Here on Earth: A New Beginning

by Tim Flannery

Beginning at the moment of creation with the Big Bang, Here on Earth explores the evolution of Earth from a galactic cloud of dust and gas to a planet with a metallic core and early signs of life within a billion years of being created. In a compelling narrative, Flannery describes the formation of the Earth’s crust and atmosphere, as well as the transformation of the planet’s oceans from toxic brews of metals (such as iron, copper, and lead) to life-sustaining bodies covering 70 percent of the planet’s surface. Life, Flannery shows, first appeared in these oceans in the form of microscopic plants and bacteria, and these metals served as catalysts for the earliest biological processes known to exist. From this starting point, Flannery tells the fascinating story of the evolution of our own species, exploring several early human species—from the diminutive creatures (the famed hobbits) who lived in Africa around two million years ago to Homo erectus—before turning his attention to Homo sapiens. Drawing on Charles Darwin’s and Alfred Russell Wallace’s theories of evolution and Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis, Here on Earth is a dazzling account of life on our planet.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, Environment, History, Nature, Natural History, Ecology

316 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2010

About the author

Tim Flannery is one of Australia's leading thinkers and writers.

An internationally acclaimed scientist, explorer and conservationist, he has published more than 130 peer-reviewed scientific papers and many books. His books include the landmark works The Future Eaters and The Weather Makers, which has been translated into more than 20 languages and in 2006 won the NSW Premiers Literary Prizes for Best Critical Writing and Book of the Year.

He received a Centenary of Federation Medal for his services to Australian science and in 2002 delivered the Australia Day address. In 2005 he was named Australian Humanist of the Year, and in 2007 honoured as Australian of the Year.

He spent a year teaching at Harvard, and is a founding member of the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists, a director of the Australian Wildlife Conservancy, and the National Geographic Society's representative in Australasia. He serves on the board of WWF International (London and Gland) and on the sustainability advisory councils of Siemens (Munich) and Tata Power (Mumbai).

In 2007 he co-founded and was appointed Chair of the Copenhagen Climate Council, a coalition of community, business, and political leaders who came together to confront climate change.

Tim Flannery is currently Professor of Science at Maquarie University, Sydney.

Reviews

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

I came to this book with great expectations, which were a little disappointed. Flannery writes well and he has a very good grasp of the big picture as well as the detail, venturing into many different scientific fields to make his case. And his case is a good one, he melds together the perspectives of diverse thinkers such as Darwin, Wallace, Jared Diamond and James Lovelock, and shows how their research creates a powerful argument for regarding the Earth as an organism, and one we are in great danger - if not of destroying - at best of radically changing, creating an environment which is no longer the wonderful home for us and the rest of the world's animals that it is today (or was until the recent past).

For me, though, he doesn't maintain the flow of the argument very well. His knowledge of so many fields takes him down too many distracting paths. I must admit I ran out of steam about two-thirds of the way through. I would like to persist and to read his final chapters as it is good to read a writer on these issues who is capable of being optimistic. But, regrettably, he didn't inspire me in the way that I thought he would.

[VSY · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful book that has changed my life. Firmly grounded in science, this book nevertheless manages to rise above the reductionism that characterises much current discussion of evolution and ecology. Instead, Flannery's perspective embraces the shared experience of our humanity and identifies how we, as a species, can move forward with hope.

[Ali · Rating 4 out of 5]

