay and growth, which from what we can translate appear generally universal.
You have to hand it to the Greatest Apes, if only because they insist you do so whenever they have an opportunity. But in preparing my report on the latest environmental catastrophes to befall their civilizations, I have come across a compelling framing device that the GAs use to conceive of what they have done to their planet, its inhabitants and each other. They call it the anthropocene, a new era in which they declare their impact upon the habitats that they inhabit to be so sweeping and profound, a new era must be named to acknowledge it.
I can distinctly recall a previous assignment where I observed the [unpronounceable squeal], an entity whose ocular instruments were positioned directly in front of a mirrored abdomen, so from birth to death the [squeal] could only see and contemplate itself. I am reminded of this somewhat when considering the extraordinary self-regard it takes to name an entire epoch for oneself. However, there is quite an ominous admission made upon those who labor within anthropogenic studies. In particular, it enfolds various disruptive and even catastrophic shifts in the planet’s cycles and rhythms in an attempt to divine just how the Greatest Apes could have brought such misfortunes upon themselves. And this year alone, the relative consensus is that the long-dreaded specter of climate change has befallen the GAs. From fires in the usually frigid taigas of Siberia and the normally photogenic climes of South Lake Tahoe to flooding in Germany and the Northeastern parts of North America, the sense is that while the supersimians have enough power to change their environments, it apparently has not been for their ultimate advantage.
However, the study of the anthropocene does not wallow in what the GAs would call “doomist” thought. Rather, it attempts to identify its defining characteristics. Following are a few of them:
Extraction: This involves the slicing and dicing of specific portions of the planet for purposes of energy, textiles and shelter. Such traditions are widespread throughout GA time and locale, but it has accelerated with the rise in GA population and technological advancement. Some extractions are unique to a given culture. The North American Plate 1, for instance, is rich in multicolored Crocs and cat videos. However, to power their civilizations, the GAs must turn to more primordial materials, vouchsafed from the condensed organic material of their former ancestors.
Terraforming: The GAs have transformed their natural world several times over — so much so that arguments persist in the anthropocene community over where to place a “Golden Spike” moment for the epoch’s beginning. However, whether it is placed with the beginning of fire or atomic detonation, the GAs have curated their lived environments fastidiously. Whereas once there were glaciers and lakes, there are now amusement parks and strip clubs.
Technofossils: All living matter leaves a mark behind, and certain GA scholars examine the detritus left behind by former species in bygone eras. GAs often classify specific eras from the characteristic sediments left behind in the earth’s minerals. Speculation persists also about what sort of technological residue the GAs will leave behind, whether it’s nuclear fallout from the atomic destruction tests of decades ago or the microplastics that inhabit the most desolate reaches of this planet. But they will leave behind technofossils that will clearly outlast the civilizations that created them.
Climate Change: What will also most likely outlast the GAs are the alterations they have made to patterns of weather they have built their entire civilizations upon. These changes are powered and exacerbated by the chemical byproducts of their extraction, yet paradoxically, all the agriculture, medicine and resources, not to mention their cultures and governments, are run on these poisonous fuels. Certain of these changes are already locked in for thousands of years to come.
Extinction: Large amounts of the planet’s living creatures, whether they grow from the ground or crawl on their appendages, have found the changes wrought upon society by the GAs impossible to survive already. It is referred to as The Sixth Extinction by the GAs, so named due to several previous mass die-offs discovered within the geologic record. Because of overhunting, loss of habitat, the proliferation of humans and yes, the introduction of alien species, loss of biological diversity within the ecosphere has been pronounced, and, some GAs believe, irreversible.
Which leads me to one point: I often wonder if our arrival on this planet may be the beginning of the end for the GAs. It certainly was for quite a few of the planets which we had visited and attempted to cohabitate with the native species. So I do agree that no matter how dire the plight of the GAs are, we must not give in to their pleas to intervene at the moment. It is quite probable that we would only make the matter worse.
For as one begins to look into the anthropocene, one does have to express a begrudging respect for what the GAs have created so far. No matter how paralyzed by fear and trauma and sorrow they happen to be, they have already shaped their world in unique ways and should they decide to leverage their ingenuity in another direction, they are certainly capable of doing so as well. It is fortunate for them, that their tendency to stare into the abyss of self-obsession, unlike that of the [squeak], is just a choice, rather than an immutable quality. Otherwise, we would have to find another wayward lifeform to observe, somewhere else in the universe, before too long.
Dark Matters
Oh, yes, the self-regard of the GAs extends to their sartorial conduct in spacetime as well.
Botnodes 9/11 (Network note: Jeff Bezos/Richard Branson) launch into sort-of space for a few earthly hours; GAGIS erupts with activity. Botnode 8 (aka Elon Musk) launches a non-professional flight crew into orbit for three days; GAGIS exercises an inexplicable restraint.
Botnode 8 contemplates the consumption of a small town near his rocket site, whether it wants to be eaten or not.
Primitive, but amusing:
