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The Winds of Change: Climate, Weather, and the Destruction of Civilizations
The Winds of Change places the horrifying carnage unleashed on New Orleans, Mississippi, and Alabama by Hurricane Katrina in context.
Climate has been humanity's constant, if moody, companion. At times benefactor or tormentor, climate nurtured the first stirrings of civilization and then repeatedly visited ruin on empires and peoples. Eugene Linden reveals a recurring pattern in which civilizations become prosperous and complacent during good weather, only to collapse when climate changes -- either through its direct effects, such as floods or drought, or indirect consequences, such as disease, blight, and civil disorder.
The science of climate change is still young, and the interactions of climate with other historical forces are much debated, but the evidence mounts that climate loomed over the fate of societies from arctic Greenland to the Fertile Crescent and from the lost cities of the Mayans in Central America to the rain forests of Central Africa. Taking into account the uncertainties in both science and the historical record, Linden explores the evidence indicating that climate has been a serial killer of civilizations. The Winds of Change looks at the present and then to the future to determine whether the accused killer is on the prowl, and what it will do in the future.
The tragedy of New Orleans is but the latest instance in which a region prepared for weather disasters experienced in the past finds itself helpless when nature ups the ante. In the closing chapters, Linden explores why warnings about the dangers of climate change have gone unheeded and what is happening with climate today, and he offers perhaps the most explicit look yet at what a haywire climate might do to us. He shows how even a society prepared to absorb such threshold-crossing events as Katrina, the killer heat wave in Europe in 2003, or the floods in the American Midwest in the 1990s can spiral into precipitous decline should such events intensify and become more frequent.
The Winds of Change places climate change, global warming, and the resulting instability in historical context and sounds an urgent warning for the future.
Climate has been humanity's constant, if moody, companion. At times benefactor or tormentor, climate nurtured the first stirrings of civilization and then repeatedly visited ruin on empires and peoples. Eugene Linden reveals a recurring pattern in which civilizations become prosperous and complacent during good weather, only to collapse when climate changes -- either through its direct effects, such as floods or drought, or indirect consequences, such as disease, blight, and civil disorder.
The science of climate change is still young, and the interactions of climate with other historical forces are much debated, but the evidence mounts that climate loomed over the fate of societies from arctic Greenland to the Fertile Crescent and from the lost cities of the Mayans in Central America to the rain forests of Central Africa. Taking into account the uncertainties in both science and the historical record, Linden explores the evidence indicating that climate has been a serial killer of civilizations. The Winds of Change looks at the present and then to the future to determine whether the accused killer is on the prowl, and what it will do in the future.
The tragedy of New Orleans is but the latest instance in which a region prepared for weather disasters experienced in the past finds itself helpless when nature ups the ante. In the closing chapters, Linden explores why warnings about the dangers of climate change have gone unheeded and what is happening with climate today, and he offers perhaps the most explicit look yet at what a haywire climate might do to us. He shows how even a society prepared to absorb such threshold-crossing events as Katrina, the killer heat wave in Europe in 2003, or the floods in the American Midwest in the 1990s can spiral into precipitous decline should such events intensify and become more frequent.
The Winds of Change places climate change, global warming, and the resulting instability in historical context and sounds an urgent warning for the future.
336 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2006
6 people are currently reading
229 people want to read
About the author
Eugene Linden
30 books119 followersI've spent my entire writing career exploring various aspects of one question: Why is it that after hundreds of thousands of years one relatively small subset of our species has reached a point where its fears, appetites, and spending habits control the destiny of every culture, every major ecosystem, and virtually every creature on earth? What happened that enabled us to seize control in a blink of an eye?
I began scratching at this question in my first book, Apes, Men and Language, published over 40 years ago. In that book I explored the implications of some experiments from the 1960s that showed that chimpanzees could use sign language in ways similar to the way we use words - to express opinions and feelings, to make specific requests, and to comment on the events of their day. Since the moral basis of our rights to use nature as so much raw material is deeply entangled with the belief that we are the lone sentient beings on the planet, I wondered what it would mean if it turned out that other animals possessed higher mental abilities and consciousness? I never expected that the scientific establishment and society would say "oops, sorry," but I also never imagined that the issue would turn out to be as fraught and contentious as it has.
