Human Energy Podcast

The Noosphere and the Harmony of the Spheres: Bringing Techno-, Info-, and Biospheres into Planetary Alignment - Boris Shoshitaishvili - N2 Conference 2023

Human Energy Season 2 Episode 39

Boris Shoshitaishvili from the Berggruen Institute presents his talk at the N2 Conference 2023 at the University of California Berkeley.

The Noosphere and the Harmony of the Spheres: Bringing Techno-, Info-, and Biospheres into Planetary Alignment


The noosphere is an early (and enduring) paradigm of human "planetary identity" that goes beyond some of the limitations of traditional cosmopolitan thought thanks to its suite of scientific, philosophical, and poetic resonances—such as its analogy to the geochemical system of Earth spheres; its emphasis on mind (noos); and its associations with the ancient "harmony of the spheres". But given the noosphere concept's utopian flavor from its origins in Teilhard and Vernadsky's theories, noosphere thought today runs up against a profound mismatch with context: We are increasingly recognizing that human planetary presence contributes to the creation of other, non-utopian, and "out-of-human-control" planetary spheres—specifically, the "technosphere" and the "infosphere". So a 21st century vision of the noosphere can no longer effectively serve as a utopian eschatology, as the concept had originally. But the noosphere idea still has real value today: as a framing concept for ongoing efforts at harmonizing the technosphere and infosphere with each other and with the biosphere.

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