From Pioneers to Cooperators:
The Next Evolutionary Leap?
Robin Wall Kimmerer in Braiding Sweetgrass writes about the concept of pioneer species and the transition to collaboration. Pioneer species are those first plants to emerge in a disturbed landscape. In traditional ecological systems, pioneer species are fast-growing, fiercely competitive, and consume all available resources. Sound familiar? Yet, what we begin to recognize is that these ecosystems must evolve into a state of cooperation. The same must be true for us.
I hold onto the greatest hope that we are witnessing the final moments of the pioneering phase of human civilization, standing at the threshold of something new. The reason? The resources that fueled this phase are running out, or we are reaching so far out to them, we are falling over in the process of trying to grab hold. One need only look at the ongoing genocide in cobalt-producing regions t as evidence of this.
A System of Growth, A System of Extraction
Every system requires resources to expand. Fungi extract minerals from the soil and facilitate a symbiotic exchange between plants, trading minerals for sugars which allow both the flora and the fungi to thrive. For centuries, human progress has been defined by the acquisition of ever-greater resources, land, minerals, water, fuel. Perhaps the Industrial Revolution, for instance, was like humanity acquiring a new species of fungus, which allowed us greater and greater access to more and more resources – the machines we created a pale mimicry to the fungus who break apart stones for the trees. Thus, the Industrial Revolution enabled us to extract and redistribute resources at an unprecedented scale, much like past revolutions did.
The Bronze Age, the Iron Age — each technological leap was fueled by access to new minerals, ores and processes for creating natural and synthetic compounds which propelled us into new levels of pioneering. With each breakthrough, we expanded, not only in population but in our capacity to consume and control. We grew, but as a fundamentally destructive force. Now, we are in the Information Age. Information has become the new resource. But instead of a symbiotic exchange in which human and knowledge grow harmoniously, the infinite stream of information is consuming the finite resource of attention, thus limiting our ability to make new discoveries and populate new ground..
Perhaps this is the end of the pioneer, the slow down we have been waiting for.
The Rise of Self-Reflection and the Limits of Information
If there is one undeniable benefit of the Information Age, it is the acceleration of self-awareness. The vocabulary of psychology, shadow work, and spirituality has moved from the esoteric to the everyday. People are identifying their own patterns, as well as those of their parents and ancestors. Estrangement between generations is rising, a visible symptom of this massive shift in self-reflection, as more people are recognizing that the way they were raised needs repair.
For me, this new resource — information — is best used to facilitate collective healing, to help us transition from a pioneer species to a cooperative species. And yet, as the echoes of extraction continue, we find ourselves approaching a threshold:
“A species that is out of balance with its environment will inevitably suffer the consequences.” — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass
We can feel the final throes of extraction-pioneering culture.. It may seem as if the environment is losing, but I maintain that this is not the case. What we are hearing is the molting of a civilization built on the belief that everything can be exploited.
And now, with AI reshaping the landscape of information, we may be witnessing the last phase of this resource-mining cycle — where instead of a million perspectives, we are given just one – take it or leave it.
The Call to Cooperation
So what does it mean to stand at this threshold?
We feel the call for community in our bones, embedded in our epigenetics. Everything within us urges us to return to collaboration, to something ancient and deeply necessary. But we are unprepared. We have no infrastructure. We lack resources such as the oral traditions and stories of our ancestors. Even those who return to the land find themselves struggling — losing crops to insects, unable to afford help, watching structures built in an era of planned obsolescence fall into disrepair.
We are rediscovering what it means to cooperate. Yet, cooperation is difficult when our primary experience of community has often meant tolerating abuse or toxic relationships. True cooperation is built not on forced togetherness but on necessity. And necessity is rising.
The Bridge We Must Build
We are learning about ourselves even as we experience the death throes of the pioneer phase. The truth is, we may never fully witness the cooperative era in our lifetimes. Perhaps small groups will make inroads, but as a civilization, we are only beginning this transition.
Our task is not to complete the shift but to use the resources we have — our knowledge, our self-awareness, our relationships — to lay the groundwork. We must learn to heal ourselves enough to remain in community, even with those we find difficult. We must develop the skills to manage conflict in a way that strengthens, rather than fractures, the whole.
We must release our obsession with possession and control — the idea that time is an exploitable commodity — so that we can contribute to something larger.
Above all, we must stop our addiction to competition, to resourcing more for ourselves, and our patch of land, and look instead at how we can all benefit from cooperation with nature and each other. And if we can bridge the gap between the pioneer and the collaborator without falling through the cracks, we will have done our part to leave a legacy of cooperation for future generations..
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