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James Howard Kunstler's The Long Emergency was an underground hit, going into nine printings of the hardcover edition. His shocking vision for our post-oil future caught the attention of environmentalists and business leaders and was the subject of much debate, stimulating discussion about our dependence on fossil fuels. Now in paperback, with a new afterword, The Long Emergency is set to reach an even larger audience.
The last two hundred years have seen the greatest explosion of progress and wealth in the history of mankind, much of it based on the exploitation of cheap, nonrenewable fossil-fuel energy. But the oil age is at an end. Life as we know it is about to change radically, and much sooner than we think. The Long Emergency tells us just what to expect after we pass the point of global peak oil production and the honeymoon of affordable energy is over, preparing us for economic, political, and social changes of an unimaginable scale. Riveting and authoritative, The Long Emergency is a devastating indictment that brings new urgency and accessibility to the critical issues that will shape our future, and that we can no longer afford to ignore.
Doomsday comedy
| Customer Rating:   | I don't know what's scarier; the doomsday scenarios laid out in this book that totally ignore and/or dismiss the human ability to overcome problems, or that this was assigned reading at my University. In the first five pages of the book, the author basically admits he is a member of the "die-off" crowd; the crowd that believes we are rapidly running out of oil and that civilization will self-destruct in our lifetime. He thinks that vast portions of the population will die off because the oil-free Earth cannot support them, that the United States will break up into regional territories, that we will be forced to revert back to 19th century pre-industrialized ways, (with maybe a few exceptions in medical knowledge retained) and that the suburbs will be abandoned and become the new slums, unfit for human habitation. He mocks those who believe that humanity will find another source (or sources) of transportation power. He is definitely skewing the argument in his favor, sometimes completely ignoring developments, such as advancing hybrid technology, and rapidly developing plug-in cars such as the Volt that GM is working on. You can't really blame him, though. Alarmism is the way to sell books. Would this book sell worth a darn if it were titled "The Temporary, Passing Emergency?" No. But, it's not all doom-and-gloom rubbish. I agree with him when he says that we need to get over our stupid fear of the nuclear boogeyman and start ramping up nuclear power again. The French get most of their power from nuclear; why aren't we? Has anyone in the United States EVER died from a nuclear power plant accident? (No!)
Anyway, I think I'll keep this book instead of selling it back to the bookstore at the end of the term. That way in 20 years when my kids come home teary-eyed from college, convinced that we only have a few years of civilization left, I can pull out this bad boy and show them this type of alarmist propaganda is nothing new. |
Depressing, but interesting
| Customer Rating: | | This book gives a lot of interesting historical and current information, but is a little too "doom and gloom" and repeats thoughts a little too much and also is too emotional for a nonfiction book. However, hopefully enough people will take notice of the message and start doing things differently. |
Very interesting
| Customer Rating: | Kunstler has formulated a vision of the future that is very frightening to those of us who have only known a cheap-oil world. The problem is not just global warming, but the breakdown of just about every product and service that we have come to rely on. The analysis of just how much we depend on fossil fuels is alone worth the purchase price.
I would be very interested to read a counter-point to this book. That is, what is an alternative, more hopeful outcome for the world when oil production begins to decline? Is there one? I would like to compare the plausibility of the future described in 'The Long Emergency' with a more optimistic one. I have a feeling, however, that Kunstler's pessimistic view of the future would be a lot more believable.
Anyway, this book is a must-read for anyone interested in energy issues. But since energy use underlies almost everything in our modern world, this book would be of interest to many. I highly recommend it. |
prophetic -- read this excerpt
| Customer Rating: | I'm posting this mid-October 2008, in the midst of the global financial crisis. Here's a phophetic excerpt from The Long Emergency that was written in mid-2004:
"By the time you read this, it is very likely that the housing bubble will have begun to come to grief... The economic wreckage is liable to be impressive. If house owners cannot make their mortgage payments, Fannie May and Freddie Mac, and by extension the federal government, would be the big losers. The failure of [Fannie and Freddie] would make the Savings and Loans fiasco of the 1980s look like a bad night at poker... It could easily bring on cascading failures that might jeopardize global finance. This time, the American public will feel the pain... Our desperate problems with oil and gas will effectively shut down the growth of our industrial economies, and with that our expectations for economic progress, as we have known it... The transient and ephemeral condition of industrial hypergrowth that the world has known for just over 200 years will be over. Energy will be at an extreme premium, and human survival skill will be the new capital. What it may be like to live later on in the 21st century ("The Long Emergency") is the subject of the next chapter."
I haven't read the next chapter yet, though unfortunately I have a feeling we're all about to "live" The Long Emergency instead of "read" it.
~mark~ |
Don't bother......
| Customer Rating: | This book is long on illustrating a make-believe world that the author desires, and short on facts.
Very short on facts.......
The author manages to insults virtually every racial and geographic group - except for his own, of course.
Honestly, save your money, this book is a waste of time!
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