I’ll start with definitions, straight from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. Resource: 1 a: a source of supply or support : an available means –usually used in plural b: a natural source of wealth or revenue –often used in plural :c: a natural feature or phenomenon that enhances the quality of human life d: computable wealth –usually used in plural e: a source of information or expertise.
All these definitions imply an anthropogenic basis for resources, and c is particularly transparent on this point. Digging a little further, the etymology of “resource” brings us directly to lifelong bedfellows anthropocentrism and Christianity. “Resource” is derived from the Old French “resourdre” (literally, to rise again), which has its roots in the Latin “resurgere” (to rise from the dead; also see “resurrection”).
From this etymology, it’s a simple step back in time to Aristotle’s “final cause” (which followed his material cause, efficient cause, and formal cause). Aristotle posited that, ultimately, events occurred to serve life, particularly the life of humans. This anthropocentric take on causality grew directly from the philosophy of Aristotle’s teacher Plato, who focused his philosophy on separating humans from nature while popularizing the feel-good notion that humans have immortal souls. The idea that humans have souls, which was subsequently discredited by the (western) science that grew from humble Grecian roots, became the basis for Christianity, one of three Abrahamic religions that developed in the Mediterranean a few centuries after Plato learned from Socrates and then taught Aristotle.
Considering the history of western thought, it’s no surprise we view every element on Earth as feedstock for industrialization. The only question is when we exploit Earth’s bounty, not if. The logical progression, then, is to exploitation of humans to further feed the industrial machine.
Within the last few years, personnel departments at major institutions became departments of human resources. Thus, whereas these departments formerly dealt with persons, they now deal with resources. There’s a reason you feel like a cog in a grand imperial scheme: Not only are you are viewed as a cog by the machine, and also by those who run the machine, but any non-cog-like behavior on your part leads to rejection of you and your actions. Seems you’re either a tool of empire or you’re a saboteur (i.e., terrorist).
It’s time to invest in wooden shoes.
As if fifteen people are even willing to poke a stick in the eye of the corporations that run and ruin our lives. Why is that? Probably because we think we depend upon them, when in fact they depend upon us. And, to a certain extent — to the extent we allow — we do depend upon industrial culture for our lives. But only in the short term, and only as self-absorbed, comfortable individuals unwilling to make changes in our lives (even ones that are necessary to our own survival). Taking the longer, broader view, it is evident industrial culture is killing the living planet, and our own species. The cultural problem we face is not that we’re fish out of water. Rather, it’s that we’re fish in a river. We don’t even know there’s an ocean, much less a landbase.
Aye, there’s the rub. Evolution demands short-term thinking focused on individual survival. Most attempts to overcome our evolutionarily hardwired absorption with self are selected against. The Overman is dead, killed by a high-fat diet and unwillingness to exercise. Reflexively, we follow him into the grave.
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This post is permalined at Energy Bulletin, Counter Currents, mostly water, and Eco Friendly Mag.

The human role in extinction of species and degradation of ecosystems is well documented. Since European settlement in North America, and especially after the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, we have witnessed a substantial decline in biological diversity of native taxa and profound changes in assemblages of the remaining species. We have ripped minerals from the Earth, often bringing down mountains in the process; we have harvested nearly all the old-growth timber on the continent, replacing thousand-year-old trees with neatly ordered plantations of small trees; we have hunted species to the point of extinction; we have driven livestock across every almost acre of the continent, baring hillsides and facilitating massive erosion; we have plowed large landscapes, transforming fertile soil into sterile, lifeless dirt; we have burned ecosystems and, perhaps more importantly, we have extinguished naturally occurring fires; we have paved thousands of acres to facilitate our movement and, in the process, have disrupted the movements of thousands of species; we have spewed pollution and dumped garbage, thereby dirtying our air, fouling our water, and contributing greatly to the warming of the planet. We have, to the maximum possible extent allowed by our intellect and never-ending desire, consumed the planet. In the wake of these endless insults to our only home, perhaps the greatest surprise is that so many native species have persisted, thus allowing our continued enjoyment and exploitation.
