Synopses & Reviews
A penetrating, page-turning tour of a post-human Earth
In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman offers an utterly original approach to questions of humanity's impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us.In this far-reaching narrative, Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immortalized as fossils; how copper pipes and wiring would be crushed into mere seams of reddish rock; why some of our earliest buildings might be the last architecture left; and how plastic, bronze sculpture, radio waves, and some man-made molecules may be our most lasting gifts to the universe.The World Without Us reveals how, just days after humans disappear, floods in New York's subways would start eroding the city's foundations, and how, as the world's cities crumble, asphalt jungles would give way to real ones. It describes the distinct ways that organic and chemically treated farms would revert to wild, how billions more birds would flourish, and how cockroaches in unheated cities would perish without us. Drawing on the expertise of engineers, atmospheric scientists, art conservators, zoologists, oil refiners, marine biologists, astrophysicists, religious leaders from rabbis to the Dali Lama, and paleontologists---who describe a prehuman world inhabited by megafauna like giant sloths that stood taller than mammoths---Weisman illustrates what the planet might be like today, if not for us.From places already devoid of humans (a last fragment of primeval European forest; the Korean DMZ; Chernobyl), Weisman reveals Earth's tremendous capacity for self-healing. As he shows which human devastations are indelible, and which examples of our highest art and culture would endure longest, Weisman's narrative ultimately drives toward a radical but persuasive solution that needn't depend on our demise. It is narrative nonfiction at its finest, and in posing an irresistible concept with both gravity and a highly readable touch, it looks deeply at our effects on the planet in a way that no other book has. Alan Weisman teaches international journalism at the University of Arizona. He is also an award-winning journalist whose reports have appeared in Harper's, The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, Discover, and on NPR, among others. Formerly a contributing editor to the Los Angeles Times Magazine, he is now a senior radio producer for Homelands Productions. National Book Critics Circle Award NomineeA Time Magazine Best Book of the YearAn Orion Book Award Finalist In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman offers an original approach to questions of humanity's impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us. Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immortalized as fossils; how copper pipes and wiring would be crushed into mere seams of reddish rock; why some of our earliest buildings might be the last architecture left; and how plastic, bronze sculpture, radio waves, and some man-made molecules may be our most lasting gifts to the universe. The World Without Us reveals how, just days after humans disappear, floods in New York's subways would start eroding the city's foundations, and how, as the world's cities crumble, asphalt jungles would give way to real ones. It describes the distinct ways that organic and chemically treated farms would revert to wild, how billions more birds would flourish, and how cockroaches in unheated cities would perish without us. Drawing on the expertise of engineers, atmospheric scientists, art conservators, zoologists, oil refiners, marine biologists, astrophysicists, religious leaders from rabbis to the Dali Lama, and paleontologists--who describe a prehuman world inhabited by megafauna like giant sloths that stood taller than mammoths--Weisman illustrates what the planet might be like today, if not for us. From places already devoid of humans (a last fragment of primeval European forest; the Korean DMZ; Chernobyl), Weisman reveals Earth's tremendous capacity for self-healing. As he shows which human devastations are indelible, and which examples of our highest art and culture would endure longest, Weisman's narrative ultimately drives toward a radical but persuasive solution that needn't depend on our demise. In posing a provocative concept with gravity in a highly readable presentation, it looks deeply at our effects on the planet in a way that no other book has. Also available on CD as an unabridged audiobook. Please email [email protected] for more information.
