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Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change
Our day-to-day experiences over the past decade have taught us that there must be limits to our tremendous appetite for energy, natural resources, and consumer goods. Even utility and oil companies now promote conservation in the face of demands for dwindling energy reserves. And for years some biologists have warned us of the direct correlation between scarcity and population growth. These scientists see an appalling future riding the tidal wave of a worldwide growth of population and technology.
A calm but unflinching realist, Catton suggests that we cannot stop this wave - for we have already overshot the Earth's capacity to support so huge a load. He contradicts those scientists, engineers, and technocrats who continue to write optimistically about energy alternatives. Catton asserts that the technological panaceas proposed by those who would harvest from the seas, harness the winds, and farm the deserts are ignoring the fundamental premise that "the principals of ecology apply to all living things." These principles tell us that, within a finite system, economic expansion is not irreversible and population growth cannot continue indefinitely. If we disregard these facts, our sagging American Dream will soon shatter completely.
A calm but unflinching realist, Catton suggests that we cannot stop this wave - for we have already overshot the Earth's capacity to support so huge a load. He contradicts those scientists, engineers, and technocrats who continue to write optimistically about energy alternatives. Catton asserts that the technological panaceas proposed by those who would harvest from the seas, harness the winds, and farm the deserts are ignoring the fundamental premise that "the principals of ecology apply to all living things." These principles tell us that, within a finite system, economic expansion is not irreversible and population growth cannot continue indefinitely. If we disregard these facts, our sagging American Dream will soon shatter completely.
320 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1980
122 people are currently reading
2290 people want to read
About the author
William R. Catton Jr.
6 books32 followersWilliam R. Catton, Jr. was an American sociologist best known for his scholarly work in environmental sociology and human ecology. The calm but unflinching realist got most praise for his 1980 book, Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change.
Catton had graduated from Oberlin College with an A.B. degree in 1950, whereupon he entered the graduate program in sociology at the University of Washington. He earned his M.A. there in 1952 and his Ph.D. in 1954. He was Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Washington State University. Catton served as president of the Pacific Sociological Association 1984-85 and as the first chair of the American Sociological Association Section on Environmental Sociology.
Catton had graduated from Oberlin College with an A.B. degree in 1950, whereupon he entered the graduate program in sociology at the University of Washington. He earned his M.A. there in 1952 and his Ph.D. in 1954. He was Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Washington State University. Catton served as president of the Pacific Sociological Association 1984-85 and as the first chair of the American Sociological Association Section on Environmental Sociology.
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October 6, 2010
I've been reading books on “the Problem of Civilization” for several years now. I'm constantly seeking to refine my conceptualization of the way humans interact with each other and their environment. Contrary to what one reviewer says (that most of Catton's book is “common knowledge for any under-40 environmentalists”), I felt that Overshoot expanded my understanding of environmental issues as a whole more than any book I've ever read – excluding perhaps the big leap that occurred when I was first exposed to the issues – though the books I've been reading were all written 10 to 30 years after it.
Overshoot is a sober, no-nonsense, presentation of ecological facts about the human condition and civilization. There are absolutely no emotional appeals, no aesthetic arguments, and no moral claims distracting from the simple paradigmatic wisdom Catton is pushing. His project in the book is to incite a paradigm shift, in Thomas Kuhn's scientific-revolutionary sense. That Catton's ideas haven't become common knowledge for everyone under 40 who's been paying attention attests to the fact that cultural paradigms function differently than scientific paradigms. A scientific paradigm has inertia, certainly, but it does fold against the pressure of accumulating evidence it can't properly explain.
The cultural paradigm Catton refers to as Exuberance is so deeply entrenched in our culture that even now, 30 years after the release of the book, in an age glutted with environmental awareness and media, practically no one addresses the fundamental revelation Catton presents: that, by using non-renewable fossil fuels and minerals, we have overshot the carrying capacity we had cultivated and irreparably reduced the earth's capacity to sustain us. As fossil fuels, clean water, arable land, minerals, etc, are exhausted, we WILL experience an extremely unpleasant die-off, accompanied by a likely-total collapse of our civilization.
Speaking of paradigm shift, Catton quite handily put the final nail in the coffin of my old, ideological way of thinking, and confirmed my new (since about this time last year) paradigm. This paradigm refuses explanations for large-scale historical, economic, and social trends based on abstract, ideological factors and not on biological, anthropological, and geographical ones. Catton gave me a number of missing links in the exposition of such an understanding. For example, I'd long suspected there must be some physical causes underlying economic recessions and booms. Economic growth depends on wealth creation, and while that could theoretically occur merely from enhanced human innovation, in practice it obviously occurs by expanding our access to and consumption of physical resources.
Other reviewers have complained that Catton is “all problems, no solutions.” I found the way Catton did supply 'solutions' extremely interesting. He says, to paraphrase, 'The American response to any problem is to ask “What can we DO about it?” Instead we must ask “What can we AVOID doing to keep a bad situation from getting much worse?”' The potential carrying capacity of the Earth is a matter of theoretical debate. However, the extent to which we obviously depend on fossil fuels shows that we have definitely overshot our current carrying capacity. Some people believe technological solutions will be found to drastically increase permanent carrying capacity by the time oil runs out. Catton likens these people to the Cargo Cultists of Melanesia, acting out vain rituals to bring back prosperity the creation of which they never understood. Since we have overshot carrying capacity and are extremely unlikely to be able to raise it to a level that can support the population the world will have produced by the time oil runs out, we will necessarily experience a die-off. This is a problem for which there IS NO SOLUTION. What we could do now is to undergo a voluntary recession, reducing economic growth now in order to make the die-off more humane and possible to weather.
Unfortunately, our current economic and political situation make that possibility seem extremely unlikely. Global warming is one issue of overshoot – we have exceeded the capacity of the environment to process our CO2 output – and the way our political and economic leaders are handling that problem is not heartening.
I very much enjoyed Catton's glossary, and had a lot of fun imagining the visual images his terminology implies. Homo Colossus, a giant cyborg human with all these appliances manufacturing goods for him and refining ore he finds and generally performing in one self-contained apparatus all the functions we have a whole global economy spread across the world for. Or acres and acres of phantom fields worked by ghost slaves.
If there is a better introduction and explanation of the ecological history of civilization, I'm not aware of it. Overshoot is unemotional, very clear, and would a wonderful introduction to these issues. I think it would have been nice had parts of this been required reading for my Intro Environmental Science class rather than Hardin's shitty “Tragedy of the Commons” essay. Go on and read more modern books that tackle the issue from a different perspective once you've finished.
Jared Diamond's Collapse is a must-read presentation of the same argument through an abundance of historical and modern geography case studies. Derrick Jensen's Endgame takes a much more emotional point of view, but this is also an important perspective. Value judgments are crucial in making long-term human policy decisions, just as they are in small-scale environmental and social issues. Don't bother with Quinn's Ishmael once you've read these three – it's a rather simplistic rehash of their concepts. Do read E.O. Wilson's The Diversity of Life, which makes emotional arguments about the intrinsic value and rights of biodiversity that are based on even more incontrovertible scientific arguments about the power biodiversity exerts in buffering our ecosystems from collapse.
Overshoot is a sober, no-nonsense, presentation of ecological facts about the human condition and civilization. There are absolutely no emotional appeals, no aesthetic arguments, and no moral claims distracting from the simple paradigmatic wisdom Catton is pushing. His project in the book is to incite a paradigm shift, in Thomas Kuhn's scientific-revolutionary sense. That Catton's ideas haven't become common knowledge for everyone under 40 who's been paying attention attests to the fact that cultural paradigms function differently than scientific paradigms. A scientific paradigm has inertia, certainly, but it does fold against the pressure of accumulating evidence it can't properly explain.
The cultural paradigm Catton refers to as Exuberance is so deeply entrenched in our culture that even now, 30 years after the release of the book, in an age glutted with environmental awareness and media, practically no one addresses the fundamental revelation Catton presents: that, by using non-renewable fossil fuels and minerals, we have overshot the carrying capacity we had cultivated and irreparably reduced the earth's capacity to sustain us. As fossil fuels, clean water, arable land, minerals, etc, are exhausted, we WILL experience an extremely unpleasant die-off, accompanied by a likely-total collapse of our civilization.
Speaking of paradigm shift, Catton quite handily put the final nail in the coffin of my old, ideological way of thinking, and confirmed my new (since about this time last year) paradigm. This paradigm refuses explanations for large-scale historical, economic, and social trends based on abstract, ideological factors and not on biological, anthropological, and geographical ones. Catton gave me a number of missing links in the exposition of such an understanding. For example, I'd long suspected there must be some physical causes underlying economic recessions and booms. Economic growth depends on wealth creation, and while that could theoretically occur merely from enhanced human innovation, in practice it obviously occurs by expanding our access to and consumption of physical resources.