That first book was the result of a curious turn of events. My first major journalistic assignment was an investigation of fragging (attacks by enlisted men on their officers) in Vietnam. That article, "The Demoralization of an Army: Fragging and Other Withdrawal Symptoms," was published as a cover story in Saturday Review in 1971. It got a good deal of attention, and a few publishers contacted me about possibly writing a book. I was eager to do that, but a few publishers lost interest when they learned that I wanted to write about experiments teaching sign language to apes and not Vietnam. Dutton gamely stayed on, however, and "Apes" is still in print in some parts of the world.
Since that first book, I've revisited and explored animal thinking in several books and many articles. In Silent Partners: The Legacy of the Ape Language Experiments, I looked at what happened to the animals themselves in the aftermath of the experiments as the chimps were whipsawed by a society that shifted back and forth between treating them as personalities and commodities. I wrote articles for National Geographic, TIME, and Parade, among other publications about animal intelligence as the debate progressed at its glacial pace.
Then, in the 1990s, I had an epiphany of sorts. I'd heard a story about an orangutan that got hold of a piece of wire and used it to pick the lock on his cage, all the while hiding his efforts from the zookeepers. Here seemed to be a panoply of higher mental abilities on display, unprompted by any rewards from humans, and it occurred to me that, if animals could think, maybe they did their best thinking when it served their purposes, and not some human in a lab coat. Out of this flash came two more books, The Parrot's Lament: Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence and Ingenuity, and, The Octopus and the Orangutan: More Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity, as well as a few more articles for TIME, Parade, and Oprah among other publications. I've found this approach to thinking about animal intelligence both liberating and fun, and I intend to explore this a good deal more.
The question of what makes us different than other creatures was but one aspect of my career-long efforts to understand how we have come to rule the planet. At the same time that I was exploring the question of higher mental abilities in animals I also began to think about how our notions our notions of our own specialness related to the consumer society. If intelligence, language and consciousness gave us dominion, it was the consumer society that gave us the tools to exploit nature for our own benefit. I've developed my thoughts on the nature and origins of consumer societies in four b
I began scratching at this question in my first book, Apes, Men and Language, published over 40 years ago. In that book I explored the implications of some experiments from the 1960s that showed that chimpanzees could use sign language in ways similar to the way we use words - to express opinions and feelings, to make specific requests, and to comment on the events of their day. Since the moral basis of our rights to use nature as so much raw material is deeply entangled with the belief that we are the lone sentient beings on the planet, I wondered what it would mean if it turned out that other animals possessed higher mental abilities and consciousness? I never expected that the scientific establishment and society would say "oops, sorry," but I also never imagined that the issue would turn out to be as fraught and contentious as it has.
That first book was the result of a curious turn of events. My first major journalistic assignment was an investigation of fragging (attacks by enlisted men on their officers) in Vietnam. That article, "The Demoralization of an Army: Fragging and Other Withdrawal Symptoms," was published as a cover story in Saturday Review in 1971. It got a good deal of attention, and a few publishers contacted me about possibly writing a book. I was eager to do that, but a few publishers lost interest when they learned that I wanted to write about experiments teaching sign language to apes and not Vietnam. Dutton gamely stayed on, however, and "Apes" is still in print in some parts of the world.
Since that first book, I've revisited and explored animal thinking in several books and many articles. In Silent Partners: The Legacy of the Ape Language Experiments, I looked at what happened to the animals themselves in the aftermath of the experiments as the chimps were whipsawed by a society that shifted back and forth between treating them as personalities and commodities. I wrote articles for National Geographic, TIME, and Parade, among other publications about animal intelligence as the debate progressed at its glacial pace.