Although insults by Homo sapiens since the Industrial Revolution are well documented and widely acknowledged, abundant archaeological evidence indicates similar actions in the more distant past have led to the rise and fall of 23 major civilizations. Humans clearly have impacted their environments since initially appearing on the evolutionary stage, and human impacts have grown profoundly since the development of agriculture and subsequent technologies (as reviewed by Charles Redman’s 1999 text, Human Impact on Ancient Environments and, in more accessible prose, by Jared Diamond’s 2005 book, Collapse). Concomitantly, the environment has influenced the development of humans and their societies. The interaction between humans and their environments and the relative roles of culture and resources on human societies have received considerable attention from archaeological scholars. (The word “resources” is problematic because it implies materials are placed on this planet for the use of humans. We see finite substances and the living planet as materials to be exploited for our comfort. For efficiency and familiarity, I reluctantly use the word throughout this essay. I’ll save the full rant for another post while pointing out that my perspective is less imperial, and less Christian, than the traditional view.) The expansive literatures on resources, culture, and human-environment interactions indicate the important role of resources in constraining the development of several societies in the North American Southwest (as described particularly well by Timothy A. Kohler and colleagues). Exploitation of ecosystems, even to the point of destroying fertility of soils, has constrained subsequent food production (as described most notably by J.A. Sandor and colleagues). Although I recognize the importance of these topics, I leave the continued study and discussion of culture, resources, and human-environment interactions in the distant past to scholars with more interest and expertise than me, and instead turn my attention to recent and ongoing assaults by humans on the living planet.
If we accept that humans played a pivotal role in loss of species and degradation of ecosystems — and both patterns seem impossible to deny at this point — we face a daunting moral question: How do we reverse these trends?
Maintenance of biological diversity is important to our own species because present and future generations of humans depend on a rich diversity of life to maintain survival of individuals and, ultimately, persistence of our species. In addition, as architects of the extinction crisis currently facing plant Earth, we have a responsibility to future Homo sapiens and to non-human species to retain the maximum possible biological diversity. We must embrace our capacity and capability to sustain and enhance the diversity and complexity of our landscapes. The substantial economic cost of maintaining high levels of biological diversity will pale in comparison to the costs of failing to do so, which potentially include the extinction of humans from Earth.
Reintroducing ecological processes with which species evolved, and eliminating processes detrimental to native species, underlie the ability to maintain and perhaps even restore species diversity. Specifically, the management of wildland ecosystems should be based on maintenance and restoration of ecological processes, rather than on structural components such as species composition or maintenance of habitat for high-profile rare species. In fact, a focus on the latter goals — a fine-filter approach — may clog the coarse filter necessary for landscape-scale management of many species and ecosystems.
Drivers of Change
The proximate drivers underlying changes in land cover during the first few decades after European contact were mineral extraction, agricultural expansion, timber removal, and introduction of nonnative species (most importantly, livestock). The quest for silver and gold drove the Conquistadors to dismember, rape, and murder native peoples throughout the New World. The effects of mining on natural ecosystems were no less dramatic. Even before fossil fuels were employed to ease the extraction of metals from the ground, waterways were diverted and steam-powered water cannons were used to blast soil from mountains. Every tree within several dozen miles of a mining operation was cut down or pulled from the ground to power steam-powered stamp mills. Trees that escaped the eye of mine operators rarely got away for long. The western expansion of the human population across North America drove great demand for construction lumber, railroad ties, paper products, and heat from the hearth. These changes and their consequences have been well documented in a wide variety of publications (see, for example, People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn, One with Ninevah by Paul Ehrlich and Anne Ehrlich, and The Diversity of Life by Edward O. Wilson).
Farmers and ranchers followed frontiersmen, trappers, and miners into western North America. Whereas frontiersmen left a relatively small ecological footprint and the operations of trappers and miners tended to be limited in spatial scale, agriculture dominated virtually every acre of the North American West. Row-crop agriculture covered areas with fertile soil that could be fed by irrigation systems, including nearly all rivers. The massive, arid expanses unable to sustain row crops supported the dominant form of agriculture: livestock. By the early twentieth century, cattle and sheep had trampled nearly every wildland acre in search of forage. Stockmen (and, rarely, stockwomen) led the charge to exterminate perceived predators and potential competitors for forage: wolves, bears, coyotes, eagles, and prairie dogs were among the species slaughtered in the pursuit of safe environs for livestock and those who grew them. Perhaps more important than direct mortality from shooting and trapping were pronounced changes in site conditions that resulted from the collective action of millions of mouths and hooves.
Livestock have had pronounced negative impacts throughout North America. Livestock still loom large, and other biological invasions have transformed western landscapes. Some, like livestock, are politically “untouchable” despite adverse impacts on native species and ecosystems (e.g., “sport” fishes and various species of turf grasses critical to the golf-course industry). Others are universally undesirable but seemingly intractable because of ecological, rather than political, reasons.
