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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 304.2
EAN: 9780312427900
ISBN: 0312427905
Label: Picador
Manufacturer: Picador
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 432
Publication Date: August 05, 2008
Publisher: Picador
Release Date: August 05, 2008
Sales Rank: 806
Studio: Picador
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
Time #1 Nonfiction Book of 2007
Entertainment Weekly #1 Nonfiction Book of 2007
Finalist for the 2007 National Book Critics Circle Award
Salon Book Awards 2007
Amazon Top 100 Editors’ Picks of 2007 (#4)
Barnes and Noble 10 Best of 2007: Politics and Current Affairs
Kansas City Star’s Top 100 Books of the Year 2007
Mother Jones’ Favorite Books of 2007
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Best Books of the Year 2007
Hudson’s Best Books of 2007
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Best Books of 2007
St. Paul Pioneer Press Best Books of 2007
If human beings disappeared instantaneously from the Earth, what would happen? How would the planet reclaim its surface? What creatures would emerge from the dark and swarm? How would our treasured structures--our tunnels, our bridges, our homes, our monuments--survive the unmitigated impact of a planet without our intervention? In his revelatory, bestselling account, Alan Weisman draws on every field of science to present an environmental assessment like no other, the most affecting portrait yet of humankind's place on this planet.
Customer Reviews Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Great concept, long boring delivery
Great topic, this would have been an excellent 20-30 page paper. It turned instead into a disappointing and wordy 275-page book. While thought-provoking, long sections (second third for example) aren't engaging and it takes serious dedication to keep reading. All the chapters about infrastructure degradation quickly become repetitive and boring.
The book is overall mostly descriptive with limited speculations (towards the end). I am sympathetic to the criticisms of the consumerist society ... Read More
Rating:  - Thought-provoking facts, but taken with a grain of salt
One thing that surprises me about this book is some of the comments from other reviewers printed on the back: "This book is the very DNA of hope"--The Globe and Mail or "Extraordinarily foresighted ... beautiful and passionate." While I agree with the foresighted comment (it's a book whose very premise is about the future without us, so if it wasn't foresighted, I don't know what it would be) the others I find strange in their overwhelming sentiment that this book left them with a positive feeling. ... Read More
Rating: - errata
Errata:
Page 94: "Only 6,000 years ago, what is now the world's largest nonpolar desert was green savanna."This change is attributed to: "Our tilted axis straightened not even half a degree, but enough to nudge rain clouds around".No, the larger forcing was the change in the time of perihelion, the time of closest approach relative to the seasons.Perihelion in winter (as it is currently) weakens the northern hemisphere monsoons.
Page 141: "In turn, Sweden's shores were ... Read More
Rating:  - Interesting "What If?" Look at the World
A very well written and captivating look at Mother Earth's response to the disappearance of humans.I felt the author did a fantastic job at educating the reader on the devastating impact of important human discoveries that we take for granted today.It really will make you think twice about bringing home a plastic bag from the grocery store.
I also enjoyed the limitation of religious theories and beliefs as this book is dedicated to physical science.
Rating: - life will find a way - but we should too
It's an easy speculation to say that without humans, the earth will restore, recleanse, rectify itself.Indeed, in his book The World Without Us, Alan Weisman repeatedly hints to the reader that the world doesn't need us as much as we need it.But Weisman goes beyond the obvious implication and details just how incredibly short-sighted we humans have been in just a brief time on this planet.
Weisman thoroughly stresses home the point that despite our tendencies toward toxicity, life will ... Read More
The World Without Us |