Then, in the 1990s, I had an epiphany of sorts. I'd heard a story about an orangutan that got hold of a piece of wire and used it to pick the lock on his cage, all the while hiding his efforts from the zookeepers. Here seemed to be a panoply of higher mental abilities on display, unprompted by any rewards from humans, and it occurred to me that, if animals could think, maybe they did their best thinking when it served their purposes, and not some human in a lab coat. Out of this flash came two more books, The Parrot's Lament: Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence and Ingenuity, and, The Octopus and the Orangutan: More Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity, as well as a few more articles for TIME, Parade, and Oprah among other publications. I've found this approach to thinking about animal intelligence both liberating and fun, and I intend to explore this a good deal more.
The question of what makes us different than other creatures was but one aspect of my career-long efforts to understand how we have come to rule the planet. At the same time that I was exploring the question of higher mental abilities in animals I also began to think about how our notions our notions of our own specialness related to the consumer society. If intelligence, language and consciousness gave us dominion, it was the consumer society that gave us the tools to exploit nature for our own benefit. I've developed my thoughts on the nature and origins of consumer societies in four b
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
February 21, 2008
A competent but unadventuresome tour of the state of global warming science and media coverage thereof, circa 2006. Linden was a longtime environmental writer at Time, and one of the first "big" journalists to start covering global warming on a regular basis, and the several chapters that deal with the history of climate change in the media are excellent and fascinating. But this really-quite-decent book is most notable, unfortunately, for coming out at just about exactly the same time as, and being totally overshadowed by, Elizabeth Kolbert's juggernaut of global warming book, Field Notes from a Catastrophe.
(I thought [a minority opinion, to be sure] that Kolbert's book was competent but unadventuresome also--just how unoriginal Kolbert's book was is highlighted by the literally dozens of sections where the two books treat the same material in practically identical ways. But that's another story. Anyway, Linden's book is just as good if not a little better, because he provides richer social/political context for the scientific material they both cover. But timing+marketing means a lot in publishing, and Kolbert won this particular battle of the magazine writers.
Tangentially, Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers, which also came out at the same time, is way more interesting, way more original, and way more inflammatory to boot. Amusingly, given that he's a scientist and the other two are writers, Flannery's book is much better written, but also plays more loosely with the line between what is known and not known. I'd recommend Kolbert for a primer on basic climate change science, Linden for that plus more of the social, political and media context, and Flannery if you already know a fair amount of that stuff and are up for a more intellectual, idiosyncratic and enjoyable take on all that, plus some powerful sections on the need for action, and what that action ought to be.
(I thought [a minority opinion, to be sure] that Kolbert's book was competent but unadventuresome also--just how unoriginal Kolbert's book was is highlighted by the literally dozens of sections where the two books treat the same material in practically identical ways. But that's another story. Anyway, Linden's book is just as good if not a little better, because he provides richer social/political context for the scientific material they both cover. But timing+marketing means a lot in publishing, and Kolbert won this particular battle of the magazine writers.
Tangentially, Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers, which also came out at the same time, is way more interesting, way more original, and way more inflammatory to boot. Amusingly, given that he's a scientist and the other two are writers, Flannery's book is much better written, but also plays more loosely with the line between what is known and not known. I'd recommend Kolbert for a primer on basic climate change science, Linden for that plus more of the social, political and media context, and Flannery if you already know a fair amount of that stuff and are up for a more intellectual, idiosyncratic and enjoyable take on all that, plus some powerful sections on the need for action, and what that action ought to be.
March 3, 2012
A tsunami of both separate facts and the patterns and trends made up of those facts. The author's message is urgent, but his tone is dispassionate - he seems to feel he doesn't need to shout because the information he presents shouts for itself. My basic nature is to be skeptical about any ideas or data other people present; one of my mottoes is "Prove it." However, in this area, I am convinced. The numbers are there to show that our global average temperatures are getting hotter and that the heating-up is also speeding up.
'The Winds of Change' contains a tremendous amount of history about our planet's climate, with explanations of the research that provided that historical background, and an equal amount of info about the mechanisms by which the atmosphere and the world ocean route much of the heat Earth absorbs from the Sun in the tropics to the planet's temperate and polar regions and bring colder air and water back to the equatorial regions to start the cycle over, as well as the effects on that circulation of the continents' locations, mountain ranges, and forests.