It is not surprising that we are largely unable to manage, much less eradicate, nonnative species. After all, there are more than 50,000 nonnative species in the United States alone, invading terrestrial ecosystems at the rate of 700,000 hectares each year at an annual cost of $120 billion; they threaten 400 species with extinction (these figures come from the excellent scholarship of David Pimentel and colleagues, most notably including their 2005 paper in the journal Ecological Economics titled, “Update on the environmental and economic costs associated with alien-invasive species in the United States”). To make matters even more challenging, every species on Earth is capable of invading other sites (as assured by biotic potential), and every site is subject to invasion by at least one, and potentially many, nonnative species. Because biological invasions depend exclusively on the “match” between characteristics of biological invaders and characteristics of sites, and because there are an infinite number of potential “matches” between species and sites, solutions to the problem of biological invasions are specific to species and sites.
Given the disinterest in environmental issues displayed by citizens and their elected representatives, I doubt we will seriously address the problem of biological invasions before we cause the extinction of own species. As such, this disinterest in environmental issues reflects ignorance or disdain for the living planet that sustains our own species. It represents, in other words, omnicide that will almost certainly prove fatal.
The transition to modernity brought infrastructure, notably cities and the ever-widening, increasingly well maintained roads between them. Thus, within the last few decades, early drivers of change such as mining and agricultural expansion have been supplanted in importance by alteration of fire regimes, urbanization, and global climate change. Herein, I focus on the relatively simple impacts of each of these factors in isolation. As with historical drivers of change, interactions between these factors are complex, under-studied, and undoubtedly critically important.
A large and growing body of knowledge and empirical evidence indicates that fire was historically prevalent in North America, except in the driest deserts and the coldest tundra. It is clear that native species on the continent have evolved adaptations to periodic fires. Historical prevalence of fire ensures that even those species that seem most intolerant of fire have evolved in the presence of recurrent fires, as described in abundant ecological literature. Adaptations to fire are many and diverse, and include escape (e.g., distributions limited to rocky areas where fire rarely occurred), tolerance (e.g., thick bark), and rapid recruitment in post-fire environments (e.g., widely dispersed seeds and ability to establish in open environments).
Recognition that virtually all native species in North America evolved in concert with periodic fires leads to two general conclusions: (1) Native species have developed adaptations to fires that occur at a particular frequency, season, and extent; and (2) maintenance or reintroduction of the fire regimes with which these species evolved should assume high priority for those interested in maintaining high levels of biological diversity. A corollary to the first conclusion is that classification of native species along a gradient of adaptation to fire is simplistic and potentially misleading. Native species are “adapted” to recurrent fires, and classifying some as more tolerant than others suggests that fire is “good” for some species and “bad” for others. A more appropriate view is that recurrent fires, at the appropriate frequency, season, and extent (i.e., components of the historical fire regime), are part and parcel of these ecosystems. A corollary of the second conclusion is that reintroduction of ecological processes should be a relatively efficient and comprehensive strategy for retaining native species in extant ecosystems. Indeed, the historical prevalence of fire in these ecosystems suggests that fire is a necessary component of any comprehensive strategy focused on retention of biological diversity. Because fire was — and is — a dominant process in these systems, restoration of fire regimes would seem to be an important first step toward maintenance of high levels of biological diversity.
Urbanization and the associated transportation infrastructure have divided formerly large, contiguous landscapes into fragmented pieces. Fires that formerly covered large areas are constrained by fragmentation, and animals that necessarily range over large areas, such as mountain lions, bison, and grizzly bears, have suffered expectedly. These changes have been particularly pronounced since Oil War II, largely as a result of government subsidies that have promoted growth of the human population and suburban development. These trends will be reversed within the next few years because the Oil Age is drawing to a close. Unfortunately, our near-term inability to burn fossil fuels on a large scale probably will come too late to save many of the planet’s species from the effects of runaway greenhouse.
Ultimately, the story of western civilization is the story of fossil fuels. Profound changes in land use and land cover have been enabled by access to inexpensive oil and its derivatives (e.g., coal, uranium, ethanol, photovoltaic solar panels, wind turbines). Dramatic fluctuations in the price of oil within the next few years, coupled with steadily declining global supplies of this finite substance, likely will cause a complete collapse of the world’s industrial economy, which might usher in a new era with respect to species assemblages and land cover. Given the dependence of humans on fossil fuels for power, water, and food (including production and delivery), it seems inevitable that many people will die and the industrialized world’s vaunted infrastructure will collapse, thereby giving other species a slim and dwindling chance to make a comeback. Although the pattern of dwindling access to resources and subsequent collapse of civilizations has been thoroughly described in the archaeological record, the ongoing collapse obviously exceeds previous others with respect to geographic scale, as well as the number of species and the number of humans impacted.
Peak Oil and the Collapse of Industrial Civilization
Oil discovery and extraction tend to follow bell-shaped curves, as described by M. King Hubbert more than 50 years ago. The easily reached, light oil is extracted first. Heavier oil, often characterized by high sulfur content, is found at greater depths on land and also offshore. This heavier oil requires more money and more energy to extract and to refine than light oil. Eventually, all fields and regions become unviable economically and energetically. When extracting a barrel of oil requires more energy than contained in the barrel of oil, extraction is pointless.
