The World Without Us
Author: Alan Weisman
Amazon info
Sometimes I take an unusual perspective with respect to dramatic issues such as global warming, overpopulation, or pollution. I think that it simply doesn't matter. The planet will be fine. Humans will either die off, or possibly evolve into some human/machine mix that is capable of living in the new environment. In either case, with the human population greatly reduced, the planet will recover.
So, I was fascinated to see a book available on this exact topic. I had even seen a book review in some magazine with nice graphics illustrating the time lines. I couldn't wait to read it. Of course, it would take forever to show up in the library, but hey, Molly has a new Kindle that required "testing" :). So, I downloaded the book and started reading.
Disappointing (but mostly due to high hopes). First, it might have been reading it on the Kindle - which I find works very well for fiction and historical fiction, but I haven't read much non-fiction on it. Or perhaps it was the poor organization of the book. I am guessing the latter. I certainly noticed that most of the paragraphs were written in "mystery form" - a series of teasers with the final answer at the end. For example (making this up) - "Then there emerged the greatest ecological danger that humanity had ever faced.... on and on for five more sentences, until it finally resolves as something like 'plastic bags' ". The book seemed to go on for an overly long time without much coherent structure. At times I felt "lost" as in where am I in the author's train of thought and where are we going.
On the positive side, each of the sections was interesting (if somewhat repetitive) and the scope of the book is admittedly huge. The question pondered is what would happen if one day humans all miraculously disappear. What would fall apart (nearly everything), what would remain (ceramics, bronze, glass, dioxins, nuclear waste), and what would happen. I was expecting a chronological treatment (perhaps misled by the timelines in the magazine article) - and it would be a challenge to do a worldwide timeline. So instead, the author has chapters that cover various topics. There is a chapter on what works of humans survive, there is a chapter on the Korean DMZ (which has been human free for about 50 years), there is a chapter on bronze and how ceramics survive. All in all, lots of useful information (plastic bags turn out to be especially evil) - but perhaps it could have been better organized. Reading it felt like 800 pages, but according to Amazon, the page count is only 336 pages.
Recommended: To those interested in future visions, green reading.