Along with well over 90% of our civilization's climate scientists, the author draws the logical conclusion that the warming process now taking place is destabilizing weather in many regions of the world, with increasingly ruinous effects on agriculture, fishing, and other vital aspects of human civilization, along with economic engines such as the insurance industry. Those who deny this are only able to do so by ignoring or willfully misinterpreting the data that have led to a clear consensus among the people who know the most about the subject. As the late Daniel Patrick Moynihan put it, they're entitled to their own opinions, but they aren't entitled to their own facts, and this is about facts.
'The Winds of Change' contains a tremendous amount of history about our planet's climate, with explanations of the research that provided that historical background, and an equal amount of info about the mechanisms by which the atmosphere and the world ocean route much of the heat Earth absorbs from the Sun in the tropics to the planet's temperate and polar regions and bring colder air and water back to the equatorial regions to start the cycle over, as well as the effects on that circulation of the continents' locations, mountain ranges, and forests.
Along with well over 90% of our civilization's climate scientists, the author draws the logical conclusion that the warming process now taking place is destabilizing weather in many regions of the world, with increasingly ruinous effects on agriculture, fishing, and other vital aspects of human civilization, along with economic engines such as the insurance industry. Those who deny this are only able to do so by ignoring or willfully misinterpreting the data that have led to a clear consensus among the people who know the most about the subject. As the late Daniel Patrick Moynihan put it, they're entitled to their own opinions, but they aren't entitled to their own facts, and this is about facts.
August 9, 2009
This book is about climate change and its affects on civilization. It starts out reminiscent of Jared Diamond's Collapse in that it goes through examples of civilizations that died at least partially because of rapid climate change. The book then becomes a primer on how rapid climate change can occur and how man made global warming could cause a rapid climate change event. The interesting emphasis is on the notion of sudden rapid climate change. Too many people believe climate change will be a slow grinding process that gives us at least a chance to continually adapt to the problem. This makes clear that that is not necessarily so, that Earth's past includes severe and sudden climate changes. The book is very well done as a climate change primer and appropriately circumspect in its conclusions. It's not simply a run for the hills doomsday book. Rather it does a good job of educating the public on various aspects of climate change. Eugene Linden has always been an excellent popularizer of science topics and this book is no exception.
September 11, 2018
Climate change is a hot button topic, and the source of a lot of debate (except among most scientists, who almost all agree it's real). This book takes a look at climate change, but not just recent events like most people think of. This looks at historical instances of massive weather shifts having significant effects on world events, like the fall of the Mayan Empire, the destruction of the Spanish Armada, the the loss of the Viking colonies in Greenland and North America, and the fall of the ancient city of Akkad.
Linden takes a lot of high-end scientific concepts and makes them easy to understand. There's a lot to think about here, and, since it's a fair, objective piece, the US comes off looking not so great in a lot of it. US businesses are among the biggest obstacles to addressing climate change effectively.
Two things make me ever more uneasy reading this when I am. The first is that the book, published in 2006, cites the Kyoto Accords as a step, but nowhere near enough. Considering Trump pulled the US out of those, it's not a good feeling in the wake of this read. Secondly, as I write this, what some predict will be the most powerful storm to ever hit North Carolina is looming on the horizon, having gone from a tropical storm to a Category 4 in two days, and may well be Cat 5 before it hits.
It's a good, if disturbing, read, and makes a very good case for the science of global warming and climate change, as well as highlighting some of the potential horrific things that might happen if this isn't addressed.
Linden takes a lot of high-end scientific concepts and makes them easy to understand. There's a lot to think about here, and, since it's a fair, objective piece, the US comes off looking not so great in a lot of it. US businesses are among the biggest obstacles to addressing climate change effectively.
Two things make me ever more uneasy reading this when I am. The first is that the book, published in 2006, cites the Kyoto Accords as a step, but nowhere near enough. Considering Trump pulled the US out of those, it's not a good feeling in the wake of this read. Secondly, as I write this, what some predict will be the most powerful storm to ever hit North Carolina is looming on the horizon, having gone from a tropical storm to a Category 4 in two days, and may well be Cat 5 before it hits.
It's a good, if disturbing, read, and makes a very good case for the science of global warming and climate change, as well as highlighting some of the potential horrific things that might happen if this isn't addressed.
