Humanity's Period of Grace: The Holocene

What is the desired state of planet Earth? We use different "cups" to show the various stable states that the ecosystem can reside in. We have been in the Holocene period for the last 10,000 years, a period of interglacial warming; and the last interglacial period before that was the Eemian, in which global temperatures were 2 degrees Celsius warmer, and sea levels that were 4-6 meters higher, than today. Graphs are used to show that the Earth has varied within a very small range of environmental boundaries over the last 100,000 yeas, and that even small changes can lead to large shifts in life conditions on the Earth. Professor Rockström gives a history of human development since the beginning of modern homo sapiens through the advent of agriculture, the beginning of civilizations, and up to the Great Acceleration. We understand the Holocene, and the Holocene is the state that we know can support human development in the future.

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