Dawn of the Anthropocene: Earth Systems Engineering and Management

1. Dawn of the Anthropocene:Earth Systems Engineering and Management TU Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands Back to Basics October 31, 2007 Brad Allenby Templeton Fellow Lincoln Professor of Ethics and Engineering Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering Arizona State University

2. So long as we do not, through thinking, experience what is, we can never belong to what will be. The flight into tradition, out of a combination of humility and presumption, can bring about nothing in itself other than self deception and blindness in relation to the historical moment. Source: M. Heidegger, The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays, translation by W. Lovitt (New York, Harper Torchbooks, 1977), “The Turning,” p. 49; “The Age of the World Picture,” p. 136.

3. Where Are We Now? • The world is entering the “Age of Humans,” the Anthropocene: • Global climate change • Biodiversity shift from “evolved biodiversity” to “engineered biodiversity” • Technology, especially the converging foundational streams of nanotechnology, biotechnology, cognitive science, robotics, and information and communication technology, is critical locus of accelerating evolutionary pressures. There is an extraordinary flight from ethical responsibility. It is based on a profound misunderstanding of the world as we have created it.

4. Key Concepts • “Earth systems” include economic, technological, and cultural systems, not just physical systems. Moreover, the human/natural/built integrated systems of the Anthropocene cannot be understood through just one worldview, be it scientific, theological, or postmodern. • Complexity and focus on systems • Mutually exclusive but equally valid ontologies • The world as design space (e.g., from withdraw from using fossil fuels to designer atmosphere) • The human as design space • Result: radical contingency

5. Case Study: The Autonomic City • Trend 1: increasing integration of ICT at all scales in urban systems: smart materials, smart buildings, smart infrastructure, regional sensor systems of all kinds – and all interconnected. • And increasingly virtual: highly complex Net-based systems (e.g., Google Earth) are being mashed against these evolving “smart urban components” to create far more complex information topographies. • Trend 2: ICT itself evolving to be qualitatively more complex: • autonomic ICT at all scales, from chip, to PC/assembly, to global communications networks • Piggybacked on Net, an auto-catalytic, self-designing system • Result: The Autonomic City, already here, profoundly different from anything we know, but essentially invisible to us

6. The Autonomic City: Portents • Remember October 19, 1987 – “Black Monday” – Dow Jones dropped 22% in one day. Main reason: internal systems dynamics (multiplying independent computerized trading programs with “sell” floors working in an integrated system), not major changes in market fundamentals. • This was simple system: What happens at much more complex urban systems level? Who’s even looking? • Note that the trick is in the interplay of technology with cultural and economic systems at many different scales.

7. Case Study: Ambient Air Capture of CO2 Technology for ambient air capture of CO2 being commercialized (approx. $200-$150 per ton CO2) Global climate change is not inevitable, but a pricepoint issue. Focus on fossil fuel use is obsolete, as is existing regulatory/treaty process (strong institutional and individual opposition as a result) Undermines use of global climate change as lever for social engineering Relevant question becomes much more fundamental: what kind of world do you want – 280 ppm equivalent? 360? 550? - and who gets to choose? Distributional effects are potentially significant.

8. Principles of Earth Systems Engineering and Management • Only intervene when necessary, and then only to the extent required, in complex systems. • The capability to model and dialog with major shifts in technological systems should be developed before, rather than after, policies and initiatives encouraging such shifts. • The network that is relevant to a particular analysis is called forth by that analysis. Accordingly, it is critical to be aware of the particular boundaries within which one is working, and to be alert to the possibility of logical failure when one’s analysis goes beyond the boundaries. • The actors and designers are also part of the system they are purporting to design, creating interactive flows of information (reflexivity) that make the system highly unpredictable and perhaps more unstable. • Implicit social engineering agendas and reflexivity make macroethical and value implications inherent in all ESEM activities. • Conditions characterizing the anthropogenic Earth require democratic, transparent and accountable governance, and pluralistic decision-making processes. • We must learn to engineer and manage complex systems, not just artifacts, understanding that such systems cannot be centrally or explicitly controlled. • Ensure continuous learning. • Whenever possible, engineered changes should be incremental and reversible, rather than fundamental and irreversible. Accordingly, premature lock-in of system components should be avoided where possible, because it leads to irreversibility. • In working with complex systems, seek resiliency, not just redundancy.