An Unnatural History
Hold on to your optimism because this book will damage much of the hope for the future you may have.
What I enjoyed most was learning of the history of the sciences we take for granted today. The very concept of extinction got supporters of the idea laughed out of the room. To many scientists in the 17th century, every known creature was thought to have always been there.
When a mastodon's skeleton was discovered in the United States, it just proved that a living herd had not yet been found in the wild. Not that it was evidence of a long-lost species.
Peter Diamandis once said, "The day before something is a breakthrough, it's a crazy idea."
The book is a long list of crazy ideas that have become accepted fact.
By page 19 it is no surprise to learn that the rapid extinction event amphibians are being accelerated by our own human activity and systems.
My constant complaint in these kinds of books is that they are full of destruction & doom and short of constructive hope & solutions.
That said, it's a terrific read. The history of scientific discovery is especially telling. Just think about how the very notion of climate change was universally laughed at only 20 years ago. Not as much now.
The book does not touch on this but, I feel this is the biggest scientific, economic and social opportunity humanity has ever had. We have the chance to reinvent everything!
So far, our world has stumbled into the future, today we can plan it. Reimagine it. Improve it. Best of all, the world is full of those crazy ideas that just might work. Oh, my! We could be at the inflection point where humanity realizes it's true potential.
Elizabeth Kolbert's website - http://elizabethkolbert.com/
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| Elizabeth Kolbert |
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