ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces collapsology, followed by a review of collapse in the museum literature. Four possible scenarios for the future of our civilization and the planet are presented and their implications and consequences are discussed. Collapse refers to the ending of our current means of sustenance, shelter, security, pleasure, identity, and meaning, and the remainder of this chapter is concerned with an examination of how collapse might unfold for human society. This taxonomy of collapse includes financial, commercial, political, social, and cultural collapse. Our current systems, be they political, financial, commercial, or industrial, are now obsolete as a result of the damage they have inflicted on the world’s ecosystems, There is a great urgency in developing new life-support systems that steward and protect the More-Than-Human World. The necessary systemic changes are not only scientific, political, economic, and cultural but also moral in nature.