The top of the bell-shaped curve for oil extraction is called “Peak Oil” or “Hubbert’s Peak.” We passed Hubbert’s Peak for world oil supply in 2005 and began easing down the other side, with an annual decline rate of 0.5% between 2005 and 2008 leading to a record-setting price of $147.27/barrel in July 2008. The International Energy Agency, which had never previously acknowledged the existence of a peak in oil availability, predicted an annual decline rate in crude oil in excess of 9% after 2008. The current economic recession resulting from the high price of oil led to a collapse in demand for oil and numerous other finite commodities, hence leading to reduced prices and the rapid abandonment of energy-production projects. Many geologists and scientists predict a permanent economic depression will result from declining availability of oil and the associated dramatic swings in the price of oil. It seems clear the permanent depression is already here. The absence of a politically viable solution to energy decline explains, at least in part, the absence of a governmental response to the issue even though the United States government recognizes peak oil as a serious problem (along, no doubt, with many other governments of the world).
Without energy, societies collapse. In contemporary, industrialized societies, virtually all energy sources are derived from oil. Even “renewable” energy sources such as hydropower, wind turbines, and solar panels require an enormous amount of oil for construction, maintenance, and repair. Extraction and delivery of coal, natural gas, and uranium similarly are oil-intensive endeavors. Thus, the decline of inexpensive oil spells economic disaster for industrialized countries. Demand destruction caused by high energy prices is affecting the entire industrialized world.
Viewed from a broader perspective than energy, economic collapses result from an imbalance between demand and supply of one or more resources (as explained in considerable depth by Jared Diamond in Collapse). When supply of vital resources is outstripped by demand, governments often print currency, which leads to hyperinflation. In recent history, the price of oil and its refined products have been primary to rates of inflation and have played central roles in the maintenance of civilized societies.
Addressing the issue of peak oil while also controlling emissions of carbon dioxide, and therefore reducing the prospect of “runaway greenhouse” on planet Earth, represents a daunting and potentially overwhelming challenge. Peak oil and the effects of runaway greenhouse are the greatest challenges humanity has ever faced. Tackling either challenge, without the loss of a huge number of human lives, will require tremendous courage, compassion, and creativity.
There is little question that the decades ahead will differ markedly from the recent past. From this point forward, Homo sapiens will lack the supply of inexpensive energy necessary to create and maintain a large, durable civilization. The fate of western civilization is in serious question, given our inability to sustain high levels of energy extraction. The population of humans in industrialized countries probably will fall precipitously if oil extraction turns sharply downward, as predicted by the International Energy Agency. The benefit of a massive human die-off is the potential for other species, and even other cultures, to expand into the vacuum we leave in our wake.
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This post is extracted and modified from a forthcoming book chapter celebrating 20 years of archaeological research in the North American Southwest. To improve accessibility for this audience, I have removed references to the primary literature (if you’d like a copy of the academic version, please send me an email message). The book will be published by the Colorado University Press. Thanks to Carla Van West for inviting my participation in the Southwestern Symposium held in Tempe, Arizona, January 2008, and for soliciting my chapter for the book. Thoughtful comments on earlier drafts were provided by Dana Backer and Paul Taylor.
This essay is permalinked at Energy Bulletin, Speaking Truth to Power, Island Breath, mostly water, StumbleUpon, and (sans links) the website of the Western Watersheds Project.

Start by studying these premises. I mean really studying them. Pick them apart. Find everything wrong with them. If you cannot refute them, then you support the culture of life. Welcome aboard. Now please help me bring it all down.
If you can refute the premises of Endgame, please do so. I’d love to keep the current game going, knowing I am not sanctioning murder by doing so.
The problem is ecological overshoot, as a handful of ecologists have been saying for decades (thereby echoing Malthus). We’ve far exceeded the human carrying capacity of the planet. As a result, we threaten every species on Earth, including our own, with extinction by the end of this century.Currently, there is not nearly enough food to feed every human on the planet, even at the expense of nearly every non-human species. Actually, tens of thousands of people have been starving to death every day for a few decades, but they’ve been beyond our imperial television screens. Will somebody out there please explain to me how supporting the industrial economy gives life, instead of destroying life?
