Beyond Human Supremacy | Eileen Crist (REPLAY)

Republished from August 2022. The worldview of human supremacy is driving the human expansionism that is devastating the living world. Philosopher and environmental writer Eileen Crist, author of Abundant Earth: Toward an Ecological Civilization, offers a compelling alternative - reimagining ourselves as "Earthlings" and creating societies that make space for the flourishing of all life. Highlights include:

• Why the biodiversity crisis is fundamentally a crisis of ongoing and relentless human expansion and results in continued depopulation of the nonhuman world;
• How the worldview of human supremacy - the belief that humans are superior to nonhumans and all of nature - is the pervasive and unrecognized force driving human expansionism;
• How human expansionism began with the first expanding empires, much earlier than modern capitalism;
• Why creating an ecological civilization requires 'scaling down' human activity and 'pulling back' from nature to make space for nonhuman life;
• Why plant-based eating is one of the most effective ways of increasing biodiversity;
• Why language is critical, and how words like "weed" and "natural resources" distort our relationship to nature;
• How we need to regain our indigenous-inspired identity as responsible, interconnected Earthlings;
• Why an ecological civilization will be local in terms of living and also globally connected, replacing domination with coexistence in an age of deepening ecological overshoot.

See episode website for show notes, links, and transcript:

https://www.populationbalance.org/podcast/eileen-crist-2

OVERSHOOT | Shrink Toward Abundance

OVERSHOOT tackles today's interlocked social and ecological crises driven by humanity's excessive population and consumption. The podcast explores needed narrative, behavioral, and system shifts for recreating human life in balance with all life on Earth. With expert guests from wide-ranging disciplines, we examine the forces underlying overshoot: from patriarchal pronatalism that is fueling overpopulation, to growth-biased economic systems that lead to consumerism and social injustice, to the dominant worldview of human supremacy that subjugates animals and nature. Our vision of shrinking toward abundance inspires us to seek pathways of transformation that go beyond technological fixes toward a new humanity that honors our interconnectedness with all beings.

Hosted by Nandita Bajaj and Alan Ware. Brought to you by Population Balance.

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