“The Social Pathology of Polycrisis”

The polycrisis, an inadvertent peril of our own making, poses an existential threat to the modern world. Given humanity’s innate desire to live safely, and to prosper, what explains this self-inflicted danger? Root causes of the polycrisis are both material and ideational. This essay focuses on the latter, exploring the impact of an exaggerated sense of human exceptionalism which legitimizes profligate behavior and releases us from accountability to each other, to the planet, and to future generations.