The root cause of the problem is complex, but it can be reduced to a few primary factors: agriculture (i.e., western culture), industrialization (the epitome of western culture), and their contribution to human population growth. The genus Homo persisted on the planet some 2 million years, and our own species had been around for at least 250,000 years, without exceeding carrying capacity. We actually lived without posing a threat to the persistence of other species. During those good ol’ days, humans had abundant spare time for socializing and art, spending only a few hours each week hunting, gathering, and otherwise feeding themselves (i.e., “working”). Contrast with today’s humans, and how much time we spend working (and rarely enjoying that work, if talk around the water cooler is any indication. Agriculture leads to food storage, which leads to empire, which produces slavery, oppression, and mass murder (all of which were essentially absent for the first couple million years of the Homo experience). Lives were short, but happy by every measure we can find. In short, without agriculture there is no ecological overshoot. The human population explosion is effect, not cause. The industrial revolution exacerbated the problem to such an extent we’ll never be able to recover without historic human suffering. We are only beginning the witness the impacts of reduced energy supplies on the industrial economy, and we’ll be squarely back in the stone age, fully unprepared, within a very few short years.
At this point, our commitment to western culture (i.e., civilization) is so great that any attempt to power down will result in suffering and death of millions (and probably billions). Nonetheless, it’s the only way to allow our own species, and millions of others, to persist beyond century’s end and squeeze through the global-change bottleneck (which, as we know, resulted from industrialization). Every day in overshoot is another day to be reckoned with later, and therefore another few thousand humans who must live and die in Hobbesian fashion. There are no decent solutions. A collapse in the world’s industrial economy is producing the expected results, finally, too late to save thousands of species we’ve sent into the abyss, but perhaps barely in time to save a few remaining species, including our own. If you care about other species and cultures, or even the continued persistence of our own species, then you support our imminent return to the post-industrial stone age. Such a return saves the maximum number of human lives, over the long term.
When you realize the (eco)systems in the real world actually produce your food and water, you’ll defend to the death the systems that produces your food and water. I’m in that camp. How about you? What do you support? The industrial culture of death, which sanctions murderous actions every day? Or the culture of life?

“Peak Oil, economic collapse and related factors have doomed our civilization. It stands no chance of survival much longer. Global Climate Change is not necessary for failure of our civilization, but it is here and will be the final blow and perhaps the factor that determines whether any humans will ultimately survive. Global Climate Change will change the equation from one of civilizational survival, which is not possible, to species survival. The actions taken by mankind in the short term can no longer mitigate the impacts of climate change, but they could mitigate or prevent the worst possible impacts and thus give our species a chance to survive. And establishment of a carbon market as per Al Gore and Obama are not going to help one whit.”
“The chances are greater than 50/50 in my view that nothing effective will be done about global climate change and we will begin to see the cascading and synergistic impacts of climate change with economic failure very soon.”
My anonymous correspondent has plenty of thoughtful company. Scientists are predicting massive die-off of the hairless ape, and soon, if we don’t take immediate action (e.g., here and here). Of course we will not willingly take effective action. That would force us to abandon the “ideal” of economic growth (that is, of mass murder). But, much as I hate to quibble, I’m a lot more optimistic than my anonymous correspondent.
After all, even the mainstream media have realized that low oil prices are behind us. The Saudis are going so far as to sound the alarm about a “catastrophic” energy crunch. As I’ve been saying and writing for years, peak oil is the planet’s salvation, and ours, too. It will generate the massive die-off needed to save our species. Such is the cost of overshoot for any species, even one as clever as ours.
The bill has come due. The price we pay for saving the planet — which, in this case, means our own species, along with a plethora of others — is unpalatable in the extreme. Social unrest. Resource wars. Massive human die-off.
But enough about that. Back to the television. Kulture calls.
Better days lie ahead.

My first book was driven by my quest for academic success, the culmination of which I believed to be tenure. The first listing in my first book, Glossary of Fire Management Terms Used in the United States, is abort. The final term, a riveting 137 pages later, is zone weather forecast. I promise not to quote from this book if you promise not to buy it.
Seven years later, after obtaining the academic prize of tenure, I sought bigger game. With full professor in my sights, the seemingly necessary round of ammo was a major synthetic work. So I churned out a book that synthesized contemporary knowledge about North American savannas. It also signaled the hallmark of my early career in that it described the interface between science and its application. Even at this early stage in my career, I didn’t fit neatly into the academic categories of real “science” and application of that science, but instead attempted to bridge the enterprises. Consider these passages, for example:
“As with any human activity, sciences shares many characteristics with everyday activities. For example, observations of recurring events are used to infer general patterns in banking and fishing, as well as most scientific disciplines. The discussion herein focuses on features that are unique to science. I assume in this chapter that science is obliged in part to offer explanatory and predictive power about the natural world. An additional assumption is that the scientific method, which includes explicit hypothesis-testing, is among the most efficient and valid techniques for acquiring reliable knowledge. The scientific method should be used to elucidate mechanisms underlying observed patters; such elucidation is the key to predicting and understanding natural systems.”