July 17, 2008
If you have any doubts that we are experiencing extreme and fast climate change, read this book. Linden goes through what we know about long cycles of climate, and what has been discovered in recent years. He also explains why the public is not alarmed while scientists are.
The science is explained in term that laymen can understand, and Linden has actually gone to places such as Antarctica, Greenland, and on a cruise to study the Gulf Stream with scientists. His writing is authoritative, and back by science. Once you begin to understand what he Greenland ice cores, Antarctic ice cores, and lake and ocean bed sediment cores tell us about climate in the past and mechanisms involved in climate change, you can understand what is going on now. You do need a bit of science background to understand the use of the proxies in the science, but it's not that hard if you can grasp the concept of isotopes.
The science is explained in term that laymen can understand, and Linden has actually gone to places such as Antarctica, Greenland, and on a cruise to study the Gulf Stream with scientists. His writing is authoritative, and back by science. Once you begin to understand what he Greenland ice cores, Antarctic ice cores, and lake and ocean bed sediment cores tell us about climate in the past and mechanisms involved in climate change, you can understand what is going on now. You do need a bit of science background to understand the use of the proxies in the science, but it's not that hard if you can grasp the concept of isotopes.
June 9, 2010
The banner on this book describes it very well, "Climate, weather, and the destruction of civilizations." The author describes climate changes over the eons in a clear and understandable manner, and the impact of these changes on earlier civilizations. Our political dysfunction allows for no preparation for any traumatic events and keeps the average person in a state of ignorance - regardless of whether or not climatic changes are the result of human activity.
September 8, 2022
Eugene Linden has written a book that takes a long view of weather and climate patterns. He finds that there have been extreme weather events during the past that appear to have a relationship with patterns of decline of civilizations. In history settlements seem to grow and prosper when the climate is pleasant and then collapse when an extreme climate event happens. He has several examples. He brings his conclusions into the present with great clarity. There is now a lot of corroborating evidence in ice cores, in the sea floor, and in ocean current temperatures, and it is revealing to see how Mother Nature is really in charge. I think his main message is that we should not be complacent. We are inclined to think that our environment has always been this way and will continue to be so. We should be ready to adapt. This is not a scary read; it is sometimes a bit tedious, but the information relayed is thought-provoking.
March 4, 2021
Published in 2006 this is a bit dated in terms of up to date information on climate change, but I thought the author did a good job at detailing what science could and could not determine with accuracy and also why there are so many debatable points on the topic. I also liked getting a basic history told in an interesting fashion. I had last month read a suspense fiction novel by the author that used his knowledge of climate and archaeology and it was for that reason that I picked this book to read.
December 19, 2017
The Winds of Change: Climate, Weather, and the Destruction of Civilizations (Hardcover)
by Eugene Linden
by Eugene Linden
July 14, 2010
Linden examines historical events to determine if climatic change could have been a factor explaining the decline of civilizations. He carefully reviews the evidence scientists have presented over the last 30 years. He explains the chief "gears" that drive air currents. He cogently explains the ocean currents that greatly affect weather. He investigates the El Nino phenomenon and its global consequences. Most interesting to me was his examination of the scholarly debates regarding whether climatic events account for the decline of the Akkadian Empire in Mesopotamia, the incursions into Roman territory of the Avars, the decline of the Mayan Empire, the demise of Norse settlements in Greenland, the difficulties encountered by English colonists in North America, and the famines throughout India in the 1870s. I learned that climatologists now have proof that the climate of a region can change dramatically in just a few years. Some civilizations have been able to adapt to new climatic conditions; others have been unable to do so.
This work focuses on climatology and scientific methods of determining the climate of the distant past. Linden also describes and reviews numerous works which over the past three decades have significantly changed our understanding of the influence of climate on human history.
This work focuses on climatology and scientific methods of determining the climate of the distant past. Linden also describes and reviews numerous works which over the past three decades have significantly changed our understanding of the influence of climate on human history.
