Noema Magazine, Issue 7

‘Exploring the transformations sweeping our world’

Noema is published by THE BERGGRUEN INSTITUTE, ‘established in 2010 to develop foundational ideas about how to reshape political and social institutions in the face of these great transformations.’ In ancient Greek, noema means ‘thinking’ or the ‘object of thought.’

Issue six: The Next Axial Age asks whether humanity is entering a period of transformation comparable to the original Axial Age, when many of the world’s major philosophical, ethical and religious traditions emerged more than two millennia ago. Today, artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, genetic engineering and the climate crisis are once again forcing fundamental questions about human purpose, consciousness, nature and our place in the world.

Across the issue, competing perspectives examine whether new technologies can expand human awareness and reconnect us with planetary systems — or instead flatten knowledge into an increasingly uniform computational worldview. Contributions move between AI, consciousness, ecology, spirituality and complexity, asking what kind of shared ethical framework might emerge from a period of profound technological and environmental change.

Published by Noema Magazine / The Berggruen Institute
English
Softcover
208 pages

250 x 190 mm
ISSN 26921774