Introduction

Visions of the apocalypse have permeated human history. Although the ways in which the apocalypse has been envisaged vary enormously, a distinction can usefully be made between apocalypticism in pre-modern and modern times. In pre-modern times (and today in some non-western contexts), visions of the apocalypse stemmed from a lack of control over the human environment. In a seemingly capricious and uncontrollable universe, the end of the world was easy to imagine. Religion and magical rituals may attempt to assert control over the environment; however such attempts take place on the symbolic plain or are founded on a view of the natural world that sees it as epiphenomenal to spiritual realities. They are not founded on a naturalistic view that sees the world as knowable on its own terms.

In contrast, Western modernity is based on the principle that the world is founded on certain universal laws that can be discovered and that through their discovery the world can be fashioned to suit human desires. The world envisaged at the dawn of modernity by enlightenment thinkers was (potentially at least) predictable and controllable. Yet self-confident eighteenth- and nineteenth-century modernities have been followed by twentieth- and twenty-first century modernities that are ever less confident in human capabilities to transform our world in positive ways. World wars, genocides and environmental destruction are results of the modern project. Even such positive results of modernity as discoveries in medical science have been shown to have frightening unintended consequences, such as antibiotic resistance.