February 21, 2010
3.5*
ช่วงเวลาหนึ่งหมื่นปีที่ผ่านมาบนโลกเป็นช่วงอากาศอบอุ่นเกือบคงที่ตลอด พวกเราจึงแทบไม่เคยคิดเลยว่าภูมิอากาศโลกมันเปลี่ยนกันได้ แถมอาจเปลี่ยนอย่างฉับพลันในชั่วข้ามคืนก็เคยมีมาแล้ว
เรื่องภูิมิอากาศเพิ่งเป็นหัวข้อเด่นเมื่อประมาณ 20 ปีมานี้เองหลังจากมีหลักฐานเพิ่มขึ้นมาก
ใครจะคิดว่านักประวัิติ���าสตร์ต้องมาทำงานร่วมกับนักวิทยาศาสตร์
เนื้อหาหนังสือครอบคลุมตั้งแต่ประวัติศาสตร์ของอาณาจักรที่น่าสงสัยว่าหายไปเพราะภัยพิบัติจากภูมิอากาศหรืออย่างไร
วิทยาศาสตร์ของระบบภูมิอากาศโลก และเขาศึกษาแกนน้ำแข็งกับตะกอนใต้สมุทรกันอย่างไร
ปฏิทินสรุปภัยพิบัติจากภูมิอากาศตั้งแต่อดีตที่มนุษย์ศึกษากันมาได้จนถึงปัจจุบันเลยทีเดียว
มีช่วงที่อ่านสนุกปนๆกับช่วงที่น่าเบื่อเพราะเนื้อหาซ้ำๆเดิม หรือบางทีก็อ่านไม่ง่าย
ชื่นชอบในด้านที่นำเสนออย่างหลากหลายมุมมองของวิชา
ช่วงเวลาหนึ่งหมื่นปีที่ผ่านมาบนโลกเป็นช่วงอากาศอบอุ่นเกือบคงที่ตลอด พวกเราจึงแทบไม่เคยคิดเลยว่าภูมิอากาศโลกมันเปลี่ยนกันได้ แถมอาจเปลี่ยนอย่างฉับพลันในชั่วข้ามคืนก็เคยมีมาแล้ว
เรื่องภูิมิอากาศเพิ่งเป็นหัวข้อเด่นเมื่อประมาณ 20 ปีมานี้เองหลังจากมีหลักฐานเพิ่มขึ้นมาก
ใครจะคิดว่านักประวัิติ���าสตร์ต้องมาทำงานร่วมกับนักวิทยาศาสตร์
เนื้อหาหนังสือครอบคลุมตั้งแต่ประวัติศาสตร์ของอาณาจักรที่น่าสงสัยว่าหายไปเพราะภัยพิบัติจากภูมิอากาศหรืออย่างไร
วิทยาศาสตร์ของระบบภูมิอากาศโลก และเขาศึกษาแกนน้ำแข็งกับตะกอนใต้สมุทรกันอย่างไร
ปฏิทินสรุปภัยพิบัติจากภูมิอากาศตั้งแต่อดีตที่มนุษย์ศึกษากันมาได้จนถึงปัจจุบันเลยทีเดียว
มีช่วงที่อ่านสนุกปนๆกับช่วงที่น่าเบื่อเพราะเนื้อหาซ้ำๆเดิม หรือบางทีก็อ่านไม่ง่าย
ชื่นชอบในด้านที่นำเสนออย่างหลากหลายมุมมองของวิชา
October 17, 2018
This was an informative and educational read about climate change past and present. I liked how it linked together issues involving policy, politics, and economics along with the science aspects. It definitely sheds a light on the failures of government and large corporations to act.
However, the writing in this book wasn't that good. Some parts were erratic, shifting suddenly from topic to topic. Other times same information was repeated numerous times throughout the book and was tedious. Also, the author made really odd analogies that were awkward and even made me cringe... Definitely needs another edit! If you want to read about past civilizations and our potential future, I would recommend Jared Diamond instead.
However, the writing in this book wasn't that good. Some parts were erratic, shifting suddenly from topic to topic. Other times same information was repeated numerous times throughout the book and was tedious. Also, the author made really odd analogies that were awkward and even made me cringe... Definitely needs another edit! If you want to read about past civilizations and our potential future, I would recommend Jared Diamond instead.
