★★★★★ 4
As A Dominant Species, We Dance On The Razor’s Edge
Format: Hardcover
Under A White Sky
Elizabeth Kolbert’s claim to fame is her book The Sixth Extinction. In comparison Kolbert’s under A White Sky is rather short and disorganized, yet her coverage of those working on solutions to Climate Change is pretty darn interesting. In her conclusion, she writes, “This has been a book about people trying to solve problems created by people trying to solve problems.” Putting this sentence at the book’s beginning rather than buried at its end would have provided a reader a compass to help determine where Kolbert was going with her dialogue.
As she wades through the reversed direction of the Chicago river; Asian carp; Cane toads; forced and accelerated evolution in regard to coral, in particular in regard to the Great Barrier Reef (without discussing the importance of the worlds reefs; the continual flooding of New Orleans both despite and because of the actions of The Army Corps of engineers, one begins to ponder a general connection that might exist, while the book itself is headed toward a two star rating.
Then, Kolbert got to Global Warming and Climate science. The book’s last sixty pages are worth the complete price of admission. The chapter begins with carbon sequestration, the pros and cons of how it can be done, and does it also contribute to the growing problem. The stoppered bathtub” analogy is perhaps the best analogy I’ve heard in regard to the anthropocentric carbon dioxide problem on the Earth. The tub is full of water/ the sky’s CO2 level; the tubs stoppered, so the water isn’t going anywhere, and the atmosphere’s increased CO2 level won’t drop in the near future either; and even if the water flow to the tub is reduced, it will still accumulate until over flowing, as will reduced emissions continue to amass in the atmosphere. In a sense, we are already beyond the tipping point in terms of global temperature increase.
Harvard University Center for the Environment director Dan Schrag says, “I’m a scientist. My job is not to tell people the good news. My job is to describe the world as accurately as possible.” He predicts, due to the fact that the oceans must equilibriate. “If we were to stop CO2 emissions tomorrow, which of course isn’t possible, it’s still going to warm for centuries. That’s just basic physics.” Thus enters the topic of geoengineering, and the connection with people trying to solve problems created by people trying to solve problems truly comes into focus. Kolbert , in a rather clandestine way connects the dots of her past “local problems”, but now the problem fix, if it doesn’t work could create problems beyond solving.
She hits the nail on the head with this. Humans have been around 35-50 thousand years, but only the last ten thousand or so have they thrived, largely due to agriculture and differentiation of what one can do because of agriculture. But ag has only been able to thrive because of the rather consistent global weather of the past ten thousand years, due to glacial retreat. This has been presented in great detail by Jared Diamond in his book Guns, Germs, and Steel. The CO2 we’ve put into the atmosphere isn’t going anywhere, as we continue to pour more into the mix. Her interviews with climate scientists do not bode well for our species, as everything they think of to combat the CO2 conundrum brings more as the bathtub continues to fill. One could say humans have become victims of their own success as a species.
Ultimately, one gets the feeling from Kolbert and her interviews, that the enormous fluctuations in the Earth’s climate over geological time, and those yet to come, render whatever we do as humans as a moot point. The Earth will shake is off as a dog rids itself of fleas. She also brings to the argument, when the blank really hits the fan, as it will despite, or because of any preventative efforts by man, the resulting population displacements will be staggering.
A sobering, informative book as we, as a species, dance on the razor’s edge.
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Reviewed in the United States on September 24, 2021
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