The Transition From the Biosphere To the Noösphere

In his pivotal contribution to the theory of the Earth’s evolution, Vernadsky formulates his idea of the noösphere as a new planetary layer emerging from the combined cognitive agency of humans and the technical infrastructures they build. As this layer coalesces in front of Vernadsky’s eyes through the buildup of large-scale urban settlements, global economy, cosmopolitan cultural exchange, and acceleration of human cognition through systems of social organization, it brings forth a major evolutionary transition that imbues the two older evolutionary layers—the biosphere and geosphere—with the type of intelligence that closely resembles affordances of planetary-scale computation: the capacity to monitor, model, and regulate the Earth’s biogeochemistry. This intelligence is inherently synthetic, artificial and takes advantage of abstract rationality.