“Even geology, so old and seemingly inexorable, is dragged into our orbit, through the aggregate influence of a planet’s worth of agriculture, deforestation, mining, and urbanisation; as islands are built up out of the sea from Tokyo to Dubai; as dams trap enough sediment behind them to shift seismic profiles at continental scale; and by fleets of bucket, suction, and clamshell dredgers, drawing straight lines across estuaries and deltas.”