Other reviewers have complained that Catton is “all problems, no solutions.” I found the way Catton did supply 'solutions' extremely interesting. He says, to paraphrase, 'The American response to any problem is to ask “What can we DO about it?” Instead we must ask “What can we AVOID doing to keep a bad situation from getting much worse?”' The potential carrying capacity of the Earth is a matter of theoretical debate. However, the extent to which we obviously depend on fossil fuels shows that we have definitely overshot our current carrying capacity. Some people believe technological solutions will be found to drastically increase permanent carrying capacity by the time oil runs out. Catton likens these people to the Cargo Cultists of Melanesia, acting out vain rituals to bring back prosperity the creation of which they never understood. Since we have overshot carrying capacity and are extremely unlikely to be able to raise it to a level that can support the population the world will have produced by the time oil runs out, we will necessarily experience a die-off. This is a problem for which there IS NO SOLUTION. What we could do now is to undergo a voluntary recession, reducing economic growth now in order to make the die-off more humane and possible to weather.
Unfortunately, our current economic and political situation make that possibility seem extremely unlikely. Global warming is one issue of overshoot – we have exceeded the capacity of the environment to process our CO2 output – and the way our political and economic leaders are handling that problem is not heartening.
I very much enjoyed Catton's glossary, and had a lot of fun imagining the visual images his terminology implies. Homo Colossus, a giant cyborg human with all these appliances manufacturing goods for him and refining ore he finds and generally performing in one self-contained apparatus all the functions we have a whole global economy spread across the world for. Or acres and acres of phantom fields worked by ghost slaves.
If there is a better introduction and explanation of the ecological history of civilization, I'm not aware of it. Overshoot is unemotional, very clear, and would a wonderful introduction to these issues. I think it would have been nice had parts of this been required reading for my Intro Environmental Science class rather than Hardin's shitty “Tragedy of the Commons” essay. Go on and read more modern books that tackle the issue from a different perspective once you've finished.
Jared Diamond's Collapse is a must-read presentation of the same argument through an abundance of historical and modern geography case studies. Derrick Jensen's Endgame takes a much more emotional point of view, but this is also an important perspective. Value judgments are crucial in making long-term human policy decisions, just as they are in small-scale environmental and social issues. Don't bother with Quinn's Ishmael once you've read these three – it's a rather simplistic rehash of their concepts. Do read E.O. Wilson's The Diversity of Life, which makes emotional arguments about the intrinsic value and rights of biodiversity that are based on even more incontrovertible scientific arguments about the power biodiversity exerts in buffering our ecosystems from collapse.
March 24, 2015
William Catton’s book, Overshoot, describes the process by which most modern societies have achieved overshoot — a population in excess of the permanent carrying capacity of the habitat. It examines the long human saga, and reveals embarrassing failures of foresight that make our big brains wince and blush. Catton drives an iron stake through the heart of our goofy worldview — the myths, fantasies, and illusions of progress. Readers are served a generous full strength dose of ecological reality with no sugar coating.
Humans evolved to thrive in a tropical wilderness. In the early days, we lived lightly, like bonobos, in a simple manner that supported a modest population density. As the millennia passed, we learned how to increase carrying capacity by adopting ever-more-clever technology, like spears, bows and arrows, and fire — better tools, more food. This was a blind leap into the unknown. It pushed us out of evolution’s safety net, and required us to create cultural safety nets, based on enlightened self-restraint. Our path became slippery.
Much later, we slipped into soil mining — agriculture — which sent our carrying capacity into the stratosphere — temporarily. Topsoil is created over geological time. From a human timeframe, it is a nonrenewable resource. Soil mining often leads to water mining and forest mining. It has a long history of spurring population growth, bloody conflict, and permanent damage to ecosystems.
Then, we slipped into metal making, and invented many new tools for raising carrying capacity even higher. This was a big fork in the path. Up to this point, we increased carrying capacity by takeover, expanding into new habitat and pushing out other species. Now, we added drawdown to the game, by tapping into finite nonrenewable resources, and becoming heavily addicted to them.
When communities lived with enlightened self-restraint, salmon and bison could be renewable sources of food for tens of thousands of years, or more. Iron, oil, and topsoil are not renewable. Their extraction does not contribute to the real carrying capacity of the habitat. What they provide is phantom carrying capacity, a boost that can only be temporary.
A habitat’s carrying capacity is limited by the least abundant necessity. The limiting factor was usually food, but it can also be water or oil. Writing in the late 1970s, Catton perceived that 90 percent of humankind was dependent for survival on phantom carrying capacity. Today, that figure is certainly higher, with billions of people dependent on oil-powered agriculture and market systems. As the rate of oil extraction declines in the coming decades, there will be many growling tummies.
Columbus alerted Europeans to the existence of an unknown hemisphere, the Americas. This “New World” was fully occupied by Stone Age nations that survived by low-tech hunting, fishing, foraging, and organic soil mining. They had no wheels, metal tools, or domesticated livestock. European colonists, with their state of the art technology, vigorously converted wilderness into private property devoted to the production of food and commodities for humans. This greatly expanded the carrying capacity of the Americas (for humans). Colonists exported lots of food to Europe, and population exploded on both sides of the Atlantic.
A bit later, we developed a tragic addiction to fossil fuels, which led to the Industrial Revolution. We began extracting solar energy that had been safely stored underground for millions of years. Cool new machines allowed us to expand cropland, increase farm productivity, and keep growing numbers of people well fed. The population of hunter-gatherers grew 0.09% per generation. With the shift to agriculture, population grew 0.78% per generation. Since 1865, it’s growing 27.5% per generation.
For four centuries, much of the world experienced a ridiculously abnormal era of innovation, growth, and excess — the Age of Exuberance. This created a state of mind that perceived high waste living as normal, and expected it continue forever. We were proud that our children would be able to live even more destructively than we could. Our glorious leaders worked tirelessly to increase drawdown and worsen overshoot.
We have no limits. We’ll grow like crazy until the sun burns out. This is known as the cornucopian paradigm. Cornucopians hallucinate that withdrawals from finite nonrenewable savings are income, and that wealth can be increased by withdrawing even more nonrenewable savings. Cornucopians proudly refer to overshoot as progress. Ecology, on the other hand, insists that our ability to survive above carrying capacity, in overshoot, can only be temporary. We can refuse to believe in limits, but limits don’t care if we believe in them.
The Age of Exuberance was brought to an end by the oil shocks of the 1970s. Our poor children now have a bleak future, a sickening descent into primitive barbarism — no SUVs, ATVs, RVs, PWCs, or McMansions. It was fun having the wonders of industrial society, like bicycles, metal pots, books, and running water. But these luxuries were provided by a system that has been surviving for 200 years on an exponential drawdown of nonrenewable resources. It’s a way of life that survives by burning up posterity’s savings. Catton warned us, “It was thus becoming apparent that nature must, in the not far distant future, institute bankruptcy proceedings against industrial civilization, and perhaps against the standing crop of human flesh.”
Sadly, the consumer hordes can’t wrap their heads around the notion that the Age of Exuberance is over. Yes, things are a bit rough now, but recovery is just around the corner, probably tomorrow. The crazy cornucopian pipedream has become the primary worldview in most societies. It is still injected into the brains of every student, numbing the lobes related to enlightened self-restraint, often permanently.
We become anxious and angry as we slip and slide into more and more limits. Catton noted that a worrisome reaction to this is to blame someone, to identify scapegoats, hate them, and kill them — but this is pointless. “The end of exuberance was the summary result of all our separate and innocent decisions to have a baby, to trade a horse for a tractor, to avoid illness by getting vaccinated, to move from a farm to a city, to live in a heated home, to buy a family automobile and not depend on public transit, to specialize, exchange, and thereby prosper.”
While Catton was writing, 40 years ago, a new paradigm was beginning to appear on the radar — the ecological paradigm. This rational mindset made it easy to understand our predicament, and to envision intelligent responses, but probably not brilliant solutions. Society is not rushing to embrace the ecological paradigm, because any mention of limits is still pure heresy to the dominant paradigm.
Ecology is not titillating infantile twaddle created by big city marketing nitwits trying to sell you the keys to a treadmill way of life. It’s as real as life and death. In the game of ecology, there is no “get out of overshoot free” card. There is no undo command. The cost of overshoot is die-off, an unpleasant return to carrying capacity. After the fever comes the healing. This is an essential book for animals younger than 100 years old.
