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beceverett's review
As someone with a postgraduate degree in environmental science, I was looking forward to reading this book. Working in this sphere, I am perhaps more invested in managing climate change than your average person, though I find environmental alarmism an inappropriate method to draw attention to the issue.
I started off positive - I share Stellenberger’s views on the activism conducted by Extinction Rebellion. However, it quickly became extremely apparent much of Stellenberger’s evidence is cherry picked. While talking about flooding, he discusses how there are virtually no higher risks in developing countries such as the (almost completely landlocked) Democratic Republic of Congo. This is a very sweeping statement - had he examined the developing country the Solomon Islands, for example, he would see that there are islands within this country that have already been lost due to rising sea levels.
The following chapter discusses bushfires, and mentions the 2019-2020 Australian bushfires. As an Australian, I feel that I have a particular emotional investment in how this story is told which has possibly clouded my view; however there were instances again where inaccurate statements were made. Shellenberger states the fires were only as bad as they were because of the higher population density, and there was a higher fuel load due to the Federal Government not allowing fire management to take place. Not only is this incorrect - fire management is governed at a state or territory level and not federally, there was no opportunity to implement fire regimes over the last twelve months because of increased temperatures and no precipitation.
I am, however, finding the discussion of the media interesting. Shellenberger argues that the media dramatises the data surrounding climate change discussion. While I cannot say how accurate this is in a global sense, most Australian media is owned by Rupert Murdoch, and as such, tends to lean towards climate change denial.
I started off positive - I share Stellenberger’s views on the activism conducted by Extinction Rebellion. However, it quickly became extremely apparent much of Stellenberger’s evidence is cherry picked. While talking about flooding, he discusses how there are virtually no higher risks in developing countries such as the (almost completely landlocked) Democratic Republic of Congo. This is a very sweeping statement - had he examined the developing country the Solomon Islands, for example, he would see that there are islands within this country that have already been lost due to rising sea levels.
The following chapter discusses bushfires, and mentions the 2019-2020 Australian bushfires. As an Australian, I feel that I have a particular emotional investment in how this story is told which has possibly clouded my view; however there were instances again where inaccurate statements were made. Shellenberger states the fires were only as bad as they were because of the higher population density, and there was a higher fuel load due to the Federal Government not allowing fire management to take place. Not only is this incorrect - fire management is governed at a state or territory level and not federally, there was no opportunity to implement fire regimes over the last twelve months because of increased temperatures and no precipitation.
I am, however, finding the discussion of the media interesting. Shellenberger argues that the media dramatises the data surrounding climate change discussion. While I cannot say how accurate this is in a global sense, most Australian media is owned by Rupert Murdoch, and as such, tends to lean towards climate change denial.
christianhartman's review
5.0
There are many valid criticisms of this book, and a 285 page book tackling a topic of this magnitude will always invite criticisms of cherry picking data and examples for discussion, so while the book suffers from the inevitable errors of omission and commission in the data, the core of what he argues is what struck me the most profoundly, that of a return to environmental humanism as opposed to its more recognized sibling environmental alarmism.
This book is also most likely many people’s first introduction to the idea that nuclear power and nuclear bombs are not equivalent, and should be not be fought against so vigorously when the benefits Shellenberger and others lay out in this book and others are impossible to ignore at the very least. In my own mind, to be an environmentalist and to be totally opposed to nuclear power (different from saying you can’t have, even serious, reservations of course) is to be a fraud.
The last paragraph is a good summary: “ environmental humanism will eventually triumph over apocalyptic environmentalism, I believe, because the vast majority of people in the world want both prosperity and nature, not nature without prosperity. They are just confused about how to achieve both”.
This book is also most likely many people’s first introduction to the idea that nuclear power and nuclear bombs are not equivalent, and should be not be fought against so vigorously when the benefits Shellenberger and others lay out in this book and others are impossible to ignore at the very least. In my own mind, to be an environmentalist and to be totally opposed to nuclear power (different from saying you can’t have, even serious, reservations of course) is to be a fraud.
The last paragraph is a good summary: “ environmental humanism will eventually triumph over apocalyptic environmentalism, I believe, because the vast majority of people in the world want both prosperity and nature, not nature without prosperity. They are just confused about how to achieve both”.
doug_whatzup's review
4.0
I’ve always tried to be a good steward of my little corner of the earth. I recycle, even though I know that a lot of my recycled waste winds up in the same place (or maybe even worse places) than the rest of my trash. I compost food waste and avoid toxic weed sprays and pesticides whenever possible. I never, ever litter and detest people who do.