“Resource managers need reliable scientific information to effectively manage plant communities and ecological processes. Because abundant data are available in a wide variety of qualities, managers must extract relevant information from the body of knowledge to address management decisions. Additional factors contribute to the dilemma that managers face as they attempt to incorporate scientific knowledge into management decisions: much of the available information is contradictory or inconsistent, and many scientists still attempt to provide mechanistic explanations about ecosystem function based on descriptive research. This latter tendency has trapped scientists into making predictions about things they cannot predict. Adherence to scientific principles, including hypothesis-testing, will improve communication between resource managers and scientists while increasing the credibility of both groups.”
The capstone for my work on the links between the development of reliable knowledge (i.e., science) and the application of that knowledge (i.e., management) came with one of two books published in 2003. This is perhaps the most respectable of my books by the academic elite who review my publications on a regular basis. It grew from a course I developed and taught for several years.
“Some readers will undoubtedly argue that managers are not interested in hearing about ecologists’ problems, and vice versa. Although we fear this may be true, we assume that progressive managers and progressive scientists are interested in understanding problems and contributing to their solution. Indeed, progressive managers ought to be scientists, and progressive scientists ought to be able to assume a manager’s perspective. As such, effective managers will understand the hurdles faced by research ecologists, and the trade offs associated with the different methods used to address issues of bias, sample size, and so on. Managers and scientists will be more effective if they understand science and management. How better to seek information, interpret scientific literature, evaluate management programs, or influence research than to understand and appreciate ecology and management?”
The other book published in 2003 marked the end of my work on global climate change. By the time this book was published, I believed we had passed the tipping point with respect to global climate change, that we were doomed to extinction at our own hand. Ever the optimists, we structured the book as if we could prevent that fate, or at least forestall it.
“Human-induced change in global environments is one of the most important and timely topics facing society. As the effects of human activities on Earth’s climate, sea levels, and ecosystems become more apparent in the coming decade, global change issues likely will become even more important to global citizens the their governmental representatives.”
“One important aspect of global change is the potential response of terrestrial ecosystems to changing environmental conditions. Anthropogenic increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration have both direct and indirect ramifications for natural ecosystems: global increases in carbon dioxide may stimulate plant growth, but they will also increase surface temperatures and change precipitation regimes. Considerable research has described the effects of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration and expected increases in temperature on ecosystems, but little research has focused on changes in the amount of seasonality of precipitation anticipated in the next few decades.”
“In short, scientific understanding and effective management of plant species and communities in the face of climate change will depend on our ability to accurately predict their response to different biotic and abiotic driving variables. This in turn will depend on a mechanistic understanding of individual and combined species response to resource limitations under changing environments. To this end, several large-scale field experiments have been designed to assess the physical and biological mechanisms that may control the effects of changes in precipitation regimes on individual plants, plant populations, and plant communities and their ecosystems. However, in contrast with carbon dioxide and surface temperature research — the sole focus of many books, journals, and scientific meetings — there has been no central forum for the discussion of information about this newly breaking arena of global change research.”
We fixed that problem, for all the good it did.
I took a job with The Nature Conservancy (TNC) at the cutting edge of development and application of scientific knowledge: I helped create, and then administered, a program for postdoctoral scholars. But the gig with TNC made me realize how fantastic life in the academy can be, so I decided to return to the life and students I love. Before I could make a graceful exit, though, I hung around in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area drowning in self-induced misery. One result was my only book-length work of fiction, written as therapy.
I strongly recommend writing as therapy. It’s so much cheaper than a shrink, or even a drink. But I do not recommend attempting to get the resulting drivel published. Consider, for example:
“‘Remember to call the nurse,’ Diane had said as we headed for our respective offices this morning. Dr. Weisner’s nurse had left a message on our answering machine regarding results of my recent blood work. Of course I had remembered. Six or seven times, in fact. But frequent interruptions ensured that I had forgotten an equal number of times. I grab the telephone and call before I can forget again.”
“After working steadily through the maze of choices and enduring a scratchy recording of Glenn Miller’s orchestra for several painful minutes, I am rewarded with a harried human voice.”
“‘Hi, this is Gary Peterson. I’m returning a call from Dr. Weisner’s nurse, Judy.’”
“‘Please hold, sir.’ More Glenn Miller. I review my e-mail messages, deleting half of the thirty messages that arrived overnight without reading them. I’ve got to unsubscribe from two or three of these journalism listserves that I never find time to read. I wouldn’t be averse to getting rid of e-mail altogether, as it’s become one more step on the road to replacing things that are important with those that are urgent. Bob Matthews peers into my open door, sees I’m on the telephone, and disappears before I have a chance to catch him. My patience is wearing thin when the human voice return. ‘Judy is not here today, sir.’”
