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A review by spiralnode
The Uninhabitable Earth: A Story of the Future by David Wallace-Wells
dark
informative
sad
slow-paced
3.0
'The Uninhabitable Earth' was certainly very informative - it is exactly what it says on the tin, what are the consequences of global warming?
The material was interesting and relevant to our world today, and is approached in chapters each about a certain consequence: oceans, wildfires, or politics for example. While I was familiar with many of these, there were also pieces of information that I didn't even consider, such as:
'Since 1950, much of the good stuff in the plants we grow—protein, calcium, iron, vitamin C, to name just four—has declined by as much as one-third, a landmark 2004 study showed. Everything is becoming more like junk food. Even the protein content of bee pollen has dropped by a third.'
I also thought the info on the various impact around the world was worth the read: Russia will benefit from climate change the most, and Bangladesh already being hit due to disadvantageous geographic location, flat and low-lying topography, high population density;, high levels of poverty, reliance of many livelihoods on climate sensitive sectors, particularly agriculture, and the estimate is that by 2050, 1 in every 7 people will be climate change refugees. Australia will be the first rich country impacted by climate change.
The data was put together in a chronological way, the author stating thins such as the degree increase 20 years ago, at present, and the estimate. This made it even more alarming, when you consider the changes that many of us have made in our lifestyle, in our priorities, and yet the future remains terrifying. How are politicians taking actions, how are world leaders pushing positive change in policies?
While there was some commentary on it, the book very much stayed with the data and the information at present than made any meaningful suggestions. Which is fine, it served the purpose of the summary, but I could see how for some readers this would be disappointing.
However, my most disappointing was on the execution style, the writing. There were some fluffy quotes from fiction writers or philosophers that I didn't think had a place here, some ideas were discussing round and round, saying the same thing with different worlds, and I thought at times the author was even contradicting himself. The book starts with him stating that things seem urgent, but in reality data modelling is hard so we haven't reached the predicted numbers in the past. But the tone throughout the rest of the read, the data and the events that we were presented with, were in direct contradiction to that.
A worthwhile read, but still not the climate change book I'd recommend to people.
The material was interesting and relevant to our world today, and is approached in chapters each about a certain consequence: oceans, wildfires, or politics for example. While I was familiar with many of these, there were also pieces of information that I didn't even consider, such as:
'Since 1950, much of the good stuff in the plants we grow—protein, calcium, iron, vitamin C, to name just four—has declined by as much as one-third, a landmark 2004 study showed. Everything is becoming more like junk food. Even the protein content of bee pollen has dropped by a third.'
I also thought the info on the various impact around the world was worth the read: Russia will benefit from climate change the most, and Bangladesh already being hit due to disadvantageous geographic location, flat and low-lying topography, high population density;, high levels of poverty, reliance of many livelihoods on climate sensitive sectors, particularly agriculture, and the estimate is that by 2050, 1 in every 7 people will be climate change refugees. Australia will be the first rich country impacted by climate change.
The data was put together in a chronological way, the author stating thins such as the degree increase 20 years ago, at present, and the estimate. This made it even more alarming, when you consider the changes that many of us have made in our lifestyle, in our priorities, and yet the future remains terrifying. How are politicians taking actions, how are world leaders pushing positive change in policies?
While there was some commentary on it, the book very much stayed with the data and the information at present than made any meaningful suggestions. Which is fine, it served the purpose of the summary, but I could see how for some readers this would be disappointing.
However, my most disappointing was on the execution style, the writing. There were some fluffy quotes from fiction writers or philosophers that I didn't think had a place here, some ideas were discussing round and round, saying the same thing with different worlds, and I thought at times the author was even contradicting himself. The book starts with him stating that things seem urgent, but in reality data modelling is hard so we haven't reached the predicted numbers in the past. But the tone throughout the rest of the read, the data and the events that we were presented with, were in direct contradiction to that.
A worthwhile read, but still not the climate change book I'd recommend to people.