Is there something weird about our taste for apocalypse stories? | Aeon Essays

The problems we face will not be fixed at the level of the individual life. We all know this because none of us have changed our own lives anywhere near enough to make a difference. Where would we start? With our commute? With candles? Life is already hard. Solutions will need to be implemented at a higher level of organisation. We fear this. We kn... See more

Emergence, or the way that complex systems come from simple parts, is a well-known phenomenon in science and nature. It is how everything from slime moulds to cities to our sense of self arises. It is how bees become a hive, how cells become an organism, how a brain becomes a mind. And it is how humans become humanity.

In the annals of eschatology, we are living in a golden age. The end of the world is on everyone’s mind.