Humans evolved to thrive in a tropical wilderness. In the early days, we lived lightly, like bonobos, in a simple manner that supported a modest population density. As the millennia passed, we learned how to increase carrying capacity by adopting ever-more-clever technology, like spears, bows and arrows, and fire — better tools, more food. This was a blind leap into the unknown. It pushed us out of evolution’s safety net, and required us to create cultural safety nets, based on enlightened self-restraint. Our path became slippery.
Much later, we slipped into soil mining — agriculture — which sent our carrying capacity into the stratosphere — temporarily. Topsoil is created over geological time. From a human timeframe, it is a nonrenewable resource. Soil mining often leads to water mining and forest mining. It has a long history of spurring population growth, bloody conflict, and permanent damage to ecosystems.
Then, we slipped into metal making, and invented many new tools for raising carrying capacity even higher. This was a big fork in the path. Up to this point, we increased carrying capacity by takeover, expanding into new habitat and pushing out other species. Now, we added drawdown to the game, by tapping into finite nonrenewable resources, and becoming heavily addicted to them.
When communities lived with enlightened self-restraint, salmon and bison could be renewable sources of food for tens of thousands of years, or more. Iron, oil, and topsoil are not renewable. Their extraction does not contribute to the real carrying capacity of the habitat. What they provide is phantom carrying capacity, a boost that can only be temporary.
A habitat’s carrying capacity is limited by the least abundant necessity. The limiting factor was usually food, but it can also be water or oil. Writing in the late 1970s, Catton perceived that 90 percent of humankind was dependent for survival on phantom carrying capacity. Today, that figure is certainly higher, with billions of people dependent on oil-powered agriculture and market systems. As the rate of oil extraction declines in the coming decades, there will be many growling tummies.
Columbus alerted Europeans to the existence of an unknown hemisphere, the Americas. This “New World” was fully occupied by Stone Age nations that survived by low-tech hunting, fishing, foraging, and organic soil mining. They had no wheels, metal tools, or domesticated livestock. European colonists, with their state of the art technology, vigorously converted wilderness into private property devoted to the production of food and commodities for humans. This greatly expanded the carrying capacity of the Americas (for humans). Colonists exported lots of food to Europe, and population exploded on both sides of the Atlantic.
A bit later, we developed a tragic addiction to fossil fuels, which led to the Industrial Revolution. We began extracting solar energy that had been safely stored underground for millions of years. Cool new machines allowed us to expand cropland, increase farm productivity, and keep growing numbers of people well fed. The population of hunter-gatherers grew 0.09% per generation. With the shift to agriculture, population grew 0.78% per generation. Since 1865, it’s growing 27.5% per generation.
For four centuries, much of the world experienced a ridiculously abnormal era of innovation, growth, and excess — the Age of Exuberance. This created a state of mind that perceived high waste living as normal, and expected it continue forever. We were proud that our children would be able to live even more destructively than we could. Our glorious leaders worked tirelessly to increase drawdown and worsen overshoot.
We have no limits. We’ll grow like crazy until the sun burns out. This is known as the cornucopian paradigm. Cornucopians hallucinate that withdrawals from finite nonrenewable savings are income, and that wealth can be increased by withdrawing even more nonrenewable savings. Cornucopians proudly refer to overshoot as progress. Ecology, on the other hand, insists that our ability to survive above carrying capacity, in overshoot, can only be temporary. We can refuse to believe in limits, but limits don’t care if we believe in them.
The Age of Exuberance was brought to an end by the oil shocks of the 1970s. Our poor children now have a bleak future, a sickening descent into primitive barbarism — no SUVs, ATVs, RVs, PWCs, or McMansions. It was fun having the wonders of industrial society, like bicycles, metal pots, books, and running water. But these luxuries were provided by a system that has been surviving for 200 years on an exponential drawdown of nonrenewable resources. It’s a way of life that survives by burning up posterity’s savings. Catton warned us, “It was thus becoming apparent that nature must, in the not far distant future, institute bankruptcy proceedings against industrial civilization, and perhaps against the standing crop of human flesh.”
Sadly, the consumer hordes can’t wrap their heads around the notion that the Age of Exuberance is over. Yes, things are a bit rough now, but recovery is just around the corner, probably tomorrow. The crazy cornucopian pipedream has become the primary worldview in most societies. It is still injected into the brains of every student, numbing the lobes related to enlightened self-restraint, often permanently.
We become anxious and angry as we slip and slide into more and more limits. Catton noted that a worrisome reaction to this is to blame someone, to identify scapegoats, hate them, and kill them — but this is pointless. “The end of exuberance was the summary result of all our separate and innocent decisions to have a baby, to trade a horse for a tractor, to avoid illness by getting vaccinated, to move from a farm to a city, to live in a heated home, to buy a family automobile and not depend on public transit, to specialize, exchange, and thereby prosper.”
While Catton was writing, 40 years ago, a new paradigm was beginning to appear on the radar — the ecological paradigm. This rational mindset made it easy to understand our predicament, and to envision intelligent responses, but probably not brilliant solutions. Society is not rushing to embrace the ecological paradigm, because any mention of limits is still pure heresy to the dominant paradigm.
Ecology is not titillating infantile twaddle created by big city marketing nitwits trying to sell you the keys to a treadmill way of life. It’s as real as life and death. In the game of ecology, there is no “get out of overshoot free” card. There is no undo command. The cost of overshoot is die-off, an unpleasant return to carrying capacity. After the fever comes the healing. This is an essential book for animals younger than 100 years old.
December 11, 2009
Impressive. For the clarity and consistency of his ecological thought, and even more so given that the book was first published in 1980 when even among green activists and academics there was only a fuzzy understanding of the nature and depth of the ecological predicament created by our industrial civilization. For that matter, even now there probably aren't more than 5% of the population of the US who would really understand his worldview.
Catton gets so many things right that it feels a bit like nitpicking to note that he doesn't understand either wind or solar power (and thus comes down against them), and that he didn't foresee the vast strides science and technology would take in the next 30 years (thus creating opportunities to sustainably maintain a high level of civilization).
But he absolutely nails the basic issues of carrying capacity, the unsustainability of a fossil-fuel-driven economy, and the various types of reactions that people would have to the news that there are not only limits to growth but that we have overshot them and have thus set ourselves up for a possibly civilization-ending crash (said reactions ranging from ostrichism, through cosmeticism and the wonderfull named cargoism, to realism).
One of the most interesting parts of the book for me was when Catton described what it was like to live through the first oil shock... and analyzes people's reactions from an ecological perspective. Spooky... it felt like I was reading an account of our own future. And all the more frustrating therefore that this book was largely ignored for so many years during which we (the Western world) could have been doing things that would have allowed us, if not to completely avoid the coming die-off, at least to minimize its severity and impact.
Catton gets so many things right that it feels a bit like nitpicking to note that he doesn't understand either wind or solar power (and thus comes down against them), and that he didn't foresee the vast strides science and technology would take in the next 30 years (thus creating opportunities to sustainably maintain a high level of civilization).
But he absolutely nails the basic issues of carrying capacity, the unsustainability of a fossil-fuel-driven economy, and the various types of reactions that people would have to the news that there are not only limits to growth but that we have overshot them and have thus set ourselves up for a possibly civilization-ending crash (said reactions ranging from ostrichism, through cosmeticism and the wonderfull named cargoism, to realism).
One of the most interesting parts of the book for me was when Catton described what it was like to live through the first oil shock... and analyzes people's reactions from an ecological perspective. Spooky... it felt like I was reading an account of our own future. And all the more frustrating therefore that this book was largely ignored for so many years during which we (the Western world) could have been doing things that would have allowed us, if not to completely avoid the coming die-off, at least to minimize its severity and impact.
March 11, 2015
This is easily among the top five most important and compelling books I've ever read. I almost qualified that as "nonfiction books," but the sentence stands as true without the modifier, and I cannot record this book highly enough to everyone.
Catton recent passed. He had a long life, relatively speaking, and I hope it was happy. He was certainly one of the most important, eloquent (and unfortunately little-known or appreciated) voices of the past century. RIP, and may your legacy have greater, necessary impact than it was allowed in your lifetime, great Elder!
Catton recent passed. He had a long life, relatively speaking, and I hope it was happy. He was certainly one of the most important, eloquent (and unfortunately little-known or appreciated) voices of the past century. RIP, and may your legacy have greater, necessary impact than it was allowed in your lifetime, great Elder!
