ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the idea of the human domination of the natural world that is the essence of an anthropocentric framework for understanding the human relationship to the environment. It discusses the projects of ecological restoration and geoengineering as paradigmatic examples of the human domination of the natural world, as both a physical phenomenon and an epistemological idea. Both restoration and geoengineering are projects derived from the same kind of thinking that labels the current age the anthropocene, an essential anthropocentrism that considers human interests as the primary end of human action and policy. The re-creation of restored natural areas and systems through the process of ecological restoration is the human production of artifacts. Restoration projects, however, are definitely artifacts, since they are entities and systems that come into being because of human intention and design. Ecological restoration and geoengineering are thus paradigmatic examples of the anthropocentrism of the so-called Age of the Anthropocene.
