Gene drive technology as human intervention into nature. On the fate of environmental ethics in the anthropocene

Summary

My dissertation explores what the idea that we currently live in the age of humans or “anthropocene” means for our ability to critically evaluate – and possibly sometimes condemn – interventions by humans into nature. To answer this question, I focus on so-called “gene drive” technology: a biotechnological innovation that aims to spread genetic modifications through wild populations. The debate about living in the anthropocene suggests that we should let go of an understanding of nature as independent and as something we predominantly relate to in local interactions. Against this interpretation of the anthropocene, I propose understanding it in terms of interventionism and anthropocentrism, and discuss what we lose when we let go of the “independence” and “local” pillars of environmental ethics and how we could possibly maintain them – all linked to an interpretation of gene drives as human interventions into nature.