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Binding: PaperbackDewey Decimal Number: 304.28 EAN: 9780143036555 ISBN: 0143036556 Label: Penguin (Non-Classics) Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics) Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 592 Publication Date: December 27, 2005 Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) Studio: Penguin (Non-Classics) Editorial Review: Amazon.com: Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed is the glass-half-empty follow-up to his Pulitzer Prize-winning Guns, Germs, and Steel. While Guns, Germs, and Steel explained the geographic and environmental reasons why some human populations have flourished, Collapse uses the same factors to examine why ancient societies, including the Anasazi of the American Southwest and the Viking colonies of Greenland, as well as modern ones such as Rwanda, have fallen apart. Not every collapse has an environmental origin, but an eco-meltdown is often the main catalyst, he argues, particularly when combined with society's response to (or disregard for) the coming disaster. Still, right from the outset of Collapse, the author makes clear that this is not a mere environmentalist's diatribe. He begins by setting the book's main question in the small communities of present-day Montana as they face a decline in living standards and a depletion of natural resources. Once-vital mines now leak toxins into the soil, while prion diseases infect some deer and elk and older hydroelectric dams have become decrepit. On all these issues, and particularly with the hot-button topic of logging and wildfires, Diamond writes with equanimity. Because he's addressing such significant issues within a vast span of time, Diamond can occasionally speak too briefly and assume too much, and at times his shorthand remarks may cause careful readers to raise an eyebrow. But in general, Diamond provides fine and well-reasoned historical examples, making the case that many times, economic and environmental concerns are one and the same. With Collapse, Diamond hopes to jog our collective memory to keep us from falling for false analogies or forgetting prior experiences, and thereby save us from potential devastations to come. While it might seem a stretch to use medieval Greenland and the Maya to convince a skeptic about the seriousness of global warming, it's exactly this type of cross-referencing that makes Collapse so compelling. --Jennifer Buckendorff Product Description: In his runaway bestseller Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond brilliantly examined the circumstances that allowed Western civilizations to dominate much of the world. Now he probes the other side of the equation: What caused some of the great civilizations of the past to fall into ruin, and what can we learn from their fates? Using a vast historical and geographical perspective ranging from Easter Island and the Maya to Viking Greenland and modern Montana, Diamond traces a fundamental pattern of environmental catastropheone whose warning signs can be seen in our modern world and that we ignore at our peril. Blending the most recent scientific advances into a narrative that is impossible to put down, Collapse exposes the deepest mysteries of the past even as it offers hope for the future. Diamonds most influential gift may be his ability to write about geopolitical and environmental systems in ways that dont just educate and provoke, but entertain. The Seattle Times Extremely persuasive . . . replete with fascinating stories, a treasure trove of historical anecdotes [and] haunting statistics. The Boston Globe Extraordinary in erudition and originality, compelling in [its] ability to relate the digitized pandemonium of the present to the hushed agrarian sunrises of the far past. The New York Times Book Review Average Rating:
 Rating:  - Warms up after the first couple chaptersNot quite as good as his best-known book, "Guns, Germs and Steel", mostly because the first 50 pages are about Montana. Who cares about Montana? I barely even know where it is. But after that it gets wicked awesome. Unfortunately you can't really skip the Montana parts - too many concepts are introduced that you'll need later - but hey, it's Diamond; you can suck it up for 50 pages. Vikings come later. Vikings! Rating:  - Obvious pluses and not so obvious minusesJared Diamond has a gift for explaining complex phenomena to the average person in a way that is captivating and digestible. In this book, he tackles a topic (the collapse of societies) that is depressing to some and terrifying to others (I suppose it is infuriating to those who just want to be free to build a mine with no environmental protection). He manages to keep the reader's attention for over five hundred pages and leave us with hope for the future -- if we can learn the lessons of the past. ... Read More Rating: - Critical topic, excellent scholarship, yet very accessibleI have been following the many trends on ecology, politics, and economics for many years. I'll admit I'm a complete pessimist in regards to human nature. Yet Diamond's book gives me a bit of hope that the message of stewardship vs resource consumption may be considered in a systematic way. My hope derives (ironically) from the well-researched conclusion that without a change of course, our planet's ruling class will soon face political/economic unrest resulting from widespread starvation, disease, ... Read More Rating:  - condition not revealedI was sorry to find underlining in the book. Underlining should be revealed as part of the condition of the book, Rating: - A (mixed) review of the abridged audio bookI am somewhat surprised by the huge success of Diamond's books. They are interesting, yes, and he does address important topics. But he is not a brilliant writer, and his books are overall rather tedious (at least this is what I thought of "The 3rd chimpanzee" and of "Guns Germs and Steel"). I have not read the full book, and I am instead reviewing the abridged audio version read (very well) by Christopher Murney. I found even this shorter version rather dull. List after list of dates, names, ... Read More |