But I cannot for the life of me buy into this “we’re all gonna die if we don’t turn this around in x number of years” nonsense. I can accept that the world is warming to a degree (no pun intended), and that some of all of that trend is anthropomorphic, but experience has taught me that to the more extreme and strident a case one makes, the less likely it is to be valid.
For a guy like me, who strives toward a rational approach to environmental issues, Michael Shellenberger’s “Apocalypse Never” is a must-read. In an ideal world, Greta Thunberg and AOC would read it as well, and maybe learn a couple of things, but that’s probably too much to wish for.
Shellenberger, a life-long progressive and environmental activist, argues that apocalyptic environmentalism not only impedes human progress, particularly for the most impoverished among us, but actually harms the environment in ways that should be obvious to those of us who aren’t blinded by the movement’s religious-like fervor.
These people push solar and wind without any consideration at all given to their blight on the landscape, the waste issues they create, the wildlife they harm or their comparative inefficiency. These are the same people who claim that “the science is settled,” despite the fact that the very nature of scientific inquiry is that it is never “settled.”
The older one gets, the more one realizes that so much of what we’re told “by the experts” is utter nonsense. I grew up being told that a new ice age was imminent, that margarine was good for you, that Saddam’s nukes were a threat to world peace. Now, in the midst of a global pandemic, the experts are telling us not to wear masks; no, wait, we all must wear masks; that hydroxychloroquine might be an effective treatment for coronavirus; that hydroxychloroquine is a scam; that the pandemic is over; that a second wave is upon us. Everybody, it seems, has an angle, an agenda.
Shellenberger has an agenda as well. He believes nuclear energy is the answer, and he makes a compelling case for it in “Apocalypse Never.” I’m not sure that I buy it completely, but I think I’ll be buying a few more shares of Energy Fuels (UUUU) just in case.
But I cannot for the life of me buy into this “we’re all gonna die if we don’t turn this around in x number of years” nonsense. I can accept that the world is warming to a degree (no pun intended), and that some of all of that trend is anthropomorphic, but experience has taught me that to the more extreme and strident a case one makes, the less likely it is to be valid.
For a guy like me, who strives toward a rational approach to environmental issues, Michael Shellenberger’s “Apocalypse Never” is a must-read. In an ideal world, Greta Thunberg and AOC would read it as well, and maybe learn a couple of things, but that’s probably too much to wish for.
Shellenberger, a life-long progressive and environmental activist, argues that apocalyptic environmentalism not only impedes human progress, particularly for the most impoverished among us, but actually harms the environment in ways that should be obvious to those of us who aren’t blinded by the movement’s religious-like fervor.
These people push solar and wind without any consideration at all given to their blight on the landscape, the waste issues they create, the wildlife they harm or their comparative inefficiency. These are the same people who claim that “the science is settled,” despite the fact that the very nature of scientific inquiry is that it is never “settled.”
The older one gets, the more one realizes that so much of what we’re told “by the experts” is utter nonsense. I grew up being told that a new ice age was imminent, that margarine was good for you, that Saddam’s nukes were a threat to world peace. Now, in the midst of a global pandemic, the experts are telling us not to wear masks; no, wait, we all must wear masks; that hydroxychloroquine might be an effective treatment for coronavirus; that hydroxychloroquine is a scam; that the pandemic is over; that a second wave is upon us. Everybody, it seems, has an angle, an agenda.
Shellenberger has an agenda as well. He believes nuclear energy is the answer, and he makes a compelling case for it in “Apocalypse Never.” I’m not sure that I buy it completely, but I think I’ll be buying a few more shares of Energy Fuels (UUUU) just in case.
shinyhero's review
4.0
4.25/5.0
*This book is not a climate denial book*. The author is a self-professed humanist environmentalist. He fully acknowledges the reality of human-caused climate change, as well as its negative consequences. Shellenberger also spent a lot of time interviewing people in developing countries to try to understand the environmental and economic hardships they face.
Prior to this book, I have read David Wallace-Well’s Uninhabitable Earth, which is also a recent book, but on the alarmist spectrum:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41552709
I have also read the rebuttals to Apocalypse Never, the most famous of them:
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/article-by-michael-shellenberger-mixes-accurate-and-inaccurate-claims-in-support-of-a-misleading-and-overly-simplistic-argumentation-about-climate-change/
https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/07/review-bad-science-and-bad-arguments-abound-in-apocalypse-never/
I have also read the counter-rebuttal by Shellenberger:
https://environmentalprogress.org/big-news/2020/8/3/bad-science-and-bad-ethics-in-peter-gleicks-review-of-apocalypse-never-at-yale-climate-connections
Even after reading all the counter-points, I find Apocalypse Never to be sensible, somewhat convincing, and practical. Sure, there are some scientific estimates that may be up for contention (just like in David Wallace-Well’s book on the other end of the spectrum). But overall, Shellenberger points out the practical flaws of some of the current environmentalist strategies and policies. This is a book worth reading to balance out the cacophony of counter-productive apocalyptic environmentalism in recent years.
