I am currently developing two book projects.

The first is a study of the history of the concept that technology could cause an apocalyptic collapse of human societies or natural systems. My interest is in pushing the timeline of this history backwards to early modern period, and de-centering it away from an exclusive emphasis on Europe and the Enlightenment by studying cross-cultural perceptions of technology, extinction, and existential risk in areas of colonial violence and “green imperialism.” The working title for this project is either Apocalyptic Technology: The History of an Idea, 1680-1880 or Inventing the End of the World: Early Modern Extinctions and Apocalyptic Technology.

I’m also currently researching a book involving William James and his siblings Alice and Henry, the Society for Psychical Research, and the globalization of science in the three decades following the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa. The working title for that project is Ghosts of the Machine Age: A Family, an Empire, and the Prehistory of AI.