Weisman imagines what would happen if the earth's most invasive species--ourselves--were suddenly and completely wiped out . . . Weisman knows from the work of environmental historians that humans have been shaping the natural world since long before the industrial age. His inner Deep Ecologist may dream of Earth saying good riddance to us, but he finds some causes for hope . . . it's the cold facts and cooler heads that drive Weisman's cautionary message powerfully home. When it comes to mass extinctions, one expert tells him, 'the only real prediction you can make is that life will go on. And that it will be interesting.'--Jennifer Schuessler, The New York Times Book Review In his morbidly fascinating nonfiction eco-thriller, The World Without Us, Weisman imagines what would happen if the earth's most invasive species--ourselves--were suddenly and completely wiped out . . . Weisman turns the destruction of our civilization and the subsequent rewilding of the planet into a . . . slow-motion disaster spectacular and feel-good movie rolled into one . . . Weisman travels from Europe's last remnant of primeval forest to the horse latitudes of the Pacific, interviewing everyone from evolutionary biologists and materials scientists to archaeologists and art conservators in his effort to sketch out the planet's post-human future . . . Weisman knows from the work of environmental historians that humans have been shaping the natural world since long before the industrial age. His inner Deep Ecologist may dream of Earth saying good riddance to us, but he finds some causes for hope amid the general run of man-bites-planet bad news . . . In the end, it's the cold facts and cooler heads that drive Weisman's cautionary message powerfully home. When it comes to mass extinctions, one expert tells him, 'the only real prediction you can make is that life will go on. And that it will be interesting.'--Jennifer Schuessler, The New York Times Book Review Teasing out the consequences of a simple thought experiment--what would happen if the human species were suddenly extinguished--Weisman has written a sort of pop-science ghost story, in which the whole earth is the haunted house. Among the highlights: with pumps not working, the New York City subways would fill with water within days, while weeds and then trees would retake the buckled streets and wild predators would ravage the domesticated dogs. Texas's unattended petrochemical complexes might ignite, scattering hydrogen cyanide to the winds--a 'mini chemical nuclear winter.' After thousands of years, the Chunnel, rubber tires, and more than a billion tons of plastic might remain, but eventually a polymer-eating microbe could evolve, and, with the spectacular return of fish and bird populations, the earth might revert to Eden.--The New Yorker Traveling down many different avenues of scientific research, Alan Weisman postulates the complete disappearance of mankind from planet Earth . . . By his estimate most of our leavings would rot and crumble; much of our damage would take eons to undo . . . Very early in the book Mr. Weisman makes his argument personal by describing how a house would fall apart . . . As with many of the book's other conclusions, this one is accompanied by a hint of unseemly glee. The more elaborately Mr. Weisman paints a worst possible outcome, the better he has made his case. And the more triumphant he sounds . . . It is one thing to imagine one house with a leaking roof, burgeoning mold, rusting nails, broken windows and small animals gnawing on the drywall. But this book hypothesizes more avidly about decay on a grander scale . . . This book's global-scale dismay about humanity's environmental impact is its most important theme. But it's Mr. Weisman's more marginal facts that give The World Without Us so much curiosity value . . . Mr. Weisman covers a huge amount of terrain. His research is prodigious and impressive. So is his persistence . . . The World Without Us has an arid, plain, what-if style and an air of relentless foreboding.--Janet Maslin, The New York Times In The World Without Us, this pleasantly morbid parlor game becomes a grandly entertaining (and refreshingly unscreechy) study of the ways we meddling humans have perturbed our planet and of how blithely the earth would shrug off our departure.--Time Weisman's engrossing depiction of what would happen to the planet if humans vanished overnight is the kind of sensationalism we love--there's plenty of context on ecology, global warming, and our own evolutionary past.--New York magazine The World Without Us taps into one of our deepest, if only furtively acknowledged, pleasures: imagining destruction. Just as Tom Sawyer sneaked deliciously into his own funeral, we gobble up Weisman's anecdotes about the decay and dissolution of everything human. It also appeals to our love of looking in the cosmic rearview mirror: Like A Christmas Carol or It's a Wonderful Life, it sucks us in with a vision of what is, what has been and what is yet to come. The book is addictive . . . One of the reasons The World Without Us is so compelling is that Weisman, a veteran journalist, has a keen eye for locations and stories that are at once crucial an
Review
"Weisman is a thoroughly engaging and clarion writer fueled by curiosity and determined to cast light rather than spread despair. His superbly well researched and skillfully crafted stop-you-in-your-tracks report stresses the underappreciated fact that humankind's actions create a ripple effect across the web of life." Booklist (starred review)
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"I don't think I've read a better non-fiction book this year.... [Weisman] writes like Malcolm Gladwell and John McPhee mashed together and set on fast-forward." Lev Grossman, Time online
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"A sober, analytical elucidation of the effects of human dominance on this planet, intriguing if not especially comforting. This book should be broadly read and discussed." Library Journal (starred review)
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"Weisman's description of buildings crumbling slowly and the subsequent incursion of vegetation are at once beautiful and disturbing." Bookreporter.com
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"[S]o intellectually fascinating, so oddly playful, that it escapes categorizing and clichés.... Written as if by a compassionate and curious observer on another planet, [Weisman's] book restores a sense of wonder not just to one little piece of the cosmos, but to the human race whose amazing deeds have transformed it, and whose equally monumental folly now threatens it." Gary Kamiya, Salon.com
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"Extraordinarily farsighted. A beautiful and passionate jeremiad against deforestation, climate change, and pollution."