By the end of the last Tim Flannery book I read, I was pretty convinced he viewed humans as a boom-bust species, one destined to destroy itself and take a fair bit of its habitat with it, through expansion beyond what could be sustained. I suspect I wasn't the only one, because this book reads as an attempt to refute that notion, (which here Flannery dubs Medean), and to posit an alternative view of humanity, one in which our ability to cooperate and seek balance triumphs over consumerism to extinction. I truly wish that the book had succeeded, at least in convincing me that Flannery believes it, but it did not
There is much to delight at in the book, not least Flannery's masterful takedown of Richard Dawkins' reductionism, which seems lately to have come to obliterate in public conciousness the work of more naunced and less belicose biologists. Flannery wonderfully posits Dawkin's Selfish Gene as a part of the 80s obsession with greed, and tries to resuscitate the legacy of several scientists who pointed to the tendency of both species and advanced systems to create balance, and foster complex interdependent relationships for the good of all. Flannery dips in and out of topics as diverse as game theory, genetics, and the moral role of religion, arguing for a new view of humanity as superorganism, and the role of ideas and social norms (here called mnemes, because scientists require new words for social concepts to make them sound proper.)
It's probably this very jumping around that I find most frustrating. Flannery chooses to ignore ideas and theorists pertinent to the topic, but not fitting his thesis. Treating the neo-Darwinists as the voice of modern evolutionary science might be arguable, but ignoring the body of work of others such as Steven Jay Gould is not (Gould rates only a single mention - a criticism of his dismissal of sociobiology). Flannery ignores pretty much the whole body of political, economic or social analysis outside game theory as well. Treating human societies as things emblamatic of human nature, without reference to economic or political systems (and their influence upon human nature) weakens his legitimacy. His treatment of religion as based on an impulse to benefit others and follow abstract morality seems naive without mention of any religious studies theory which may disagree, even if such mention was just to explain why Flannery takes this view. In a book arguing for humanity's ability to synthesise ideas and experiences, he seems determined to avoid doing so.
This review may not seem to gel with the rating, but that's because Flannery is simply so good - so passionate, so informed (even when pretending not to be), so able to take a sweeping and intelligent view of our role as species that the book is at the end of the day absolutely worth reading. Flannery's treatment of human origins and spread is particularly riveting. Flannery from his own account seems to have fiund the process of preparing for Copenhagen profoundly disillusioning. It is to Flannery's credit, however, that he has continued to puzzle out how we might survive the coming ecological storms. The more Flannerys we have, the more people who read the book and think "what can I do", the more likely Flannery's positive outcome is.

[Tony · Rating 5 out of 5]

I gave this book 5 stars not because it is flawless (it isn't) but because of the insights it gives on such a vast topic.
'Amazing' indeed...

Flannery covers the evolution of the Earth from two perspectives: Charles Darwin, and his lesser known compatriot, Alfred Russell Wallace. Darwin is, of course, known for his painstakingly derived theory of evolution of species through natural selection, but Wallace came to the same conclusion through a more holistic approach (he could be called the originator of the Gaia hypothesis, as well as the founder of meteorology). Taking the two together, the result is an astonishing journey through time, and the profound ways that life has shaped the development of this planet (eg: primordial algal mats producing deposits of enriched Uranium sufficiently concentrated that they initiated a natural fission reactor.)

While covering the Earth as a whole, the emphasis quickly moves to the impact humanity has had. The 'argument for hope' comes from explaining how evolutionary processes might be tailoring the uncontrolled and rapacious aggression of a species capable of wiping out entire ecosystems, even in neolithic times, into a more custodial role. It makes for an interesting, if not entirely convincing argument (its power being sapped by the account of the 2010 Copenhagen summit and the reasons for its collapse). But, after all, this is an ongoing experiment.

This might seem like a bit of 'fluffy new age' stuff, but Flannery treats his material in a keen and rigorous manner. Extraordinary forensic proofs are provided for extraordinary claims, and more speculative points are clearly listed as such.

For those with a mind to do so, even those holding reservations about anthropogenic climate change, there is much to ponder here.

[Magdalena]

Despite the rise of climate scepticism, it’s probably fair to say that the scientific community has reached consensus about global climate change. We’re warming up and that warming is the result of greenhouse gasses, especially carbon dioxide. Whether or not it’s happening is no longer the question. The question is how we’re going to fix it and how long we have. Here on Earth isn’t really a book about climate change per se, although that comes out as the most urgent issue that the human ‘superorganism’ has to deal with. Instead it’s a book about the whole notion of what humanity is as a species, and how that relates to the world we live in. The book takes the Gaia hypothesis as its starting point – the notion that we’re part of the entire living ecosystem of the Earth – including the biosphere, the atmosphere, the ‘commons’ of the oceans and poles, all integrated to form a system much greater and more united than our current political system of ‘nationhood’ would suggest. Written in such clear, scientifically cogent prose, what might have appeared wacky somewhere else, comes across as elegant and utterly rational. Although it must have been tempting for Flannery to write this in a polemical style - after all, there's much to do and little time to do it in, the writing is never didactic or prescriptive.

