There is truth to this story. There is no doubt humanity has inflicted untold damage on the world’s ecosystems. Our footprint is everywhere.
As modernity chips away at the last great wild places, cutting down forests, polluting rivers, and spreading invasive species, the fossil fuels that power its march burn up the sky, altering the chemistry of the atmosphere, shifting the energy balance of the planet.
But who is the real hero of this story, and who is the victim? The narrative of nature’s fragility misses something important. Nature has agency. Nature acts on the planet on a scale that dwarfs most human processes.
