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Humans have taken over the earth. Evidently there’s a new concept that confirms this, called anthropogenic biomes. Then there’s the recent push by scientists to declare a new era, called the anthropocene.

I jest, only because this is not new territory. Environmental historians have built a whole discipline from this fertile ground. And geographers dug the foundations in the mid 1950s with this classic.

That said, I do think the human biomes classification idea is pretty cool. Many ecologists still tend to view nature through a dualistic lens, instead of regarding humans as an integral part of ecosystems. A bit of a holdover from the wilderness movement and pristine nature meme. As Daniel Botkin powerfully argued in Discordant Harmonies, the dualistic mindset does not lend itself to solving contemporary environmental problems.