June 14, 2008
Linden argues that rapid climate change has occurred historically more often than we would like to admit, and that it has had devastating impact on great and now vanished civilizations. I laid the book down after reading all but the last chapter two years ago. I read the last chapter this week (June 2008) after severe thunderstorms led to flooding in much of the USA Midwest, and I have renewed understanding and respect for the author's analysis of the relationship between carbon emissions and global warming. As for our society's ability to cope with global warming, it appears that the train has already left the station.
December 20, 2015
*changing climates favored bigger-brained, more adaptable hominids
*climate change more abrupt than originally thought
*THC - thermohaline circulation - as water evaporates, it becomes saltier, therefore heavier, so it SINKS, pulling the current behind it. Happens ONLY in the North Atlantic (Gulf Stream)
*cycles exist from 100,000 years down to 20 years (El Nino) - we are at the intersection of lots of cycles
*Human activities both increase risk of severe climate change and minimize earth's ability to cope with such changes (deforestation, mangrove depletion, etc).
We're doomed.
(suggested reading - "Late Victorian Holocausts" by Mike Davis)
*climate change more abrupt than originally thought
*THC - thermohaline circulation - as water evaporates, it becomes saltier, therefore heavier, so it SINKS, pulling the current behind it. Happens ONLY in the North Atlantic (Gulf Stream)
*cycles exist from 100,000 years down to 20 years (El Nino) - we are at the intersection of lots of cycles
*Human activities both increase risk of severe climate change and minimize earth's ability to cope with such changes (deforestation, mangrove depletion, etc).
We're doomed.
(suggested reading - "Late Victorian Holocausts" by Mike Davis)
June 30, 2009
This book is very interesting, covering climate change in Earth's history, evidence of how this has affected human civilizations in the past, how unstable Earth's climate is and how it may have fine tipping points which in breaching can cause dramatic climate changes, and how humans are able to effect the climate sufficiently (and may be doing so already) to tip the climate.
December 10, 2012
Very well researched and written. Linden presents his case without bias and systematically disproves and silences opponents of climate change by examining historical sites and evidence with a different perspective.
March 16, 2024
A great read to gain a foundation on the science of climate change as well as a primer on the political implications.
The book is dated now 15 years later but still worth a read if you want to know the basics.
The book is dated now 15 years later but still worth a read if you want to know the basics.
November 29, 2007
Alarmist! Only got two chapters in and mailed it back to the Kansas City library because-- Jesus-- I have to be able to wake up in the morning. I'm already a bit paranoid.
April 17, 2008
We are arguing about Roberts' Rules of Order as we head over the cliff...
April 18, 2015
Ties together my interest in history and climate/weather.
October 29, 2015
A history of how climate has affected different civilization over the millennia.
May 2, 2017
This book starts off with the history of Iceland and goes from the natural change in climate to what has happened from the planets addition of fossil fuels to the atmosphere.
What is scary, is that this was written in 2005. Linden chronicles the marked increase in temperatures back then. If you look at the latest year the largest temperature increase it was 2016!. There is a lot of good research in this book, however, it does get heavy into jargon as the scientists give long explanations about how the ocean currents move and exchange heat.
I kept flipping ahead and muttering, "I get it. If the currents stop we're screwed!" But in the end, it was necessary jargon and some time, you'll be able to tell your grandchildren as they watch the sea levels rise in Orlando, and Disney World is under water, how we should have listened to this man back in 2005. But then again, it was probably too late then as well.
What is scary, is that this was written in 2005. Linden chronicles the marked increase in temperatures back then. If you look at the latest year the largest temperature increase it was 2016!. There is a lot of good research in this book, however, it does get heavy into jargon as the scientists give long explanations about how the ocean currents move and exchange heat.
I kept flipping ahead and muttering, "I get it. If the currents stop we're screwed!" But in the end, it was necessary jargon and some time, you'll be able to tell your grandchildren as they watch the sea levels rise in Orlando, and Disney World is under water, how we should have listened to this man back in 2005. But then again, it was probably too late then as well.
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