Boston Globe
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"A refreshing, and oddly hopeful, look at the fate of the environment."
BusinessWeek
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"Alan Weisman has produced, if not a bible, at least a Book of Revelation." Newsweek
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"An astonishing mass of reportage that envisions a world suddenly bereft of humans." The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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"Weisman turns the destruction of our civilization and the subsequent rewilding of the planet into a Hollywood-worthy, slow-motion disaster spectacular and feel-good movie rolled into one....[His] gripping fantasy will make most readers hope that at least some of us can stick around long enough to see how it all turns out." Jennifer Schuessler, New York Times Book Review
Review
"The concept of a world devoid of humans is a vivid imagination stirrer. It has been a theme of post-apocalyptic science-fiction books and films for decades. Much of the success of films like Road Warrior and Omega Man/I Am Legend is the titillation of seeing our familiar world laid waste, devoid of humans. Wiseman has taken it out of science fiction by talking to architects, sewer workers, museum archivists, etc., and getting their considered take on what would happen to our creations if humans suddenly disappeared." Doug Brown, Powells.com (read the entire Powells.com review)
Synopsis
A penetrating, page-turning tour of a post-human Earth. In
The World without Us, Alan Weisman offers an utterly original approach to questions of humanity's impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us.
In this far-reaching narrative, Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immortalized as fossils; how copper pipes and wiring would be crushed into mere seams of reddish rock; why some of our earliest buildings might be the last architecture left; and how plastic, bronze sculpture, radio waves, and some man-made molecules may be our most lasting gifts to the universe.
The World without Us reveals how, just days after humans disappear, floods in New York's subways would start eroding the city's foundations, and how, as the world's cities crumble, asphalt jungles would give way to real ones. It describes the distinct ways that organic and chemically treated farms would revert to wild, how billions more birds would flourish, and how cockroaches in unheated cities would perish without us. Drawing on the expertise of engineers, atmospheric scientists, art conservators, zoologists, oil refiners, marine biologists, astrophysicists, religious leaders from rabbis to the Dali Lama, and paleontologists who describe a prehuman world inhabited by megafauna like giant sloths that stood taller than mammoths Weisman illustrates what the planet might be like today, if not for us.
From places already devoid of humans (a last fragment of primeval European forest; the Korean DMZ; Chernobyl), Weisman reveals Earth's tremendous capacity for self-healing. As he shows which human devastations are indelible, and which examples of our highest art and culture would endure longest, Weisman's narrative ultimately drives toward a radical but persuasive solution that needn't depend on our demise. It is narrative nonfiction at its finest, and in posing an irresistible concept with both gravity and a highly readable touch, it looks deeply at our effects on the planet in a way that no other book has.