Instead, Flannery uses evidence to suggest that we are at a major crossroad, and that we can either destroy ourselves, Medea like, or we can evolve to the next phase, recognising our unique power and our extraordinary capability to cooperate as a united organism working for the common good. Although there’s plenty of evidence for the former, the book, as the subtitle suggests, remains positive, beyond even fixing the immediate crisis of climate change and overpopulation:

There is something magnificent about the idea of a wild and free plent, one whose functioning is maintained principally by that commonwealth of virtue formed from all biodiversity." (277)

The book begins and ends with Darwin’s sand walk, and the notion of evolution and ‘survival of the fittest’ and moves through Dawkins’ selfish gene, proposing that, beyond the gene, there’s the mneme – as Flannery presents it, a kind of idea/association/memory that has a physical reality and that can be used in a way that goes beyond strict self-interest towards the greater good. It’s the idea of this greater good towards which this book leans – a ‘commonwealth of virtue’ that works, in a grander way than self-interest:

In such a commonwealth the various elements are sorted and stored in the most appropriate planetary organ. Non-living parts of the system are coopted for the benefit of life, and there is no ‘waste’ because species recycle the by-products of others. And there is a tendency, over time, towards increased productivity and interdependence. All of this is achieved I the absence of a command-and-control system, and with only limited ability to elicit specific, system-wide responses. The remaining question, as Hamilton realised, and which we shall re-visit towards the end of the this book, is whether a commonwealth of virtue so defined promotes its own stability: in other words, is it Medean or Gaian in nature? (62)

Of course whether we're Medean or Gaian is the rub, and clearly we have the potential to go either way. We could progress to the next level of cooperative evolution, perhaps through our fast evolving technology, and not only fix the planet, but also learn to live in peace with one another (yup, world peace). Alternatively, we might just end up, as Flannery so eloquently puts it in a nod to Cormac McCarthy, ‘on the road’. If there are no other superorganisms in the universe, then that would be that. It would be tempting to look around at the extreme and growing polarities, and persistent poverty so evident in the world today, and shrug. Flannery doesn’t do that, and in fact quite clearly eshews such negative “self-fulfilling prophecies”. Instead he offers a range of solutions from electric vehicles, smart grids, and satellite surveillance of environmental trangressions, along with the suggestion that the ultimate answer lies in governments being willing to cede power for the common good. That might require maturity that the human race, still in its juvenile phase, isn’t ready for. But if anyone can create the kind of awareness that leads to growth, Flannery can. If so, perhaps there really is an argument for hope.

Article first published as Book Review: Here on Earth: A New Beginning by Tim Flannery on Blogcritics.

[Susanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here on Earth: A Natural History of the Planet is intended as a popular science book that explains how the natural history of humanity has impacted the environment. At its heart are two theories of, basically, how Earth works. One is the Medea hypothesis, in which species naturally cause their own self-destruction by exploiting resources to the point of collapse. The other is the Gaia hypothesis, where Earth regulates itself (like homeostasis). The central purpose of the book is to determine whether Earth (under the influence of humans) is following a Medean or a Gaian path and what can be done by humanity to prevent complete ecological collapse.

Here on Earth is divided into six sections. They are (in an oversimplified version):
1. Basic overviews of theories of evolution and of other theories of how life on Earth runs
2. The beginnings of human life on Earth
3. Humans since the advent of agriculture
4. Human impact on the environment
5. Sociology and the environment
6. What the future holds

