The paradox referred to in the title of this essay goes to the heart of the very idea of the Anthropocene, but it is also a central truth of politics concealed by various forms of what Plato called “the Noble Lie.” The label “Anthropocene” illustrates the power of humanity to transform the conditions if life. Politics is a mode of collective existence and conflict resolution that emerged at a certain point in time, presented dramatically by Aeschylus, that is at base conventional (composed of human agreements) and therefore malleable. Yet, in both instances, human inability to change for the healthier and liberated is what comes to be emphasized. To explore this debilitating stability, I start with the vulnerability of the human body. This investigation is shaped by Wittgenstein who offered a view of humans on a friction-filled plane where language flows through us eliminating any inner/outer dichotomy that supports the idea of a person as an autonomous agent. Individuality bolstered by the idea of a private language—a language of thought—is scoured away by Wittgenstein’s account of language as a commons. This take on language as flowing through and uniting us is advanced through Harney, Moten, and others who present a perspective on “study” as a source of empowerment and change. In encountering human vulnerability accentuated by Neoliberal and corporate distortions of the commons, I try to think through the work of William Connolly on fashioning a new vocabulary for political change amid social and ecological upheaval.