Synopsis
A penetrating, page-turning tour of a post-human Earth
In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman offers an utterly original approach to questions of humanitys impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us.In this far-reaching narrative, Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immortalized as fossils; how copper pipes and wiring would be crushed into mere seams of reddish rock; why some of our earliest buildings might be the last architecture left; and how plastic, bronze sculpture, radio waves, and some man-made molecules may be our most lasting gifts to the universe.The World Without Us reveals how, just days after humans disappear, floods in New Yorks subways would start eroding the citys foundations, and how, as the worlds cities crumble, asphalt jungles would give way to real ones. It describes the distinct ways that organic and chemically treated farms would revert to wild, how billions more birds would flourish, and how cockroaches in unheated cities would perish without us. Drawing on the expertise of engineers, atmospheric scientists, art conservators, zoologists, oil refiners, marine biologists, astrophysicists, religious leaders from rabbis to the Dali Lama, and paleontologists---who describe a prehuman world inhabited by megafauna like giant sloths that stood taller than mammoths---Weisman illustrates what the planet might be like today, if not for us.From places already devoid of humans (a last fragment of primeval European forest; the Korean DMZ; Chernobyl), Weisman reveals Earths tremendous capacity for self-healing. As he shows which human devastations are indelible, and which examples of our highest art and culture would endure longest, Weismans narrative ultimately drives toward a radical but persuasive solution that needn't depend on our demise. It is narrative nonfiction at its finest, and in posing an irresistible concept with both gravity and a highly readable touch, it looks deeply at our effects on the planet in a way that no other book has. "This is one of the grandest thought experiments of our time, a tremendous feat of imaginative reporting!"--Bill McKibben, author of The End of Nature and Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and The Durable Future “The imaginative power of The World Without Us is compulsive and nearly hypnotic--make sure you have time to be kidnapped into Alan Weismans alternative world before you sit down with the book, because you wont soon return. This is a text that has a chance to change people, and so make a real difference for the planet.”--Charles Wohlforth, author of L.A. Times Book Prize-winning The Whale and the Supercomputer
“Alan Weisman offers us a sketch of where we stand as a species that is both illuminating and terrifying. His tone is conversational and his affection for both Earth and humanity transparent.”--Barry Lopez, author of Arctic Dreams
“An exacting account of the processes by which things fall apart. The scope is breathtaking...the clarity and lyricism of the writing itself left me with repeated gasps of recognition about the human condition. I believe it will be a classic.”--Dennis Covington, author of National Book Award finalist Salvation on Sand Mountain
“Fascinating, mordant, deeply intelligent, and beautifully written, The World Without Us depicts the spectacle of humanitys impact on the planet Earth in tragically poignant terms that go far beyond the dry dictates of science. This is a very important book for a species playing games with its own destiny.”--James Howard Kunstler, author of The Long Emergency
Synopsis
Time #1 Nonfiction Book of 2007
Entertainment Weekly #1 Nonfiction Book of 2007
Finalist for the 2007 National Book Critics Circle Award
Salon Book Awards 2007
Amazon Top 100 Editors Picks of 2007 (#4)
Barnes and Noble 10 Best of 2007: Politics and Current Affairs
Kansas City Stars Top 100 Books of the Year 2007
Mother Jones Favorite Books of 2007
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Best Books of the Year 2007
Hudsons Best Books of 2007
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Best Books of 2007
St. Paul Pioneer Press Best Books of 2007
If human beings disappeared instantaneously from the Earth, what would happen? How would the planet reclaim its surface? What creatures would emerge from the dark and swarm? How would our treasured structures--our tunnels, our bridges, our homes, our monuments--survive the unmitigated impact of a planet without our intervention? In his revelatory, bestselling account, Alan Weisman draws on every field of science to present an environmental assessment like no other, the most affecting portrait yet of humankind's place on this planet.
Synopsis
A penetrating take on how our planet would respond without the relentless pressure of the human presence
Synopsis
Discover the impact of the human footprint in
The World Without Us. Take us off the Earth and what traces of us would linger? And which would disappear? Alan Weisman writes about which objects from today would vanish without us; how our pipes, wires, and cables would be pulverized into an unusual (but mere) line of red rock; why some museums and churches might be the last human creations standing; how rats and roaches would struggle without us; and how plastic, cast-iron, and radio waves may be our most lasting gifts to the planet.
But The World Without Us is also about how parts of our world currently fare without a human presence (Chernobyl; a Polish old-growth forest, the Korean DMZ) and it looks at the human legacy on Earth, both fleeting and indelible. It's narrative nonfiction at its finest, taking an irresistible concept with gravity and a highly-readable touch.
Some examples of what would happen:
· One year: Several more billions birds will live when airplane warning lights cease blinking.