Contrary to the subtitle "A Natural History of the Planet," Here on Earth is less of a concise history of Earth's origins and the evolution of humanity and more of a compendium of facts about these subjects. That said, however, it's still completely fascinating. For example, did you know that there actually is a (real) creature referred to as a unicorn? It's a type of rhino with one single, really long horn - and it lasted at least until the 10th century A.D. Besides being interesting, though, Flannery writes for the average person. He doesn't oversimplify things to the point of seeming like he's teaching down to readers, but at the same time most of what he writes is perfectly comprehensible to me (I've had only the basic required high school science classes, and the majority of the few places in the book that I didn't completely understand were based on politics and economics, which I don't usually understand anyway). Flannery backs up his information with sources (appropriately cited with notes in the back), and he keeps away from extremist, gloom-and-doom predictions. Even though the book carries a clear message for better ecological management and conservation, it's not "SAVE THE EARTH OR WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE"; it's "Our current (and past) practices are probably going to come back to bite us in the butt, so let's try to do something to remedy it now." Flannery isn't a Luddite, either - he encourages the use of technology in managing resources and as potential future ways of fixing environmental problems. My one complaint about Here on Earth, which was otherwise fascinating and eye-opening for me on the topics of human and natural history and environmental science, is that Flannery does little to explain how average people can change the current environmental state, instead detailing what governments and corporations, etc. should improve on. But hey, it's a relatively small book for its topic and there's only so much that can be fit into it.

Concluding Thoughts: I foresee more science courses in my future, and my plans for my summer garden just skyrocketed.

[jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

tim flannery's reputation for lucid, potent writing has led to wide acclaim for his previous books (especially the weather makers, the future eaters, and the eternal frontier). as an eminent scientist and environmental activist, flannery's expertise is readily apparent, but it may also be the accessibility of his work that has made them so popular. here on earth is an engaging, expansive work that teeters between achingly frustrating and refreshingly hopeful.

here on earth's (american edition) subtitle, a natural history of the planet, is somewhat misrepresentative however, as the book, while offering much on the subject, is in fact more an anthropological history of man's relationship to the earth. other editions of the book feature subtitles (an argument for hope and a new beginning) that are perhaps more apt and illustrative. it may well be that flannery's american publisher (presuming that flannery himself didn't make the decision) may have opted for a less telling subtitle so as not make the book seem like yet one more work in the ever-proliferating climate change subgenre. while this may seem like a trifling point, it is indicative of the american media's reluctance and disregard of the subject altogether.

throughout here on earth flannery highlights the myriad challenges facing our exploited ecosystems, but rather than a mere litany of devastation, he offers plausible scenarios of environmental restoration. invoking james lovelock's gaia hypothesis, flannery argues for a more holistic approach in understanding ecosystems and genetic diversity. beyond that, flannery frequently cites the importance of alleviating global poverty as a key factor in reversing the effects of climate change.

here on earth is certainly one of the more optimistic works on the subject, which, given the magnitude of the problems, is a cautious optimism at best. flannery's book is an absorbing work combining scientific research, philosophical insight, and logical perspective. it would be difficult to read here on earth and not take away from it a greater knowledge and understanding not only of our planet and its history, but also the struggles we will undoubtedly face as the century progresses.

it's often said that there are two fundamental sentiments that decide an election- hope for the future, and fear of it. if hope prevails, we're likely to elect more generous governments and reach out to the world, but if fear prevails, we elect inward-looking, nationalistic ones. factors determining the successful spread of mnemes are clearly extremely complex, but at the broadest level it does seem that we, collectively and as individuals, gravitate towards one of these two tendencies. if we believe that we live in a dog-eat-dog world where only the fittest survive, we're likely to propagate very different mnemes from those that arise from an understanding of the fundamental interconnectedness of things. in large part, out future as a species will be determined by which of these mnemes prevails.

[Malcolm · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to confess to mixed feeling abut this; on the one hand I really like the Earth systems theory work Tim Flannery does; on the other, I am quite uncomfortable with the socio-biology he relies on as the principal (almost sole) source of analysis for human dynamics. I do appreciate, however, that he is more optimistic than I am about our (human) potential and the chances of survival.

The book turns around a key social and political problem – the tension (or contradiction) in human social organisation and evolutionary theory between selfishness (the ‘survival of the fittest’ and so forth) and our tendency to cooperate. One of the many things I did enjoy was his critique of the tendency in Darwinian theory (especially as presented by writers such as Dawkins) to see human as selfish, and the coincidence of the popularity this tendency since the mid 1970s and the neoliberal celebration of individual – although Flannery doesn’t make the point this explicit, there is a sense (in my reading) of an intellectual comradeship between Darwinian theorists, Nietzsche and Ayn Rand. Flannery offsets this by bringing Alfred Russel Wallace into the argument and in doing so building a tension in evolutionary theory between Darwinian reductionism and Wallace’s global inclusiveness. In doing so he builds a form of left-liberal ecosystems politics based in notion of the planet we live on a single organism (I am resisting the urge to see this as Nietzsche meets Gaia).

