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brandonpytel 's review for:
The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History
by Elizabeth Kolbert
I’m embarrassed how long it took me to read this, considering it’s a staple of contemporary climate books. Kolbert starts by outlining what we’re up against: a sixth extinction, driven by humans, at a scale and pace only rivaled several times in our planet’s history.
Using each chapter to discuss a different extinct species, Kolbert takes us around the world to explore the rapid extinction of species from mastodons to Neanderthals to coral reefs, while entrenching these subjects within a history of extinction and biodiversity. Kolbert uses refreshingly accessible pose and analogies to explain even the most complicated of scientific concepts, creating a readable narrative that tells a story of a species as much as it offers analysis of its downfall.
Most concerning is the relative ease in which we’ve driven extinctions as fast as we have — “running geologic history not only in reverse but at warp speed” — accomplished through our restlessness, expansion, and colonization. In the process, humans are giving themselves authority and agency to forever alter the composition of the planet, its atmosphere, and its inhabitants: “We are deciding, without quite meaning to, which evolution pathways will remain open and which will forever be closed.”
Using each chapter to discuss a different extinct species, Kolbert takes us around the world to explore the rapid extinction of species from mastodons to Neanderthals to coral reefs, while entrenching these subjects within a history of extinction and biodiversity. Kolbert uses refreshingly accessible pose and analogies to explain even the most complicated of scientific concepts, creating a readable narrative that tells a story of a species as much as it offers analysis of its downfall.
Most concerning is the relative ease in which we’ve driven extinctions as fast as we have — “running geologic history not only in reverse but at warp speed” — accomplished through our restlessness, expansion, and colonization. In the process, humans are giving themselves authority and agency to forever alter the composition of the planet, its atmosphere, and its inhabitants: “We are deciding, without quite meaning to, which evolution pathways will remain open and which will forever be closed.”