October 29, 2007
I love this. The argumentation is excellent, and the implications are profound and dire. The anecdote about the reindeer on the island is worth the price of the book.
April 14, 2024
Great book, a little repetitive but I think it is a good primer for understanding some of the basics of collapse.
I do have my reservations, though. Catton is dismissal of political issues that are not directly rooted in ecology which I find to be a little unfair. I understand his perspective (overshoot is one of the most pressing issues that is going to ultimately lead to this upcoming mass extinction event) but he fails to understand that a lot of these “non-ecological” issues do have direct ecological effects. Ideologically, it just comes off as centrist nonsense.
I do have my reservations, though. Catton is dismissal of political issues that are not directly rooted in ecology which I find to be a little unfair. I understand his perspective (overshoot is one of the most pressing issues that is going to ultimately lead to this upcoming mass extinction event) but he fails to understand that a lot of these “non-ecological” issues do have direct ecological effects. Ideologically, it just comes off as centrist nonsense.
March 8, 2015
tl;dr Fossil fuels have enabled man to greatly exceed the carrying capacity of the Earth, but since they are finite, population crash is inevitable. It's biology, and there's no technological deus ex machina coming that can help us escape it.
Modern man no longer belongs to the species Homo sapiens, argues William Catton in this remarkably prescient work published back in 1982, but to a species more aptly named energy-gobbling monster Homo colossus. Leaning on the same mindsets that freed (some) men from privations of hunger, humanity discovered and then came to rely on sources of energy that are by their very nature temporary. The consequence is that we are not only well beyond the sustainable carrying capacity of the planet, but are actively undermining that capacity for future generations in our zest to maintain the impossible.
How did we get here? It's not a moral failing, Catton argues, but a natural consequence of man's propensity for utilizing tools. Time and again, our advanced simian brains have allowed us to exceed the normal carrying capacity of our habitat by leaning on "ghost acreage" — resources that go beyond the limits of our immediate area. From the discovery of fire to the domestication of beasts of burden, to agriculture, we have found ways to exceed the limits that nature would otherwise place on us. Those increases have come at the expense of other species, but they were for the most part stable.
That condition has been amplified in the last two centuries, however, since we have discovered how to use the accumulated sunlight energy buried under the ground millions of years ago during the Carboniferous period. Read: fossil fuels. If we were to rely on the sustainable energy provided by the earth alone, we would need an additional 9 more earths to make up the surplus we were spending in 1982. And because fossil fuels are by their nature finite, the world we've built under the assumption that this energy is always going to be there is unsustainable. It can't last. And that means our population numbers and our standard of living are temporary. A crash is inevitable.
Maybe I should rephrase that, because the argument isn't that this lies in the future. Catton argues that the history of the 20th century can be characterized ecologically as a pattern of mutual interference, an "elbowing and counter-elbowing" between groups for access to necessarily limited resources. Democratic institutions are apt during periods of abundance, but in times of resource crisis, violence and despotism follow, veiled as they are in familiar patterns of ethnic, religious, and ideological warfare. An enlightened ecological view takes some of the personal sting out of this process, but it does little relieve the underlying tension. And it's tension over limited resources that presages collapse.
So what are we supposed to do about it?
Catton explicitly tries to tamp down this kind of questioning, so typical of American social sciences. Instead he tries to focus the reader's attention back onto that sustainable carrying capacity that we exceeded so long ago. If we behave thoughtlessly, seeking to extend our standard of living as we're doing, the consequence for the biosphere is a potentially permanent reduction in carrying capacity for our descendants who survive the population crash. If we're going to do anything, it should be to preserve as best we can that underlying support structure nature has given us.
It's a sobering message, and a little depressing given the way the world has gone since this was written. Still, you have to give the man props for his prescience.
Modern man no longer belongs to the species Homo sapiens, argues William Catton in this remarkably prescient work published back in 1982, but to a species more aptly named energy-gobbling monster Homo colossus. Leaning on the same mindsets that freed (some) men from privations of hunger, humanity discovered and then came to rely on sources of energy that are by their very nature temporary. The consequence is that we are not only well beyond the sustainable carrying capacity of the planet, but are actively undermining that capacity for future generations in our zest to maintain the impossible.
How did we get here? It's not a moral failing, Catton argues, but a natural consequence of man's propensity for utilizing tools. Time and again, our advanced simian brains have allowed us to exceed the normal carrying capacity of our habitat by leaning on "ghost acreage" — resources that go beyond the limits of our immediate area. From the discovery of fire to the domestication of beasts of burden, to agriculture, we have found ways to exceed the limits that nature would otherwise place on us. Those increases have come at the expense of other species, but they were for the most part stable.
That condition has been amplified in the last two centuries, however, since we have discovered how to use the accumulated sunlight energy buried under the ground millions of years ago during the Carboniferous period. Read: fossil fuels. If we were to rely on the sustainable energy provided by the earth alone, we would need an additional 9 more earths to make up the surplus we were spending in 1982. And because fossil fuels are by their nature finite, the world we've built under the assumption that this energy is always going to be there is unsustainable. It can't last. And that means our population numbers and our standard of living are temporary. A crash is inevitable.
Maybe I should rephrase that, because the argument isn't that this lies in the future. Catton argues that the history of the 20th century can be characterized ecologically as a pattern of mutual interference, an "elbowing and counter-elbowing" between groups for access to necessarily limited resources. Democratic institutions are apt during periods of abundance, but in times of resource crisis, violence and despotism follow, veiled as they are in familiar patterns of ethnic, religious, and ideological warfare. An enlightened ecological view takes some of the personal sting out of this process, but it does little relieve the underlying tension. And it's tension over limited resources that presages collapse.
So what are we supposed to do about it?
Catton explicitly tries to tamp down this kind of questioning, so typical of American social sciences. Instead he tries to focus the reader's attention back onto that sustainable carrying capacity that we exceeded so long ago. If we behave thoughtlessly, seeking to extend our standard of living as we're doing, the consequence for the biosphere is a potentially permanent reduction in carrying capacity for our descendants who survive the population crash. If we're going to do anything, it should be to preserve as best we can that underlying support structure nature has given us.
It's a sobering message, and a little depressing given the way the world has gone since this was written. Still, you have to give the man props for his prescience.
February 22, 2012
Masterful. The author wrote this book in 1982, but a lot of it reads as if it was taken from last year's news. The basic theme is that this planet can only support a certain number of people (or any other creatures) indefinitely; there is a limit based on the renewable natural resources we consume and the rate at which they are regenerated by nature. By tapping into the reserves of fossil fuels that are leftovers from millions of years ago, the human species temporarily increased the limits, the amounts of resources available to feed us and power all our machines and other fuel-using technology, but this can only be done as long as we keep using more and more of those fossil fuels. Now we are starting to really feel the pain of those fossil fuel supplies running low on the one hand and the effects of our using them so extensively poisoning our environment and changing the climate on the other hand.
I wish this book could be read and discussed by every high school and college student, every politician, and every voter. There is no doubt that life is going to keep getting harder and resources scarcer and spread more thinly; the challenge is to adapt to the process as effectively and with as much mutual respect, dignity, and humanity as we can.
I wish this book could be read and discussed by every high school and college student, every politician, and every voter. There is no doubt that life is going to keep getting harder and resources scarcer and spread more thinly; the challenge is to adapt to the process as effectively and with as much mutual respect, dignity, and humanity as we can.
Want to read
September 26, 2014This is a test review
October 24, 2011
Another reviewer has taken the words out of my mouth.
Catton's thesis, succinctly put:
Something akin to bankruptcy, eh? Makes ya wonder if there isn't a connection between the debt crises currently encircling the world and human overshoot.
The challenge, as Catton sees it:
Catton's thesis, succinctly put:
"Human beings, in two million years of cultural evolution, have several times succeeded in taking over additional portions of the earth's total life-supporting capacity, at the expense of other creatures. Each time, human population has increased. But man has now learned to rely on a technology that augments human carrying capacity in a necessarily temporary way--as temporary as the extension of life by eating the seeds needed to grow next year's food. Human population, organized into industrial societies and blind to the temporariness of carrying capacity supplements based on exhaustible resource dependence, responded by increasing more exuberantly than ever, even though this meant overshooting the number our planet could permanently support. Something akin to bankruptcy was the inevitable sequel." p.5
Something akin to bankruptcy, eh? Makes ya wonder if there isn't a connection between the debt crises currently encircling the world and human overshoot.