In this content, then, I did not find myself as uncomfortable with the socio-biological elements of case as I usually do, perhaps because this is a piece of ecological writing where he draws directly on E. O. Wilson so the depiction of humans as a form of super-organism is not as misplaced as it is in the more social science oriented socio-biology. It also allows Flannery to develop an argument for restoration of the Earth’s balance based in a more humane, less rapacious form of capitalism. It is this mildly social democratic argument that gives many of his proposals their potency. So, if I bring the conventions of critical social science to bear (and using Erik Olin Wright’s distinction in Envisioning Real Utopias) consider options that are desirable, viable and achievable, Flannery has injected into this debate a set of short-to-medium term proposals that may not be the most desirable solutions to the problem but are, it seems, both achievable and viable. These proposals could see us wind back the mass release of stored carbon, could see carbon traps redeveloped, could see significant steps taken towards the maintenance and redevelopment of biodiversity and other key steps that are vital to planetary survival.

So, despite my discomfort with elements of his argument, I got to the end feeling less pessimistic than I usually do about our species’ chances of survival.

[Row Dela Rosa Yoon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Published in 2010, the year when the author won the distinguished Australian of the Year award, Tim Flannery’s book offers a ray of hope in salvaging the last remaining species of the planet and in regaining the lost functioning of the Earth’s life-support systems.

The battle to avert an impending apocalype is to resuscitate Gaia– derived from John Lovelock’s theory that all organisms and their inorganic surroundings on Earth are closely integrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system, maintaining the conditions for life on the planet. This self-support system, however, has been imperiled by men’s greed. Flannery argues that men have waged war against nature. Men have turned into Gaia-killers. Among the notable examples is detailed in Rachel Garlson’s book, Silent Spring. The book provides details how capitalists murdered birds and other species when DDT was used as pesticide in the US in the 1950′s. There are other human follies that destroyed the life support systems of the earth such as massive carbon emissions and wanton logging. Although many NGOs have convened and proposed solutions, the inactivity of many advanced nations are delaying the action that help avert an impending apocalypse.

Flannery outlines the theories of Charles Darwin and Alfred Russell Wallace focussing on the origin of species, the concept of natural selection and the survival of the fittest. Species evolve through time and they differentiate through time and according to their environment; and those who adapt well survive and those who do not perish.

The survival of the fittest in the animal kingdom has prevailed throughout history. The war is not only man against man but man against nature. Darwinian theory is devoid of morality and spirituality.

Time has changed though. There is a universal awakening that believes only love and compassion can save what is remaining on earth. Flannery is offering the wisdom of ancient past. Only love can heal humanity and can perhaps bring back the life-support systems of Gaia.

[Gerardo Avalos · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not a technical book, so don't expect too much detail or depth of information. The author makes important points in describing the human impact on the functionality of the planet. He mentions two central hypotheses: the Medea hypothesis (a successful species will destroy resources as its population increases, which leads to the extinction of this species), and the Gaia hypothesis (our planet has generated a feedback system that maintains conditions suitable for the development and maintenance of life). Between these two opposites (destruction vs. maintenance of planetary homeostasis) the author describes human impacts in terms of resource abuse, population growth, pesticides, loss of diversity, etc. since the early evolution of our species to modern times. It is a good book to review environmental issues. Since it was published in 2010, many topics are outdated but it is interesting to see in what areas we have progressed and what others have worsened since 2010. The final message is optimistic, because we have the technology and the information to make good decisions. With COVID-19 the message of the book takes a new perspective since we have long been delaying decisions. The time is now, it was in 2010, but now it is even more urgent. COVID-19 is a wake-up call for humankind. We should learn from it.