*This book is not a climate denial book*. The author is a self-professed humanist environmentalist. He fully acknowledges the reality of human-caused climate change, as well as its negative consequences. Shellenberger also spent a lot of time interviewing people in developing countries to try to understand the environmental and economic hardships they face.
Prior to this book, I have read David Wallace-Well’s Uninhabitable Earth, which is also a recent book, but on the alarmist spectrum:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41552709
I have also read the rebuttals to Apocalypse Never, the most famous of them:
https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/article-by-michael-shellenberger-mixes-accurate-and-inaccurate-claims-in-support-of-a-misleading-and-overly-simplistic-argumentation-about-climate-change/
https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/07/review-bad-science-and-bad-arguments-abound-in-apocalypse-never/
I have also read the counter-rebuttal by Shellenberger:
https://environmentalprogress.org/big-news/2020/8/3/bad-science-and-bad-ethics-in-peter-gleicks-review-of-apocalypse-never-at-yale-climate-connections
Even after reading all the counter-points, I find Apocalypse Never to be sensible, somewhat convincing, and practical. Sure, there are some scientific estimates that may be up for contention (just like in David Wallace-Well’s book on the other end of the spectrum). But overall, Shellenberger points out the practical flaws of some of the current environmentalist strategies and policies. This is a book worth reading to balance out the cacophony of counter-productive apocalyptic environmentalism in recent years.
miguelf's review
2.0
It becomes readily apparent shortly into this book that this is going to be more of a polemic than an unbiased set of facts, figures and analysis on the environment. A 2 second google search of the author reveals that he’s a paid lobbyist for the nuclear power industry, and boy does he earn his pay and more in this. One learns that scaling down nuclear has been one of man’s greatest sins in the past few decades and that the reality is that nuclear waste is largely benign and the Chernobyl exclusion zone is totally safe and that anything negatively reported regarding nuclear accidents have been completely overblown. Ooooooo-kay.
I really wanted to hear a well-reasoned critique of some of the excesses of the doom & gloom that’s been associated with rising CO2 levels and our impending environmental catastrophe. It seems, as the author points out, that the common refrain that we have only 12 years to control CO2 emissions or somehow the earth will implode do seem completely overblown. It would have been great to read about what a more accurate prediction would be in terms of allowable emission limits or more realistic model scenarios. Perhaps Shellenberger just isn’t the right person to deliver a thoughtful and dispassionate account without sounding like something you would hear coming straight from Tucker Carlson, or on Breitbart or Zero Hedge. The polemicizing is that bad, with a lot of personal attacks on well-known environmentalists and use of phrases like “regressive Left” that leave no room for his way or the highway on any of the data. Vaclav Smil he is not.
Certainly all of humanity will be better off if some of the climate models are off and overestimating the changes in future temperature, ocean acidic levels and overall extreme weather changes – we should all celebrate if these do not come to pass. However, this book doesn’t nearly make a good enough case why we shouldn’t have concern and instead goes off the rails on Fox news style of tirades that simply can’t be taken seriously with this very real issue.
I really wanted to hear a well-reasoned critique of some of the excesses of the doom & gloom that’s been associated with rising CO2 levels and our impending environmental catastrophe. It seems, as the author points out, that the common refrain that we have only 12 years to control CO2 emissions or somehow the earth will implode do seem completely overblown. It would have been great to read about what a more accurate prediction would be in terms of allowable emission limits or more realistic model scenarios. Perhaps Shellenberger just isn’t the right person to deliver a thoughtful and dispassionate account without sounding like something you would hear coming straight from Tucker Carlson, or on Breitbart or Zero Hedge. The polemicizing is that bad, with a lot of personal attacks on well-known environmentalists and use of phrases like “regressive Left” that leave no room for his way or the highway on any of the data. Vaclav Smil he is not.
Certainly all of humanity will be better off if some of the climate models are off and overestimating the changes in future temperature, ocean acidic levels and overall extreme weather changes – we should all celebrate if these do not come to pass. However, this book doesn’t nearly make a good enough case why we shouldn’t have concern and instead goes off the rails on Fox news style of tirades that simply can’t be taken seriously with this very real issue.