The challenge, as Catton sees it:
"The paramount need of post-exuberant humanity is to remain human in the face of dehumanizing pressures. To do this we must learn somehow to base exuberance of spirit upon something more lasting than the expansive living that sustained it in the recent past. But, as if we were driving a car that has become stuck on a muddy road, we feel an urge to bear down harder than ever on the accelerator and to spin our wheels vigorously in an effort to power ourselves out of the quagmire. This reflect will only dig us in deeper. We have arrived at a point in history when counter-intuitive thoughtways are essential." p.7
"Unless we discard our belief in limitlessness, all of us are in danger of becoming its victims." p.10
"Desire changes entail unwarranted changes. Changed human activities involve changes in man's environment. Environmental change leads to succession; it can threaten human life. Non-competitive human interaction is imperiled by excess numbers and proliferating technology. Ecological antagonism begets social and emotional antagonism. These [are] the principles people [need] to learn to read between the lines of the news in post-exuberant times." p. 208
[B]elieving crash can't happen to us is one reason why it will. The principles of ecology apply to all living things. By supposing that our humanity exempts us, we delude ourselves. It is not just the yeast cells we put into wine vats that bloom. It is not just the recognized detritovores that crash. We have been backing into the future with our eyes too firmly averted from the detritivorous nature of our modern lifestyle. It is time to turn around and see what's ahead." p. 213
"If, having overshot carrying capacity, we cannot avoid crash,perhaps with ecological understanding of its real causes we can remain human in circumstances that could otherwise tempt us to turn beastly. Clear knowledge may forestall misplaced resentment, thus enabling us to refrain from inflicting futile and unpardonable suffering upon each other." p.214
"Profound as it might seem by standards from the culture of exuberance, if the debate about how to cope with the future was going to resolve itself into merely an argument over how to 'produce' our way out of trouble, the essential nature of our predicament would be overlooked. As it has been necessary to say repeatedly already, overlooking that predicament could not protect us from it. What really needed to be discussed was not only the dire need to conserve resources, but also this: What kind of role are human beings going to play in their own impending crash? How much will our efforts to avoid the unavoidable make it worse?" p.231
"We must learn to live within carrying capacity without trying to enlarge it. We must rely on renewable resources consumed no faster than at sustained yield rates. The last best hope for mankind is ecological modesty." p.260
"Mankind is condemned to bet on an uncertain future. The stakes have become phenomenally high: affluence, equity, democracy, humane tolerance, peaceful coexistence between nations, races, sects, sexes, parties, all are in jeopardy. Ironically, the less hopeful we assume human prospects to be, the more likely we are to act in ways that will minimize the hardships ahead for our species. Ecological understanding of the human predicament indicates that we live in times when the American habit of responding to a problem by asking 'All right, now what do we do about it?' must be replaced by a different query that does not assume all problems are soluble: 'What must we avoid doing to keep from making a bad situation unnecessarily worse?'" p.262
"Our best bet is to act as if we believed we have already overshot, and do our best to ensure that the inevitable crash consists as little as possible of outright die-off of Homo sapiens. Instead, it should consist as far as possible of the chosen abandonment of those seductive values characteristic of Homo colossus. Indeed, renunciation of such values may be the main alternative to renewed indulgence in cruel genocide. If crash should prove to be avoidable after all, a global strategy of trying to moderate expected crash is the strategy most likely to avert it." p.266
May 18, 2022
Wow. Should be required foundational reading for all humans.
April 23, 2025
Although it is has now been more than 40 years since its publication, this book has only become more relevant. Catton argues from an ecological point of view that humanity is in a state of overshoot, against so-called "cornucopianism", i.e. the mindset that continued technological advances can help supply humanity's material needs. He maintains that "colossal" industrial human society is set for collapse due to overshooting its carrying capacity through its dependence on non-renewable resources and its "detritovorous" nature (dependence on transformed organic remains from the past). Climate change is in this framework reframed as another problem of overshoot, namely that humanity is overshooting the atmosphere's capacity to hold carbon. It is a clear and concise book making an unemotional argument, and definitely worth a read if you are interested in ecology.
July 8, 2022
This is the most important book I have read in the last five years as it caused the shackles of current Western Thought celebrating 'no limits to growth!' to fall from my eyes. Like many of the politicians discussed in this book, I took plenty of political science classes, but I don't remember a one being grounded in ecological thought and how the limits of ecosystems informed what is possible politically. This book fills that gap.
First, an explanation on how I came upon Dr. William R. Catton's Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change. I was starting a learning journey about the Deep Adaptation movement. Those are the people who believe humanity and our institutions incapable of solving the climate emergency in a timely, meaningful way.
I wanted to learn what they had to say. I am generally wary of listening to random individuals making YouTube videos about what they think, but happened to listen to Michael Dowd's two-part video series on Collapse and Overshoot in a Nutshell. I link to it here as Pastor Dowd is so effective at booktalking the book, Overshoot, I immediately had to read it and I think you will want to read Overshoot after watching one or both parts of his video series too.
I don't think it is appropriate that Michael Dowd recorded the book and put it on his website. The book is still under copywrite, isn't it? Why cheat Professor Catton's heirs out of possible book sale revenues? They deserve these revenues for their father's contributions to humanity. Needless to say, readers will want to highlight all of the eye-opening thought in this book.
Humanity is stealing from the future. The abundance we live with today is achieved by massively depriving posterity. We confuse what are temporary supplements that help humans exceed previous carry capacity of the planet with permanent enhancements to humanity's standard of living. We have come to the end of the time when it didn't seem to matter that no one saw the difference between ways of enlarging human carrying capacity and ways of exceeding it. However, overuse of an environment sets up forces that will reduce the load to match the shrinkage of carrying capacity (think now: what are ways carrying capacity loads are reduced: famine, genocide, etc.). Humans are supplanting other species and taking their share of carrying capacity resulting in extinction of species faster than we can count them. As Catton so eloquently describes it, 'something akin to bankruptcy is the inevitable sequel.'
So how are we blind to this? Why isn't this commonly known and accepted? 'We and our ancestors have lived through an age of exuberant growth, overshooting permanent carrying capacity without knowing what we are doing. The past four centuries of magnificent progress were made possible by two non-repeatable achievements:
a) discovery of a second hemisphere, and
b) development of ways to exploit the planet's energy savings, ie. fossil fuels.
The resulting opportunities for economic and demographic exuberance convinced people that it was natural for the future to be better than the past. For awhile, that belief was a workable premise for our lives and institutions. Assumptions that were once viable but have become obsolete must be replaced with a new perspective. This book seeks to articulate that perspective.'
One of the most important concepts I learned of in this book is 'ghost acreage' explained through the example of Great Britain and Japan. By 1965, more than half of Britain's sustenance was coming from ghost acreage. If food could not be obtained from the sea (6.5%) or from other nations (48%) more than half of Britain would face starvation, or all British people would have been less than half nourished. Likewise, if Japan could not draw on fisheries from around the globe and upon trade with other nations, two thirds of her people would have been starving, or every Japanese citizen would have been undernourished (which presumably means nearly all would have died). Without the ability to import food created elsewhere via 'ghost acreage,' these populations can not feed themselves.
We must face the post-exuberant world and live with ecological modesty. We must allow nature to exist without human domination. We had the impulse more than 100 years ago when the U.S. National Parks were born, we must find it again. The changes that are required now and in the future are so costly and painful we will be tempted to prolong and augment our dominance at all costs. The challenge, above all, will be how will we retain our humanity as we adjust to the overdue new reality. Notice it is other species that are paying the price for our using their carrying capacity. In the future, couldn't it be us?
You've got to read this book!!! It took me six months, but it is so powerful. When you finish the book, be as awed as I was by Dr. Catton's scholarship. Also, be in awe that he is very, very, very careful to not blame anyone for the predicament we find ourselves in. I respect and admire that. Be proud, descendents!
Dr. Dowd's videos about Collapse and Overshoot in a Nutshell:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6FcN...
Here's an incredible interview with Dr. Catton describing his work:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oF6F0...
Here is the outstanding website Global Footprint Network, perfect for all ages, that tells you when your country overshoots the natural resources it can generate in a year and does permanent damage. The website also has ways we can #MoveTheDate. This is a wonderful fascinating rabbit hole to dive into. How will you move your country's date of overshoot? https://www.overshootday.org/newsroom...
First, an explanation on how I came upon Dr. William R. Catton's Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change. I was starting a learning journey about the Deep Adaptation movement. Those are the people who believe humanity and our institutions incapable of solving the climate emergency in a timely, meaningful way.