[David Friedman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A scientist-activist’s heartfelt plea, inspired and sometimes poetical, always thoroughly scientifically detailed, to make the effort to cease the practices that will render our planet unfit to support our human lives within a few decades.

Flannery describes the Earth as a homeostatic system whose organs atmosphere, oceans, crust, and life, operate together to maintain the conditions that support all life. He describes the geological history of the Earth and the impact of the human species on the system that had evolved by the time our species arose, and the damage we have done since we developed agriculture. We can and will render Earth unable to support us and we can and will drive ourselves to extinction. The Earth system may be able to correct itself in a few thousands or tens of thousands of years after that. We could and might ruin Earth for all life. He explains how and why technically, psychologically, and politically we are failing to correct that damage, and what we can and must do about it now if we want the planet and ourselves to live.

[Walt · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book started out promising- an investigation of what sustainability is, from an Earth-based, evolutionary perspective, is something very important to our times. Flannery's detailed look at the relationships between the human species and the Earth as a whole up to this point show just how interdependent we have become. And yet, moving into the final chapters of the book, about our way forward, Flannery appeals to individual greed and an optimistic view of the functioning of corporations and governments in a globalized economic system as the basis for a solution. Humans are presented as "managers" of the Gaian system, rather than the co-participants we must become. I fail to see the "argument for hope" this book is supposed to provide.

[Rich · Rating 4 out of 5]

loved the first three sections on evolution and the history of humanity. just a really concise, readable synthesis of some of the amazing shit that science has discovered since darwin. so many incredible facts. wasn't as big a fan of the later sections on how we've skullfucked the environment and failed to deal with that, partly because i've read about this recently in 'World Without Us' and 'Merchants of Doubt'. but still quite an amazing book - flannery places humanity's current unsustainability in its evolutionary context, and creates in the process an almost unified theory of us, as well as opening the door to an optimistic future. and he does it in a mere 300 pages!

[Brian Griffith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Flannery writes in a plain, entertaining way. His overview of evolution is broader, more balanced, and more fascinating than any selfish gene determinism. With a relaxed and conversational tone he explores the planetary ecosystem, the spread of superorganisms, our chemical wars on unwanted species, economics in the ecological age, and the potential for a smart planet. He has gone beyond pure science to building partnerships for a healthy biosphere, which are themselves experiments of a higher order. The book makes you want to see how far such experiments can go.

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

'An Argument for Hope' is the books subtitle, and I picked it up because I need a little hope at the moment, in our time of endless societal and environmental catastrophe.

Flannery is a beautiful and generous writer, and he certainly inspires awe for the complexity of our delicate creation. However his argument, that humans have already so profoundly altered the natural environment (for the worse) we can do it again (for the better), left me wanting. With dismay do I realise that this is his 'hope', not evidence that an optimistic outlook is justified, but a desperate plea for humanity to recognise its terrible power, and use it for good. Written in 2010, I suppose we are still hoping..

[EmG ReadsDaily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informative and hopeful

[Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great read. It really makes evolution easy to understand while using the science to discuss how Earth gave rise to life and how the decisions we make today will affect the life of the planet in the future.

[Megan S · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars for me, rounded up. By no means a perfect book but very well written and profound in the thoughts it inspired in me.
Flannery is first of all, a great writer. His prose was engaging and thought provoking. He seemed to open worlds of imagination within me. I haven’t been this hooked on a book, on the ideas described, in quite a while. The jaunt through scientific history including Darwin and Wallace among others was one of my favourite parts. These giants of people were caught in the cultural webs around them just like we are but were able to see beyond them with their grand, all-encompassing ideas.
This book has a lot to like and it touches on everything on Earth from politics to economics to history, but the heartbeat of this book is the theory from Lovelock of Gaia. A living system functioning for the increase of life within itself called planet earth. Really the Earth and the life on it are so wound and tangled together that our planet is much more than the sum of its parts. And as are we, as humans, much more than the sum of individuals. Being a group of cultures and mnemes changes our internal dynamics and external impacts. Being able to see, especially through Flannery’s comparison with ants, how humans are a super organism all working (or sometimes not working) together was a unique train of thought for me and I started seeing the whole of human history from the agricultural revolution onwards quite differently.
I really enjoyed this, I think the only thing I would have liked more of is a more timely update as it is more than a decade old now. Doesn’t seem like much but with topics of climate change and politics, things have changed a lot.
I would recommend this book.