“‘Okay, what about Dr. Weisner?’ My question is rewarded with a sudden click and more Glenn Miller. I retrieve my notes for today’s class from my briefcase. They seemed organized, logical and timely when I finished them late last night. In the harsh light of day, they appear considerably less brilliant. Maybe it’s Glenn Miller’s influence.”
“‘Sir?’ The voice seems surprised I’m still on the line.”
“‘Yes,’ I reply.”
“‘Dr. Weisner is not here, either.’”
“‘Okay, I’m just calling about the results of some blood tests. Judy left a message for me yesterday, indicating they were ready. Perhaps you can tell me?’”
“‘One minute, please.’ The voice is gone before I can reply. The big band sound of Glenn Miller scratches and squawks through the earpiece. Until today, I had no firm sentiment about Glenn Miller and his orchestra. A single telephone call, thus far characterized by few words, has irreparably destroyed my opinion of his music.”
“‘Sir?’ The voice makes no attempt to disguise her astonishment at the persistence. I can’t help thinking that she’s probably impressed by my tolerance for the raspy horns.”
“‘Yes, I’m still here,’ I reply with all the patience I can muster.”
“‘Dr. Weisner and Judy are on vacation.’”
“‘Both of them?’”
“‘Yes. They’ll be back in two weeks.’ I try to recall the last time I took a two-week vacation. I suspect it was during my sabbatical leave, three years ago.”
“‘Okay, perhaps you can help me,’ I repeat my request, which she ignored previously.”
“‘I would have to look at your chart,’ the voice says, seemingly unsettled by the prospect.”
“‘Yes, I suppose so.’ My response is followed by silence. No click. No Glenn Miller, thankfully. Just silence. ‘Hello?’”
“‘Oh, no, sir. I can’t look at your chart.’”
“‘Okay, that’s fine,’ I lie. ‘Can anybody there look at it? Perhaps another doctor?’ Even as I speak the words, I’m fearful they’ll be rewarded with scratchy blasts from my new least-favorite orchestra.”
“‘No, sir. Only Dr. Weisner and Judy can look at your chart.’”
“‘Wow, that’s an interesting policy,’ I muse aloud. I suspect the voice doesn’t share my opinion, so I feel the perverse need to offer an explanation. ‘What if the message was, “You have two days to live?” I’ll be expired nearly two weeks before Judy returns my call.’ Silence. Perhaps the voice is thinking. Perhaps she’ll even offer assistance now that I’ve survived the gauntlet and presented a compelling argument. ‘Hello?’”
“‘Only Dr. Weisner and Judy can look at your chart.’ So much for assistance.”
“‘Okay,’ I sigh in resignation. ‘Let’s assume that Judy is coming back and that I’m still alive when she does. Will you have her give me a call?’”
“‘Yes, sir. Will that be all?’”
“‘Sure. Unless you’ve got some Glenn Miller tunes I haven’t heard yet.’ Silence. ‘Hello?’ More silence. Apparently she hung up. Not that I blame her. I’d hang up on me too. Undaunted, I speak into the silence. ‘No? I guess I’ve heard his entire repertoire?’ It certainly seems that way.”
Not exactly War and Peace, eh?
As the novel was dutifully seeking a publisher, I changed careers from ecologist to conservation biologist and then to social critic. The change led to a book intended for the general public. This book, and shorter pieces of social criticism, made me realize how little society thinks of social critics. Seems nobody in society actually appreciates my criticism. Who knew?
“The evidence is simply overwhelming: The American Dream, as understood and pursued by most Americans, is killing the natives. Native cultures, native languages, and native species are vanishing from the planet at an alarming rate as a consequence of our unrelenting pursuit of the American Dream. The collective actions of 300 million Americans, procreating and shopping as if there is no tomorrow, are bringing us ever closer to the fate we’re forcing onto others. The consequences grow worse with each passing day, and — contrary to what you’re told by your government, your religious leaders, and the media — our actions pose a grave threat to you and your children.”
“This is not a doomsday book. If I was not optimistic, I could not write this book. Rather than claiming that the sky is falling and there is nothing we can do about it, this book is articulates the significant challenges we face and describes a set of solutions. Any genuine attempt to solve substantial problems must be followed by mental clarity and honesty if we are to solve them.”