I wanted to learn what they had to say. I am generally wary of listening to random individuals making YouTube videos about what they think, but happened to listen to Michael Dowd's two-part video series on Collapse and Overshoot in a Nutshell. I link to it here as Pastor Dowd is so effective at booktalking the book, Overshoot, I immediately had to read it and I think you will want to read Overshoot after watching one or both parts of his video series too.
I don't think it is appropriate that Michael Dowd recorded the book and put it on his website. The book is still under copywrite, isn't it? Why cheat Professor Catton's heirs out of possible book sale revenues? They deserve these revenues for their father's contributions to humanity. Needless to say, readers will want to highlight all of the eye-opening thought in this book.
Humanity is stealing from the future. The abundance we live with today is achieved by massively depriving posterity. We confuse what are temporary supplements that help humans exceed previous carry capacity of the planet with permanent enhancements to humanity's standard of living. We have come to the end of the time when it didn't seem to matter that no one saw the difference between ways of enlarging human carrying capacity and ways of exceeding it. However, overuse of an environment sets up forces that will reduce the load to match the shrinkage of carrying capacity (think now: what are ways carrying capacity loads are reduced: famine, genocide, etc.). Humans are supplanting other species and taking their share of carrying capacity resulting in extinction of species faster than we can count them. As Catton so eloquently describes it, 'something akin to bankruptcy is the inevitable sequel.'
So how are we blind to this? Why isn't this commonly known and accepted? 'We and our ancestors have lived through an age of exuberant growth, overshooting permanent carrying capacity without knowing what we are doing. The past four centuries of magnificent progress were made possible by two non-repeatable achievements:
a) discovery of a second hemisphere, and
b) development of ways to exploit the planet's energy savings, ie. fossil fuels.
The resulting opportunities for economic and demographic exuberance convinced people that it was natural for the future to be better than the past. For awhile, that belief was a workable premise for our lives and institutions. Assumptions that were once viable but have become obsolete must be replaced with a new perspective. This book seeks to articulate that perspective.'
One of the most important concepts I learned of in this book is 'ghost acreage' explained through the example of Great Britain and Japan. By 1965, more than half of Britain's sustenance was coming from ghost acreage. If food could not be obtained from the sea (6.5%) or from other nations (48%) more than half of Britain would face starvation, or all British people would have been less than half nourished. Likewise, if Japan could not draw on fisheries from around the globe and upon trade with other nations, two thirds of her people would have been starving, or every Japanese citizen would have been undernourished (which presumably means nearly all would have died). Without the ability to import food created elsewhere via 'ghost acreage,' these populations can not feed themselves.
We must face the post-exuberant world and live with ecological modesty. We must allow nature to exist without human domination. We had the impulse more than 100 years ago when the U.S. National Parks were born, we must find it again. The changes that are required now and in the future are so costly and painful we will be tempted to prolong and augment our dominance at all costs. The challenge, above all, will be how will we retain our humanity as we adjust to the overdue new reality. Notice it is other species that are paying the price for our using their carrying capacity. In the future, couldn't it be us?
You've got to read this book!!! It took me six months, but it is so powerful. When you finish the book, be as awed as I was by Dr. Catton's scholarship. Also, be in awe that he is very, very, very careful to not blame anyone for the predicament we find ourselves in. I respect and admire that. Be proud, descendents!
Dr. Dowd's videos about Collapse and Overshoot in a Nutshell:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6FcN...
Here's an incredible interview with Dr. Catton describing his work:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oF6F0...
Here is the outstanding website Global Footprint Network, perfect for all ages, that tells you when your country overshoots the natural resources it can generate in a year and does permanent damage. The website also has ways we can #MoveTheDate. This is a wonderful fascinating rabbit hole to dive into. How will you move your country's date of overshoot? https://www.overshootday.org/newsroom...
June 10, 2007
for some reason catton came upon a very important understanding of the unsustainable relationship between the planet's ecology and the industrial economy built by humans, felt overcome by hopelessness and fear, and decided to write a book trying to rub his feelings of sorrow and misanthropy into the faces of the readers.
basically decides humanity is doomed and everyone is either a fool or worse, for not recognizing that. rejects politics as habit, even more vociferously than he rejects technological solutions.
oh well.
November 12, 2023
Catton's work is exceptionally well-written, compelling, and well-researched. He explains the greatest problems facing humanity as resulting from the collective absence of an ecological perspective and reluctance to face limits to growth.
This was still very difficult to read at times, simply in terms of it's overall density and my lack of a scientific or research background. Despite this, it offered many fascinating examples and perspectives relating to general ecology and their applications to the human predicament.
This was still very difficult to read at times, simply in terms of it's overall density and my lack of a scientific or research background. Despite this, it offered many fascinating examples and perspectives relating to general ecology and their applications to the human predicament.
August 30, 2021
The most important book I have ever read. Do not read it, if you like hope and delusion.
November 30, 2020
This is my first ecology book. I had no idea things were so bad. I guess i was a believer in limitless progress. It's fascinating to me that until recently i could ignore all the information about the limits of the earth and the climate crisis. I believed there were lots of smart people working on solutions and everything is under control or will be shortly. I believed that top managers of our civilization are not avoiding the most important issues. But now i have doubts.
Avoidance is abundant. Is it because people in their mass are so greedy and shortsighted that we cannot sacrifice anything for the future? Or is the main problem that if one person sacrifices and another doesn't then the second one will just take over the sacrifice of the first and there will be no point in the sacrifice after all. Something like a game theory problem.
Perhaps there is a solution to this in a new belief system that values the act of sacrifice even if there are greedy bastards exploiting it. Current belief system emphasises personal gain and limitless consumption. Advertising tells us we should spend more and want more. Employers tell us we should increase the profits of the companies no matter what and that there is no greater value than increasing profits. Friends and family tell us we should strive to increase our income so we are more safe. Therapists tell us we should not avoid our needs and wants because it is unhealthy to limit yourself.
You only live once. Let go and enjoy yourself. If you don't look after yourself nobody will. You deserve more. You have a right to a comfortable life. You earned it. You've suffered enough, now treat yourself. Other people are adults and can take care of themselves. People are not all bad, they are both good and bad, so don't think about their actions too much, do your own thing. It is not healthy to worry about the fate of the Earth and civilization. A person must think first about his own life and then about others. Protect your family. Creating a new life is a miracle and the highest goal everyone should strive for. Living in comfort is normal, living ascetically means something is wrong with you. If you can't fight them, join them. You can't solve the world's problems, solve your own. To sustain youself you have to compromise and work for the companies that only think about profit, there is no benefit to avoiding participating in the economy. You are just a worker, not the owner of the business so you have no moral responsibility for what the company does. You can't bear the moral burden of the society just on your shoulders - it is madness. It is the job of presidents and scientists to solve our societal and ecological problems. Are you willing to devote your whole life to environmentalism? Is it really your calling? Perhaps you better do something you really enjoy in the short span of your lifetime.
There is a barrage of pressure and convincing arguments against doing anything about the global problems. Perhaps most of those who show signs of avoidance of global issues were ones open to them but felt the immense pressure against doing anything and were left with painful helplessness, so they had to resort to a defense mechanism - avoidance. Are we doomed to change only after a catastrophic collapse?
Avoidance is abundant. Is it because people in their mass are so greedy and shortsighted that we cannot sacrifice anything for the future? Or is the main problem that if one person sacrifices and another doesn't then the second one will just take over the sacrifice of the first and there will be no point in the sacrifice after all. Something like a game theory problem.
Perhaps there is a solution to this in a new belief system that values the act of sacrifice even if there are greedy bastards exploiting it. Current belief system emphasises personal gain and limitless consumption. Advertising tells us we should spend more and want more. Employers tell us we should increase the profits of the companies no matter what and that there is no greater value than increasing profits. Friends and family tell us we should strive to increase our income so we are more safe. Therapists tell us we should not avoid our needs and wants because it is unhealthy to limit yourself.
You only live once. Let go and enjoy yourself. If you don't look after yourself nobody will. You deserve more. You have a right to a comfortable life. You earned it. You've suffered enough, now treat yourself. Other people are adults and can take care of themselves. People are not all bad, they are both good and bad, so don't think about their actions too much, do your own thing. It is not healthy to worry about the fate of the Earth and civilization. A person must think first about his own life and then about others. Protect your family. Creating a new life is a miracle and the highest goal everyone should strive for. Living in comfort is normal, living ascetically means something is wrong with you. If you can't fight them, join them. You can't solve the world's problems, solve your own. To sustain youself you have to compromise and work for the companies that only think about profit, there is no benefit to avoiding participating in the economy. You are just a worker, not the owner of the business so you have no moral responsibility for what the company does. You can't bear the moral burden of the society just on your shoulders - it is madness. It is the job of presidents and scientists to solve our societal and ecological problems. Are you willing to devote your whole life to environmentalism? Is it really your calling? Perhaps you better do something you really enjoy in the short span of your lifetime.