[William Blair · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you don't think climate change (global warming) is mostly caused by human actions over the past decades and centuries, this book won't convince you. But if you're looking for a non-in-your-face book of facts to arm yourself with information to help convince a skeptic, this would be a good book to have under your belt. It does not set out to refute the nay-sayers, but simply presents the evidence and facts. But it's not for non-believers. The non-believers will simply respond to this book with "but where's your evidence?" and "that's not what that means"-type objections. This book is simply a broad encompassing statement of facts, albeit with extensive notes and references. It's not arm-twisting propaganda, which is what most nay-sayers seem to want to read (but then reject because "there's no facts" [that they recognize and accept] "in it" and "it didn't deal with this thing I read on the internet that PROVES that climate change simply has to be a liberal, left wing, or communist conspiracy"). Also, if you're not scientifically oriented, or don't accept plate tectonics or Darwinian evolution, or have no understanding of high school chemistry and biology and maybe a little biochemistry, you won't like this book, because you won't understand it (because you can't read it). I think the author tried to make this book for a general audience, but IMHO the ability to understand and interpret the facts of the situation requires education and erudition, which seems to be in short supply (at least among the more vocal nay-sayers that come to my attention).

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

I felt so insignificant reading this knowing we are just a mere blip in time on this earth having just been the most recent ape species (Homo sapiens)to have migrated out of Africa over the last 50,000 years.

Yet in this very short period, it's a bit depressing knowing that "we've eaten our way through one resource after the other as we've spread around the planet....to the point of our own destruction". Every part of this planet we have colonized over the last 50,000 years included the disappearance of species, particularly megafauna like mammoths, sabre-tooth tigers, giant marsupials and more.


I'm not surprised that the author (or publisher) changed the subtitle of this book to "An Argument for Hope" and "A Sustainable Future" (instead of the bland "A Natural History Of The Planet". The new book cover is also much better than the abstract old looking one.

Without "hope", we may as well continue chopping down rainforests, overfish the tuna populations, and be forced to make sci-fi fantasies of needing to populate other planets a reality since we've made ours inhabitable.

Are we able to use our intelligence to save ourselves, or will we blindly act like viruses killing our host (the planet) at the expense of our future and others?


Side Note: If you liked this book, also read "The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves" by Matt Ridley

[Ryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book containing wide ranging topics, from evolution and the biology of super-organisms like ants, to environmental pollution, climate change, and the spread of civilization since the dawn of agriculture. Unfortunately, the attempt to derive any sort of useful insight from the synthesis of these diverse subjects was a failure, as the reader is left none the wiser at the end, with regards to the future of humanity, whether we will survive the self made calamities of this century like climate change. Will we adopt the approach of living symbiotically with the rest of the planet ala Gaia, or will our success sow the seeds of our own destruction ala Medea? The evidence so far as proffered by Flannery seems to point overwhelmingly to the latter prospect, from the tragedy of the commons to our failure at global governance as shown during the dismal climate conferences.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed this book and found it highly readable but more as a collection of interesting essays than a cohesive book with strong arguments and conclusions.

[David Bradshaw · Rating 5 out of 5]

medean or gaian social structure (Medea who killed her family) or ecologically aware society that works with nature
the last sentences are powerful to me with protests (peaceful & violent) & with agitators and opportunists burning & looting in my city and my neighborhood.
"if we do not strive to love one another and to love our planet as much as we love ourselves, then no further human progress is possible here on Earth."

wonderful beginnings to further research - Alfred Russel Wallace's vision of perfecting human spirit - Darwin lost his faith before his writing and popularizers & many followers saw only survival of the fittest - a world red in claw and fang - Wallace's cooperation & symbiosis have not driven mankind over the last 150 years -
Australia & New Guinea foundations of agriculture, indigenous ecological practices

[Oliver Hodson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really beautiful book, summarising a life's scientific influences, discoveries, and challenges. It is a great gift to have cogent summaries of evidence and an argument for hope for the future. It is a fairly contingent hope, not making it less authentic, but more so- relying on huge technological advances and a triumph of the the benevolent will, Flannery thinks it is possible to ride out the maximum population level of 9 billion for a few decades, and convert to a sustainable 'gaian' interaction with the planet over the next century. It's quite a few ifs and it's not a simple solution, but it is a path for humanity that seems possible while not being a panacea, that while sitting more comfortably would probably be bollocks.

