Think about the following questions as you watch the video

1. 00:35 What does David Christian mean by the terms Modern Revolution and the Anthropocene?
2. 01:02 How did humans become a global species and how did this contribute to the Modern Revolution?
3. 01:31 What new sources of energy became available and how did they contribute to the Modern Revolution?
4. 02:28 What are the consequences of this revolution?

00:13: NARRATOR: Threshold eight began about 200 years ago
00:16: and we're living in the middle of it.
00:18: We call it the modern revolution
00:21: because it created the world we live in today.
00:25: Some geologists call the modern era the anthropocene.
00:29: That's the era in which the Earth came to be dominated
00:32: by a single species, us.
00:36: How did we suddenly get to be so powerful?
00:40: First, we became a global species.
00:43: After the year 1500, human societies began
00:46: to link up across the world.
00:48: This created huge exchange networks
00:51: in which ideas, technologies, goods and belief systems
00:55: could be shared.
00:57: Because collective learning worked
00:58: on a larger scale than ever before, innovation speeded up.
01:03: A second ingredient played a crucial role--
01:05: our discovery of new sources of energy.
01:08: The fossil fuels-- coal, oil and natural gas--
01:13: came from fossilized plants and organisms that had stored
01:16: the energy from sunlight over hundreds of millions of years.
01:21: Humans learned how to use that energy
01:23: to power engines of all kinds.
01:26: Eventually, we learned how to extract energy
01:28: from nuclear reactions like those that drive the sun.
01:32: Globalization, increased innovation
01:35: and new energy sources
01:37: allowed us to build the largest and most complex societies
01:40: that had ever existed.
01:43: Today, billions of people around the world
01:45: can instantly communicate with each other.
01:48: With abundant energy, a vast range of new materials
01:51: from plastics to semiconductors,
01:53: and an astonishing number of new machines,
01:56: many humans live better than ever before.
01:59: However, all of this new complexity has consequences.
02:05: The energy and the food we produce has to support
02:09: nearly seven billion people.
02:11: That requires a huge portion of the Earth's resources.
02:15: Human technology and activity is literally
02:18: transforming the biosphere.
02:20: We may be powerful, but are we really in charge of our power?
02:24: What lies ahead for our own species