New book about a possible new world.
By Brandon T. Bisceglia
Op/Ed and Online Editor
A real world without us in the Bialowieza Puszcza.
Photograph Courtesy of wilki.most.org
What will the human legacy be? To answer that question, perhaps it is best to ask another: what would happen if every person was removed from the planet tomorrow?
That is the scenario that journalist Alan Weisman ponders in his new book, The World Without Us (St. Martin's Press, 2007). Weisman enlists a bevy of experts, from paleontologists to nuclear technicians, to help readers imagine how the Earth would function if all the humans were suddenly whisked away. He travels to such places as the Bialowieza Puszcza of Poland (the last remaining “primeval forest” in Europe), and the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea, to see first-hand some examples of what nature does in the absence of human intervention. The connections he infers from the figures, theories, and observations he collects can often be astounding.
Houses collapse in a matter of years. The Manhattan skyline is toppled in a few hundred. Most “timeless” art is quickly subsumed. In all but a few cases exposure to air, water, and intruding flora undermines human creations pretty quickly. Throughout its pages, The World Without Us again and again reveals the tenuous grip that humanity has on its institutions.
What emerges from this deconstruction is an even more intriguing picture of what we actually leave behind. Bronze art survives relatively unscathed for perhaps millions of years. Our most treasured historical sites probably crumble within a few thousand, but the faces carved into Mount Rushmore survive as long as the mountain does. Most enduring (and disturbing) is the persistence of polyethylene polymers – plastics. Plastic molecules appear never to break down into simpler matter, which means that man’s imprint may be here on a microscopic level in the form of destructive indigestibles for an indefinitely long period of time.
The World Without Us is a bit sketchy in its presentation of timelines for the decomposition of the human imprint. The shifts from scene to scene can become confusing for the chronological learner. About halfway through the book a semi-clear pattern emerges, as simple deconstruction analysis gives way to a wider speculation about the planet’s future.
This inside-to-outside approach forces the reader to make connections both horizontally and vertically. The effort almost pays off. The book takes the reader to many places, but then sets back down again without really making a solid point.
At moments, there are flashes of purpose. Weisman’s book also explores other ways that mankind’s influence may continue to ripple in concentric waves of devastation. Some catastrophic possibilities are lain out like wildcards throughout the book: refineries and nuclear power stations that could become toxic disaster areas within weeks, for instance. There’s no telling what cumulative impact these calamities would have on the Earth. The increasingly-present issue of global warming also raises major questions. The effects continue to build after we exeunt, but predicting the outcome is literally as difficult as predicting the weather a year from now.
One nearly expects the author to proselytize after several chapters about the terraforming of Europe and the masses of plastic accumulating in the Northern Pacific Gyre. But that never quite happens. Despite all the apocalyptic speculation, there is a prominent focus on the pervasiveness and perseverance of life threaded throughout the text. By considering myriad examples from past to present, Weisman shows how plants and animals adapt to our meddling, even as we drive some to extinction and turn the general environment into a volatile cauldron. An inspiring illustration lies in his description of the post-Chernobyl landscape. Many plants and animals have already evolved to propagate and flourish despite levels of radiation so high that no person could traverse without full radiation gear. The persistence of life is well summed by one scientist quoted in the book: “If the planet can recover from the Permian, it can recover from the human.”
Even barring manmade cataclysms, an ultimately ironic caveat presents itself to the reader. The next ice age, whenever it comes, will quickly annihilate most human achievements as glaciers press over nearly every major settlement currently on the planet.
Although it doesn’t quite muster the force to stir the reader beyond rhetorical detachment, the most general implication of The World Without Us is that, given enough time, there may be nothing recognizable as human on the Earth. In that sense, the message of this book may initially seem somewhat morose. However, what it demonstrates is a more essential shift of paradigms. The struggle for posterity, timelessness, and immortality is at the end of the day based on a fallacious belief in a permanence that simply does not exist.
Weisman seems to say that man’s final legacy, no matter what, will be to become part of the nature from which he has sprung. Our greatest achievements can never be those that attempt to impose on nature. Instead, they might just be those that seek to preserve its endless array, and to make sure that we do not disrupt the balance that holds us, too, on the precipice.
Perhaps that in itself is enough of a call to action. After all, we will each find ourselves in real trouble on some tomorrow.
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