International Symposium: Geoanthropology, Planetary Health, and the Anthropocene Biosphere

The international Symposium addresses some of the defining challenges of the 21st century. Bringing together world-leading scholars, the meeting is dedicated to exploring deep-dives at the nexus of Geoanthropology, Planetary Health, and the Anthropocene Biosphere.

MPI-GEA integrates insights from model-based, laboratory, field, and interpretive research across disciplines in a highly cooperative research environment, to investigate the dynamics that have reshaped the human-Earth system, and identify possible trajectories for a more sustainable future. Extending from studies of the deep past to future projections, research at the Institute places particular emphasis on global urbanization, climate change, changes in the food system, material-energy-information flows, and human-ecosystem dynamics. As the only fully cross-sectional Max Planck Institute, MPI-GEA seeks to act as a hub for knowledge integration to address the multiple crises of the Anthropocene.

Within this framework, the symposium will focus on three central thematic areas:

I. The Anthropocene Biosphere

The Anthropocene is marked by intensifying human pressures and a growing fragility of biosphere integrity. How can the Anthropocene biosphere be understood at a systemic level, particularly in its interactions with the ‘socio-technosphere’ of infrastructures, technologies, institutions and knowledge systems? Which perspectives and opportunities exist for establishing a balance between biosphere and socio-technosphere in the future?

II. Planetary Health 

Climate change, biodiversity loss, and epidemiological risks intersect in ways that increasingly shape and affect planetary health. How can we better understand and anticipate future public and planetary health scenarios? How do they relate to biosphere transformations and climate dynamics? How are they influenced by different political, economic and social systems?

III. Systemic Thinking and Collective Decision-Making 

As the urgency of Anthropocene challenges grows, so does the need for insight into governance, communication and decision-making under deep uncertainty. How do institutions, human psychology, and network dynamics shape societal capacity to respond to existential risks? How does collective decision-making unfold in the Anthropocene, and how might responses be organized within highly compressed timescales of change?