Undaunted by societal disinterest and the occasional bit of hate mail, I continued my career as a social critic with a collection of letters to early-career academics. Consider, for example, these passages:
“As I have written in a previous book, American-style capitalism can be viewed as the pinnacle of mass murder. Consider the resource-extractive industries that produce much of the world’s pollution while impeding social justice (large oil and mining companies top the list, but American-style capitalism rewards the many corporations that follow their leads). These are the companies that destroy native cultures and species for the sake of financial gain (though to be fair, they wouldn’t be capable of these egregious transgressions without considerable support from the multitude of consumers in American society). Because they have the cash, these companies fund big-money research, the results of which further ensure their continued financial dominance on the global stage. Like hounds on the trail of chubby, dawdling rabbits, colleges and universities chase these companies in hot pursuit of gold. The incessant siren of commerce drowns out the occasional squawk of a sacrificial golden goose. Collateral damage is widely accepted in the bloody battle for short-term financial security.”
“I will be the first to register when I see an advertisement for the conference of my dreams. This conference focuses on the collapse of industrial ‘civilization.’ Such a collapse would wreak havoc on my 403(c), my 401(k), and my IRA. But it might save a few of the species and cultures that have managed to elude our iron fist, and that’s worth much more than the few dollars in my retirement funds.”
“But the rewards [of the professoriate] are supreme. You are allowed to live a life of leisure, in the historical sense: You choose the work you do. Through the lives of your students, you experience life and death the wonderful emotional roller coaster of youth. As such, you can choose to remain forever young, if only vicariously. You have opportunities to serve as a mentor. And, if you are worthy and fortunate, somebody might endow you with that noblest of distinctions by calling you, ‘teacher.’”
Shortly after publication of the self-indulgent collection of letters, I returned to my roots in fire ecology with a book co-authored by a graduate student. We make a nice team, if I do say so myself, because of my expertise in fire ecology and hers in fire policy. It’s more than that, of course, because I cannot stop myself from social criticism:
“As we write this in early 2007, we acknowledge that we might well be accused of fiddling while Rome burns. In the face of massive challenges that face our country, seemingly on every domestic and foreign issue, it has been difficult to focus on such a narrow, even apparently arcane, topic. We suggest, though, that the solutions we present here have the potential for much broader dilemmas. A problem seems insurmountable when we, as a nation, are unable to see the whole of it. In light of our incomplete knowledge, the perfect solution we seek is unattainable; meanwhile, we hold in our hands the very tools needed to mitigate the problem and reach a compromise solution. Perhaps as we learn to live with fire, we can learn to seek moderate solutions in other realms as well. We certainly hope so.”
My final book will be published this June, and perhaps even distributed this year (but I’m not betting on it). My contribution to this edited collection, in addition to wrangling authors and editing, includes lines such as these:
“The human role in extinction of species and degradation of ecosystems is well documented. Since European settlement in North America, and especially after the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, we have witnessed a substantial decline in biological diversity of native taxa and profound changes in assemblages of the remaining species. We have ripped minerals from the Earth, often bringing down mountains in the process; we have harvested nearly all the old-growth timber on the continent, replacing thousand-year-old trees with neatly ordered plantations of small trees; we have hunted species to the point of extinction; we have driven livestock across almost every acre of the continent, baring hillsides and facilitating massive erosion; we have plowed large landscapes, transforming fertile soil into sterile, lifeless dirt; we have burned ecosystems and, perhaps more importantly, we have extinguished naturally occurring fires; we have spewed pollution and dumped garbage, thereby dirtying our air, fouling our water, and contributing greatly to the warming of the planet; we have paved thousands of acres to facilitate our movement and, in the process, have disrupted the movements of thousands of species. One could argue that a fundamental problem is not that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, but that the road to hell is paved. We have, to the maximum possible extent allowed by our intellect and never-ending desire, consumed the planet. In the wake of these endless insults to our only home, perhaps the biggest surprise is that so many native species have persisted, thus allowing our continued use and enjoyment.
“If we accept that humans played a pivotal role in loss of species and degradation of ecosystems, we face a daunting moral question: How do we reverse these trends?”
I write for many reasons. I started writing books strictly out of selfishness. I took a stab at self-indulgent novelist along the way. Eventually, I moved into the realm of compassionate social critic, initially with the intent of saving civilization, then with the goal of extending the lives of people who would take my words to heart. All in all, my published output has been quite modest. And it’s been relevant only to me and a small handful of readers who use my work as one of many pieces of a very large puzzle. Looking back with the superior vision of hindsight, I wouldn’t do it again. As E.B. White pointed out, “Writing is hard work and bad for the health.”
With that in mind — and cognizant of the hypocrisy of being human — if the industrial economy had a few years left, I would write a memoir, and perhaps another novel. But instead of writing mediocre, self-absorbed, little-read books, I’ll spend the next few years reading some good ones.