· Twenty years: The water-soaked steel columns that support the street above New York's East Side would corrode and buckle. As Lexington Avenue caves in, it becomes a river.
· 100,000 years: CO2 will be back to pre-human levels (or it might take longer).
· Forever: Our radio waves, fragmented as they may be, will still be going out.
Synopsis
A penetrating, page-turning tour of a post-human Earth
In The World Without Us, Alan Weisman offers an utterly original approach to questions of humanity's impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us.In this far-reaching narrative, Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immortalized as fossils; how copper pipes and wiring would be crushed into mere seams of reddish rock; why some of our earliest buildings might be the last architecture left; and how plastic, bronze sculpture, radio waves, and some man-made molecules may be our most lasting gifts to the universe.The World Without Us reveals how, just days after humans disappear, floods in New York's subways would start eroding the city's foundations, and how, as the world's cities crumble, asphalt jungles would give way to real ones. It describes the distinct ways that organic and chemically treated farms would revert to wild, how billions more birds would flourish, and how cockroaches in unheated cities would perish without us. Drawing on the expertise of engineers, atmospheric scientists, art conservators, zoologists, oil refiners, marine biologists, astrophysicists, religious leaders from rabbis to the Dali Lama, and paleontologists---who describe a prehuman world inhabited by megafauna like giant sloths that stood taller than mammoths---Weisman illustrates what the planet might be like today, if not for us.From places already devoid of humans (a last fragment of primeval European forest; the Korean DMZ; Chernobyl), Weisman reveals Earth's tremendous capacity for self-healing. As he shows which human devastations are indelible, and which examples of our highest art and culture would endure longest, Weisman's narrative ultimately drives toward a radical but persuasive solution that needn't depend on our demise. It is narrative nonfiction at its finest, and in posing an irresistible concept with both gravity and a highly readable touch, it looks deeply at our effects on the planet in a way that no other book has.
Synopsis
An award-winning ecology writer goes looking for the wilderness we've lost, providing an eye-opening account of the true relationship between humans and nature.
Synopsis
An award-winning ecology writer goes looking for the wilderness we’ve forgotten Many people believe that only an ecological catastrophe will change humanity’s troubled relationship with the natural world. In fact, as J.B. MacKinnon argues in this unorthodox look at the disappearing wilderness, we are living in the midst of a disaster thousands of years in the making—and we hardly notice it. We have forgotten what nature can be and adapted to a diminished world of our own making.
In The Once and Future World, MacKinnon invites us to remember nature as it was, to reconnect to nature in a meaningful way, and to remake a wilder world everywhere. He goes looking for landscapes untouched by human hands. He revisits a globe exuberant with life, where lions roam North America and ten times more whales swim in the sea. He shows us that the vestiges of lost nature surround us every day: buy an avocado at the grocery store and you have a seed designed to pass through the digestive tracts of huge animals that have been driven extinct.
The Once and Future World is a call for an “age of rewilding,” from planting milkweed for butterflies in our own backyards to restoring animal migration routes that span entire continents. We choose the natural world that we live in—a choice that also decides the kind of people we are.
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About the Author
Alan Weisman is an award-winning journalist whose reports have appeared in Harpers, The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, Discover, and on NPR, among others. A former contributing editor to the Los Angeles Times Magazine, he is a senior radio producer for Homelands Productions and teaches international journalism at the University of Arizona. His essay "Earth Without People" (Discover magazine, February 2005), on which The World Without Us expands, was selected for Best American Science Writing 2006.
Table of Contents
The Nature of the Problem 1
1. Illusions of Nature 3
2. Knowledge Extinction 16
3. A 10 Percent World 33
4. The Opposite of Apocalypse 47
The Nature of Nature 67
5. A Beautiful World 69
6. Ghost Acres 81
7. Uncertain Nature 96
8. What Nature Looks Like 112
Human Nature 127
9. The Maker and the Made 129
10. The Age of Rewilding 142
11. Double Disappearance 163
12. The Lost Island 182
Epilogue 203
Acknowledgments 216
Selected Bibliography 217
Index 224