| Summary: | If the Anthropocene was distilled down to an algorithm, how might it work? In a sentence, the Anthropocene designates a geologic age in which the human is the primary planetary force. The term was originally introduced in 2002 by Dutch chemist Paul Crutzen.1 The intention of this paper is not to debate whether or not the term is adequate (others such as Capitolocene and Chthulucene have been suggested).2 Nor is it to argue the validity of this age as a replacement for previous epochs. As Heather Turpin explains, the uniqueness of anthropogenic activity and its effects must be debated: the rise of agriculture and attendant deforestation; the extraction of coal, oil, and gas, and their atmospheric consequences; the combustion of carbon-based fuels and emissions; coral reef loss; ocean acidification; soil degradation; a rate of life-form extinction occurring at thousands of times higher than throughout most of the last half-billion years.3 However Turpin’s tragic litany does pose a compelling question. How were these destructions made operational? In other words, what kind of logics and performativities were employed in this assault on life? Computer scientist Robert Kowalski once defined the algorithm as “logic + control.”4 Logic comprises the assumptions and the goals of any programme—for example, to find a path. Control defines the routines and techniques used to carry it out—for example, how the path is found. For Kowalski, this twinned approach allowed the programmer to focus on the optimization of any algorithm—maintaining the logic while finding faster and more accurate methods of control. But while the paper was intended for a computer science audience, his definition provides an interesting broader model. It allows us to think distinctly about ontologies and actions, about worldview and world-making, about politics and performance. Benjamin Bratton has stated that the “basic algorithm for our age is one in which the world is given for us and created in our image.”5 If the Anthropocene is an algorithm, then, it seems to be one characterized by a logic of exceptionalism and performed by a routine of exhaustion.
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