i finally finished “collapse“. i can now move on with my life. it’s quite a long read at 525 pages of a very small font. is it worth reading? definitely. it could use a trimmed down version to reach a wider audience. i think a lot of people wouldn’t make it past the first 100 pages or less. the book is packed with facts. always good when you’re trying to make a point. it would be helpful to society in general if everyone would at least read the last section. it covers practical application of the previous 400 pages of research and analysis of civilizations, both ancient and modern.
jared diamond’s claim is to be a cautious optimists. however, there would have to be drastic changes before i think i would share his optimism. for starters, get a competent president who has the long term interest of the country as a top priority and by the “country”, i mean all demographics. kanye west’s comment that “george bush doesn’t care about black people” was interesting and ballsy, but incorrect. george bush doesn’t care about non-rich people. it was just a coincidence that practically all the people in new orleans were black. george w. bush’s answer to climate change and environmental issues is more research. i would submit this book as all the research required. the question of global warming is irrelevant in respect to weening everyone from fossil fuels as it’s not sustainable in the long term and the local pollution is easily visible. the debates over it just allow the administration, other politicians and corporations to delay action.
a somewhat ironic aspect of the book is that jared diamond lives in los angeles, which he uses as an example in the last section. people there on average commute 60 miles a day to work. that’s insane. however, it’s a direct result of unplanned urban sprawl. atlanta and miami are similar. birmingham will eventually get there on the present course of inaction. you cannot hope to have good public transport or efficient transport when your city is scattered all over the place. while london has good public transport, i wouldn’t say that the central city is really arranged in the most desirable way. we need to start from scratch. unfortunately, that’s probably not going to happen. the only real hope is the design principal of transit villages. a system where a car is not required additionally can speed adoption of new technologies. the largest problem with moving from gas powered cars, aside from an apparently non-existant alternative, is that if there was an alternative energy source, it would take for ever to adopt it. equally, what would happen to all the existing combustion engine cars. a proper solution should attempt to provide a retrofit for existing cars that doesn’t require buying a new car. shockingly, we don’t see that because the only companies starting to promote alternative fuels are car companies. they sell cars. they see switching to alternative fuels as a gold rush equivalent to the music industry when people switch from tapes to cds.
anyway, what do you do? according to diamond, a large part of the responsibility lies with the consumer. we are a mainly market driven economy. the important factor is placing the pressure in the proper place at the retail vendor. sitting in a tree so it won’t be cut down doesn’t do anything, but get a lot of press for someone being a moron sitting in a tree. it even hurts the cause further by re-enforcing the “tree hugger” stereotype, literally. it may be a small p.r. issue for the specific logging company in that area, but no one outside the area will even know or care what the company is. furthermore, no one directly buys lumber from a logging company. except home depot, lowes, etc. that’s where you apply the pressure because they can apply pressure to the logging companies. you don’t have a demonstration at a gold mine, you picket in front of tiffany’s. as mentined in the book, these companies are reacting due to pressure to preserve there “good” name.
two specific industry groups mentioned in the book are the forest stewardship council (logging) and the marine stewardship council (fishing). these groups defined international standards that are audited by 3rd party certified companies to ensure long term sustainable industries. so, when you’re buying lumber or fish, look for their certification (assuming it exists). supposedly, home depot stocks f.s.c. lumber. m.s.c. is apparently sold by whole foods and sainsbury, neither of which are in birmingham. young’s, the company that makes admiral’s pie, apparently uses m.s.c. fish though no information appears to be available on the packaging.
another thing is to evaluate your driving/commuting situation. fuel efficient cars are better, ditch the s.u.v. and move closer to where you work. obviously, these are easier said than done. however, a large portion of an issue may be of perspective than actual barriers. i still can’t get over the woman at the public transport rally in birmingham who questioned whether or not she should have to move across the city nearer to her job than have to ride the bus an hour (it may have been more) each way to work. the answer, is obviously yes if you want to do something else with that time. maybe use that time to read a book for your own intellectual enhancement. as a comparison, the trip from my flat to craven cottage takes ~40 minutes on the tube. the equivalent bus trip would be an hour longer according to the transport for london trip planner. it’s 8.6 miles and 19 minutes from angel tube station to putney bridge tube station by car according to google maps. probably longer with traffic. i suppose i have a point somewhere. i realize everyone can’t telecommute or live 5 blocks from where they work. however, you have to trade your time for that. things could always be better planned (or at least planned), but it seems that unfortunately we can’t start from scratch. it will also always be the case that real estate nearer to city centers will be more expensive. i’m increasingly beginning to think that a couple of large companies in birmingham should just abandon downtown and build a new city center in chelsea or something and actually plan it. that’s what happened in london with canary wharf. i just have decreasing hope that downtown birmingham will ever actually turn around. for starters, they need to quit bitching about the neighborhoods (homewood, mountainbrook, vestavia, hoover, etc.) not getting on board with public transport and realize that until you can travel around downtown without a car, you aren’t going to be able to convince anyone it’s a good idea to take a bus or train from the suburbs. i haven’t been checking lately, but they’ve probably screwed up the railroad reservation park too.
is it possible to create a “good part of town” that doesn’t depend on the flawed parameter of how much money you have?
this is way of track and should probably be edited, but i don’t really want to. definitely needs more paragraph breaks.
the bottom line is that people should start with their own backyard. sure the federal government is incompetent war-mongerers, but why are you depending on the federal government anyway? start with your local and state governments. start with yourself.
one last thing, population growth was a huge part of the collapse of former civilizations. the goal should be zero population growth, but it goes farther than that because it’s the per-capita environmental impact. the world supposedly couldn’t even support the situation where all third world citizens lived a first world live style. for this reason, things like social security or economic models that depend on population growth have got to go.
hopefully, no one read all this rambling all the way through. just go checkout “collapse” from the library and read the last section. you can then decide if you want to read the previous sections.
Actually, a somewhat interesting post. You almost made a point or two
i’ll try and be more careful next time.