There is a barrage of pressure and convincing arguments against doing anything about the global problems. Perhaps most of those who show signs of avoidance of global issues were ones open to them but felt the immense pressure against doing anything and were left with painful helplessness, so they had to resort to a defense mechanism - avoidance. Are we doomed to change only after a catastrophic collapse?
June 16, 2021
It's been 41 years since this book was published, and it is more relevant than ever. Catton examines humanity from an ecological perspective, as if we were not as special and different from other species as we imagine ourselves to be, and makes the convincing case that the human species overshot the carrying capacity of its habitat a long time ago and has been living on borrowed time ever since. As Catton makes clear, by digging up non-renewable resources and inventing technology to keep our species going in overshoot, we only speed up and worsen the inevitable crash that is coming.
In 1980, if we'd needed his words, we could have perhaps reversed the trend and humanely reduced our numbers, our consumption of non-renewable resources, and saved a whole lot of the ecosystems we depend on, too. Instead, we dove head first into the 80's "greed is good" decade, and doubled down on the suicide plan. 41 years later we find ourselves with 2x the population on a much degraded planet, many species gone forever, and most ecosystems gone or "developed" (i.e. destroyed) and polluted beyond recognition.
I wonder what Catton would about our predicament if he were still alive. We face annihilation, and yet once again, we are doubling down on the false illusion that "clean" energy will somehow buy us more time, while ignoring that this simply adds to the vast array of technologies we use to destroy and drawdown what's left of this beautiful planet.
We are not special; we are not different from any other species that overshoots carrying capacity. The objective, ecological view of humanity in this book makes that clear. And so, we speed headlong towards the crash, distracting ourselves from this brutal reality and the devastation we leave in our wake with ever more depredations on our minds and spirits, numbed into oblivion with constant entertainment, fake food, and our ridiculous belief in progress.
Everyone should read this book. Everyone should have read it in 1980. If only we'd paid attention. Maybe things could have been different.
In 1980, if we'd needed his words, we could have perhaps reversed the trend and humanely reduced our numbers, our consumption of non-renewable resources, and saved a whole lot of the ecosystems we depend on, too. Instead, we dove head first into the 80's "greed is good" decade, and doubled down on the suicide plan. 41 years later we find ourselves with 2x the population on a much degraded planet, many species gone forever, and most ecosystems gone or "developed" (i.e. destroyed) and polluted beyond recognition.
I wonder what Catton would about our predicament if he were still alive. We face annihilation, and yet once again, we are doubling down on the false illusion that "clean" energy will somehow buy us more time, while ignoring that this simply adds to the vast array of technologies we use to destroy and drawdown what's left of this beautiful planet.
We are not special; we are not different from any other species that overshoots carrying capacity. The objective, ecological view of humanity in this book makes that clear. And so, we speed headlong towards the crash, distracting ourselves from this brutal reality and the devastation we leave in our wake with ever more depredations on our minds and spirits, numbed into oblivion with constant entertainment, fake food, and our ridiculous belief in progress.
Everyone should read this book. Everyone should have read it in 1980. If only we'd paid attention. Maybe things could have been different.
June 12, 2025
This is an important book, everybody knows that. I wasn't going to write a review, because everybody knows.
Except they don't.
I see a review here saying that Catton doesn't understand wind and solar. Presumably referring to electrical generation technology. Catton's argument is that any species that is living on resources beyond what results from contemporary sunlight will eventually outstrip the Earth's carrying capacity.
Well friends, we're doing that, and fast. A massive build-out of wind and solar electrical generating capacity won't change that. Even if we could produce PV panels with solar power, we'd still need to mine and refine the silicon and copper and aluminum and trace elements. So far, these have only ever been done using fossil fuels.
But even if we could produce the panels 'sustainably', what are we going to power up with them? Your car? Computers? Electric flying machines? Air conditioning? How are any of those things sustainable?
Not to mention that PV panels lose effectiveness over time, such that anyone who is using them to generate power for sale to the public will trash them after less than 30 years. And semiconductor silicon is recyclable, but nobody does it because it's cheaper to start with new material.
Our predicament is not technological, it's ecological. If we exceed our environment's carrying capacity, our population blooms and then crashes. Our species is in a major bloom phase right now.
And even if we live on only contemporary sunlight, the more of the total that we take for our own species, the more all the other species decline.
If we hope to survive as a species, we need to learn to live with limits. None of us want to hear this. Catton addresses that too.
Except they don't.
I see a review here saying that Catton doesn't understand wind and solar. Presumably referring to electrical generation technology. Catton's argument is that any species that is living on resources beyond what results from contemporary sunlight will eventually outstrip the Earth's carrying capacity.
Well friends, we're doing that, and fast. A massive build-out of wind and solar electrical generating capacity won't change that. Even if we could produce PV panels with solar power, we'd still need to mine and refine the silicon and copper and aluminum and trace elements. So far, these have only ever been done using fossil fuels.
But even if we could produce the panels 'sustainably', what are we going to power up with them? Your car? Computers? Electric flying machines? Air conditioning? How are any of those things sustainable?
Not to mention that PV panels lose effectiveness over time, such that anyone who is using them to generate power for sale to the public will trash them after less than 30 years. And semiconductor silicon is recyclable, but nobody does it because it's cheaper to start with new material.
Our predicament is not technological, it's ecological. If we exceed our environment's carrying capacity, our population blooms and then crashes. Our species is in a major bloom phase right now.
And even if we live on only contemporary sunlight, the more of the total that we take for our own species, the more all the other species decline.
If we hope to survive as a species, we need to learn to live with limits. None of us want to hear this. Catton addresses that too.
June 10, 2021
This is a brutally honest book and, although I don't know if I would recommend it to anyone unless they are really REALLY interested in ecology and the environment, it definitely changed how I view the current predicament we are in. Catton, who wrote this in 1980 (40 years ago!!!), carefully and strongly builds the case that the human species is now well past overshoot and are now so large that we are using up the environment faster than it can repair at an alarming rate. He notes that this is a common occurrence in ecology, complicated and made large by our specific evolutionary proclivities.
He states that, at this point, we need to stop avoiding it, look this problem in the eye, and try to make the impending "die-off" as humane as possible. It sounds dire and, when you try to talk about this book, you can't help but sound doomsdayish, but despite the doom and gloom he presents, he also says there are many ways this can go and its important for us as a species to see what is happening for what it is - an ecological process based on our own species limitations and evolution which we all, to a bigger and lesser degree contribute to - and use our brains and ability to think and plan to prevent the worst of what might happen.
A revolutionary book, unblinking in the face of the worst problems of our modern times. He sugarcoats nothing and doesn't let you either. Its a hard read, but a vital one.
He states that, at this point, we need to stop avoiding it, look this problem in the eye, and try to make the impending "die-off" as humane as possible. It sounds dire and, when you try to talk about this book, you can't help but sound doomsdayish, but despite the doom and gloom he presents, he also says there are many ways this can go and its important for us as a species to see what is happening for what it is - an ecological process based on our own species limitations and evolution which we all, to a bigger and lesser degree contribute to - and use our brains and ability to think and plan to prevent the worst of what might happen.
A revolutionary book, unblinking in the face of the worst problems of our modern times. He sugarcoats nothing and doesn't let you either. Its a hard read, but a vital one.
December 25, 2021
((Shudder)) I read this book because I wanted to understand some of my friends who say, “it’s already too late”. It’s a pretty depressing book to subject yourself to, especially because of it’s clear message that there’s not a lot that we can do now to change what is coming because of what we have already committed ourselves so deeply to.
I did feel strangely better to learn about organisms on Earth who bloom and crash, simply because it’s actually common. How could we have known? However, we are supposed to be “smarter” and now that we do know many simply refuse to believe it. Also, going to another planet isn’t going to change what’s going on here.
Personally, after reading something like this, very naturally come thoughts of, “Now what”? I choose to continue my efforts, small or inconsistent as they may be, if anything for the sake of sanity. I hope I don’t see this in my lifetime. Wrong, already am, but plan to live with it with as much dignity as I can muster. My hopeful personality has taken a “colossal” blow here yet as time goes and more processing happens I will try not to hate humans for it. Early on we truly did not know what the consequences of our actions would be and by the time we did it was already too late.