[E.L. Powers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Flannery is guided by two strands of evolutionary theory—reductionist science as epitomized by Charles Darwin and the more holistic analyses of Alfred Russel Wallace. According to Flannery, these opposing theories reflect the different ways humans approach the custodianship of planet Earth.

In order to explore the matter, Flannery takes the longest, widest view—something that provides comfort in an investigation of approaching climactic catastrophe. It is also fascinating stuff. Beginning with the birth of stars to the creation of water and the accident of simple life forms, Flannery documents life on Earth through to the present moment: the rise of the human ‘superorganism’ poised on the edge of destruction.

[David Rudin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I ran hot and cold on this long story of earth’s birth, growth and the advent life and eventually of humans and our checkered history on the planet. Some of it was damn engaging and I rushed back to grab the book to continue. Other parts, were agonizingly slow and tedious.

In the end, the argument for hope turned out to be too reliant on technology, too waffling on international institutions like the UN and too simplistic. This book did not leave me with hope, but it did stir up some thoughts, and thus was worth the effort to read it.

[Steve · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wish this book were a natural history of the planet. Instead it is a rambling, extended sermon full of "Oh Gosh ecology," naive elitism, and the sort of fuzzy thinking that gives liberalism a bad name. And it's too bad, because the book does have much interesting information and many intriguing concepts for solving many of the large-scale challenges facing humanity. Unfortunately the author is so undisciplined that the book is a wandering mish-mash.

[Gursewak Singh · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is an insightful discussion on the interconnected history of the natural world and the history of humanity. A thought-provoking journey through time which treads through evolutionary science and our political an industrial transformations—asking the question of how can we better live in harmony with Mother Earth.

[Darrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

read it... now.

[Annemarie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not an environmental scientist by any stretch, but Here on Earth left a deep impression on me. Tim Flannery’s writing is both thorough and accessible, taking complex scientific and ecological ideas and making them not only understandable but compelling. The book offers a sweeping, deeply researched overview of life on Earth—from its earliest beginnings to the current era of human dominance—while examining how our species has shaped (and often scarred) the planet.

Flannery presents two contrasting narratives: one of competition and destruction and one of cooperation and sustainability. He weaves together biology, geology, history and climate science (and throws in a bit of psychology and economics) to illustrate just how profoundly humanity has altered Earth's systems. What’s striking is that despite the sobering content—clear-eyed accounts of environmental degradation, species extinction, and climate change—the book isn’t entirely bleak. It also asks whether we can imagine and build a more sustainable future.

It’s engaging and thought-provoking and it made me want to learn more about the Earth, evolution, and the role we all play in the planet’s future. Whether you're an environmental novice like me or someone more scientifically inclined, Here on Earth is a powerful, necessary read.

Thanks to Libraries ACT who lent me an audio version of this book.

[Reader · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extraordinary broad sweep of science and history and the thinking and movements that have led to the certain ways with thought about and treated the natural world and how ultimately we’ve come to this place and this time when the natural world is in decline against the tide of humans and our domesticated animals and Our resource use at times chilling and sad showing the path of destruction humans have taken against the natural world it is never blamey or didactic and represents as concise a telling of ecological history as you will find. The hope Flannery generates is not overwhelming as you might expect From a very careful and ThoughtFull scientific mind but it seems that through elucidating the thinking behind some of our most destructive activities like repurposing chemical weapons into herbicide and pesticides that led to the ‘reign of death’ he shows how science and a more careful approach to policy and government projects could see cooperation with each other and with nature Triumph over short term thinking. The human super organism frames this hopeful projection of how we can clean up our act. Now in 2025 though much has worsened and an update or revised edition would be very worthwhile.