Or so he says. Oops, there I go being hopeful again.
I did feel strangely better to learn about organisms on Earth who bloom and crash, simply because it’s actually common. How could we have known? However, we are supposed to be “smarter” and now that we do know many simply refuse to believe it. Also, going to another planet isn’t going to change what’s going on here.
Personally, after reading something like this, very naturally come thoughts of, “Now what”? I choose to continue my efforts, small or inconsistent as they may be, if anything for the sake of sanity. I hope I don’t see this in my lifetime. Wrong, already am, but plan to live with it with as much dignity as I can muster. My hopeful personality has taken a “colossal” blow here yet as time goes and more processing happens I will try not to hate humans for it. Early on we truly did not know what the consequences of our actions would be and by the time we did it was already too late.
Or so he says. Oops, there I go being hopeful again.
September 7, 2023
Our day-to-day experiences over the past decade have taught us that there must be limits to our tremendous appetite for energy, natural resources, and consumer goods. Even utility and oil companies now promote conservation in the face of demands for dwindling energy reserves. And for years some biologists have warned us of the direct correlation between scarcity and population growth. These scientists see an appalling future riding the tidal wave of a worldwide growth of population and technology.
A calm but unflinching realist, Catton suggests that we cannot stop this wave - for we have already overshot the Earth's capacity to support so huge a load. He contradicts those scientists, engineers, and technocrats who continue to write optimistically about energy alternatives. Catton asserts that the technological panaceas proposed by those who would harvest from the seas, harness the winds, and farm the deserts are ignoring the fundamental premise that "the principals of ecology apply to all living things." These principles tell us that, within a finite system, economic expansion is not irreversible and population growth cannot continue indefinitely. If we disregard these facts, our sagging American Dream will soon shatter completely.
A calm but unflinching realist, Catton suggests that we cannot stop this wave - for we have already overshot the Earth's capacity to support so huge a load. He contradicts those scientists, engineers, and technocrats who continue to write optimistically about energy alternatives. Catton asserts that the technological panaceas proposed by those who would harvest from the seas, harness the winds, and farm the deserts are ignoring the fundamental premise that "the principals of ecology apply to all living things." These principles tell us that, within a finite system, economic expansion is not irreversible and population growth cannot continue indefinitely. If we disregard these facts, our sagging American Dream will soon shatter completely.
May 14, 2021
The most important book I've ever read. It deconstructs the problems of the world in a scientific but plain-spoken way so thoroughly that you will ask yourself why it isn't part of every high school curriculum. Effortlessly, Catton proves that analyzing history through the prism of politics or class struggle or racism or colonialism without considering the problem of ecological overshoot will leave us with an incomplete understanding and condemn us to hopeless solutions. Rather than prescribe solutions, Catton aims to leave us with a solid foundation in human ecology, one that allows us to ask the right questions and recognize the wrong ones. With my belief system crumbling, I remember feeling scared and even resentful towards the author. It wasn't until I had taken time to process what I had learned that the fear dissolved. I had gained a new understanding of the world, and though there may be no solution to our problems, I felt emboldened by the certainty that I could now begin asking the right questions.
December 15, 2021
One of the most important books I've ever read (in 69 years). Critical for seeing the underpinnings of earth's ecosphere and it's current civilizational challenges in the face of massive shifts in climate, ecosystem collapse, energy and water wars.
Quoting another reviewer, Erik Purasson, "one of the great and profoundly disturbing books of the 20th century. It is a point of departure for anyone desiring, first and foremost, to view the world through an ecological lens, rather than a faulty and dubious political or cultural one. Catton was a big influence on some of our best contemporary writers on the phenomena of why civilizations tend to rise and then inevitably collapse. John Michael Greer, James Kunstler, Richard Heinberg, Paul Chefurka, George Mobus- among the many, and then Peter Goodchild who stated that his worldview was defined simply by those who have read “Overshoot" and those who haven’t."
Yes, it's still that important a book these many years later.
Quoting another reviewer, Erik Purasson, "one of the great and profoundly disturbing books of the 20th century. It is a point of departure for anyone desiring, first and foremost, to view the world through an ecological lens, rather than a faulty and dubious political or cultural one. Catton was a big influence on some of our best contemporary writers on the phenomena of why civilizations tend to rise and then inevitably collapse. John Michael Greer, James Kunstler, Richard Heinberg, Paul Chefurka, George Mobus- among the many, and then Peter Goodchild who stated that his worldview was defined simply by those who have read “Overshoot" and those who haven’t."
Yes, it's still that important a book these many years later.
April 2, 2025
This is a foundation book on an ecological perspective of the world. Many other authors and books I have read on the topic have cited this book, and it's easy to see why.
I have only two criticisms. First, though it was written in 1980, it reflects a style from an earlier period by a few decades. I found it sometimes awkward and had to often re-read a sentence. An updated revision in a more modern style might be more accessible and reach a wider audience.
Second, twice the author refers to "the time of Christ". I really don't understand why authors do this, except that Christianity has so pervaded the western worldview. There isn't even evidence that Jesus ever existed. I wish authors would stop pointing to the creation of a made up religion as something of an established fact.
I have only two criticisms. First, though it was written in 1980, it reflects a style from an earlier period by a few decades. I found it sometimes awkward and had to often re-read a sentence. An updated revision in a more modern style might be more accessible and reach a wider audience.
Second, twice the author refers to "the time of Christ". I really don't understand why authors do this, except that Christianity has so pervaded the western worldview. There isn't even evidence that Jesus ever existed. I wish authors would stop pointing to the creation of a made up religion as something of an established fact.
May 29, 2025
Even if you believe yourself to be a passionate environmentalist, the novelty of Colton's ideas and terminology will probably surprise you.
He voices what presidents and energy "producers" (extractors) do not; the age of exuberance is over and to continue reliance on fossil fuels and developing new extraction methods (drawdown) is to gamble on carrying capacity and risk die off.
His points are common sense, but have been obscured by 400 years of lifestyle led by the myth of limitlessness and marketing from the fossil fuel industry.
I have never written such a long book review. My point is that this book will better equip your "ecological fluency"/your ability to discuss what you are passionate about with terms like ghost acreage, for example.
He voices what presidents and energy "producers" (extractors) do not; the age of exuberance is over and to continue reliance on fossil fuels and developing new extraction methods (drawdown) is to gamble on carrying capacity and risk die off.
His points are common sense, but have been obscured by 400 years of lifestyle led by the myth of limitlessness and marketing from the fossil fuel industry.
I have never written such a long book review. My point is that this book will better equip your "ecological fluency"/your ability to discuss what you are passionate about with terms like ghost acreage, for example.
February 20, 2018
If you are completely uninformed about the fact that humanity is living beyond its means, then you may find some insight here. There is an old saying that a man with a hammer sees every problem as a nail. That is how Catton strikes me. His hammer is his obsessive idea that populations in nature that overshoot the ability of the environment to support them plunge into a rapid die off. Nor does he offer any solutions other than the warning that we're doomed--curtailed consumption or not. There are many books that cover the same information herein, with greater thoroughness and even some solutions. As an antidote to this depressing treatise, I recommend reading those first.
August 13, 2021
Since this old school ecological look at resource depletion, mainly in form of fossil fuels, was written, global population has almost doubled. Got to keep that in mind. I appreciated how Catton often comes back to President Carter's so called "malaise speeches" of the late 70s. Amazing, reading this book today, how climate disruption caused by anthropogenic global warming could only be mentioned on a couple pages. His main focus is the age of exuberant economic growth, ghost acreage, resource depletion, and population crashes.
April 29, 2022
An ecology book that was written by a sociologist. Catton argues in this book that humans are just like other animals and that it is likely that we've overshot our carrying capacity, especially once things like fossil fuels start to run out. Our past 400 years of new world+fossil fuels have created an artificial culture of abundance, which he calls the age of exuberance, which he already saw coming to an end in 1980. I would have appreciated more math, but that was probably too much to expect from someone with Catton's background.
January 5, 2019
Read this book as part of my recommended reading list for an online course I'm undertaking with the Post Carbon Institute.
The book was bold and challenging in its ideas but I can't say very enjoyable to read. But it met its the primary goal to inform and educate the reader about the urgent need for revolutionary change in our thinking and approach to our relationship with nature if we are to continue to enjoy a habitable planet in the near future.
The book was bold and challenging in its ideas but I can't say very enjoyable to read. But it met its the primary goal to inform and educate the reader about the urgent need for revolutionary change in our thinking and approach to our relationship with nature if we are to continue to enjoy a habitable planet in the near future.
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