The Future of Life: ALA Notable Books for Adults

Famed biologist and godfather of sociobiology (and its current prodigy, evolutionary psychology), esteemed Harvard professor and one of the great scientists of our time, Edward O. Wilson outlines in this engaging but somewhat reserved book what is happening to the planet's biodiversity and what can be done about it.The Prologue is a "letter" to Henry David Thoreau as Wilson seeks to establish a conservationist continuity between the author of Walden and ourselves. The open letter is somewhat self-conscious and artificial, but certainly appropriate for a work that celebrates nature and hopes to be a modest instrument in helping to preserve the natural world.The first chapter is a survey of the life forms that live in "the biospheric membrane that covers Earth" (p. 21) with an emphasis on extreme climes including Antarctica's Lake Vostok (under two miles of ice) and the Mariana Trench (deepest part of the ocean at 35,750 feet below sea level). Chapter Two makes the assertion that the planet is currently going through a dangerous "bottleneck" characterized by disappearing habitats and extinction of species the likes of which have not been seen since the dinosaurs disappeared 65 million years ago. The culprit is of course us, represented by our short-sighted exploitation of non-renewable resources. Here Wilson begins his theme, to find a "universal environmental ethic" that will lead us "through the bottleneck into which our species has foolishly blundered." (p. 41)In the next chapter, "Nature's Last Stand," Wilson delineates just how bad things really are as he surveys the rampant deforestation and other ecological obscenities currently taking place in the world. (Incidentally, those of you interested in a readable and painstakingly detailed account of what we are doing to mother earth, full of facts and figures, see Stuart L. Pimm's The World According to Pimm: A Scientist Audits the Earth, 2001.) Wilson continues with an estimate of how much the biomass is worth in dollars and cents ($33-trillion per year, which I think is similar to Pimm's figure). He makes the important point (which cannot in my opinion be repeated often enough) that the "cost" of doing business ought to include the damage or loss of "the free services of the natural economy" currently not figured into bottom line accounting. Thus the cost of extracting coal from the ground ought to include the value of the land torn up; the cost of wood from a tree ought to include the cost of watershed lost, etc. If the real costs of using the land, the rivers and the oceans, and the air were factored in--which some day they will be, whether we like it or not--some commodities would be seen as too expensive to harvest willy-nilly, and we might very well choose more environmentally agreeable alternatives.In the final chapter Wilson gives "The Solution" which relies heavily upon the work of non-governmental environmental organizations that are attempting to use economic power to save the rain forests and other endangered "hotspots" throughout the world. Their technique includes outbidding the loggers for the rights to the forests, raising the standard of living of those who live in these endangered areas, and getting governments to see the value of their unspoiled lands.Obviously Wilson is preaching to the choir here since myself and most others who will read this book will already be true believers in saving biodiversity. Perhaps the value of the book is in further educating us in the ways this might be done. Wilson is hopeful that we will wake up before it is too late. Indeed every minute counts because once the environment is gone it is gone forever to be replaced by God knows what. Wilson emphasizes not only the unknown value of all the plants, animals and microbes that are going extinct but the moral correctness of saving them. It is here that one notices a change in tone from the Edward O. Wilson of years ago. He is now so intent on saving what biodiversity is left that he is seeking to engage religion in the task!This is Wilson somewhat mellowed at age seventy, seeking conciliation with former disputants for the greater good of planetary life. This is the entomologist as statesman.The reason Wilson surprisingly points to the morality of saving wildlife as the key inducement is that we are robbing the world of our children and our grandchildren for our leisure and luxury today. It is a significant moral issue because we are putting what will be a terrible cost onto them, and they haven't a say in it at all!I want to add that the danger inherent in the rampant devastation of the biosphere, whether through the direct destruction of ecologies or through pollution, is beyond our ability to foresee. The spectre of a runaway greenhouse effect is just that, a phenomenon that may be upon us before we realize it, leaving us with no ability to stop it. Think of Venus and a surface temperature that melts lead. There is nothing in our present understanding of the biosphere that I know of that rules out that possibility. We are not only stupidly playing with fire, we are playing Russian roulette with ourselves and we are holding the gun to the head of our children. Wilson's book is an attempt to guide us away from such utter folly. I just hope that those people in the Bush administration and at the Wall Street Journal and the Economist and elsewhere who think that our resources will take care of themselves read this wise and penetrating critique and assume personal moral responsibility for their actions and utterances.

Wilson's greatest concern is for biodiversity, preventing the extinction of species. A prerequisite for preserving diversity of species is preserving habitats. He advocates both. A whole range of strategies for preserving endangered species, including laws, captive breeding programs, and even cryogenic preservation of the genetic material of creatures that are doomed to extinction.Ecosystems are different game. The best way to preserve them is via laws and by outright purchase. He is a big fan of the Nature Conservancy, which takes the very direct approach of buying up the pristine wildernesses of the world. He admits, that doesn't go into much detail about what to do about it, that setting up a nature reserve side by side with villages full of hungry people in underdeveloped countries is not really going to work. The people will invade your preserve and take bush meat despite your best efforts to stop them. Nevertheless, he is on the side of the angels, and the organizations to which he gives copious credit in the book are indeed deserving.He tiptoes around the biggest issue, that of consumption in the rich countries. Everything we do to support our lifestyles damages the environment. While he is pretty good about talking about the environmental impact of our preference for meat over grains, he does not go into the cost of our proclivity for building large homes located a long way from anywhere. It results in cutting forests for timber, destroying farmland for home sites and roads, and asphalting things over to the point where the ground cannot breathe. Likewise, our gargantuan appetite for stuff demands huge mines to get raw materials and huge consumption of carbon and fouling of the waters to manufacture and distribute everything. Live simply, that the planet may simply live!The solution that Wilson does embrace is fewer children. In the decade since he wrote the book the Western world has tilted way below replacement level fertility, 2.1 children per woman. He doesn't even talk about which people have children. It is not the people who are likely to read his book. University educated women, whom one hopes are the smartest and society, are the least likely to have large families. We are falling to zero population growth the wrong way, with the people who are smart enough to understand why it is important being the ones who are deciding not to have kids. At a minimum, the issue is more complex than he lets on.Here's what I like best about the book. Biodiversity is a bit of a hard sell. As Wilson himself notes, whether or not the ivory billed woodpecker is extinct makes no difference whatsoever in the life of anybody living. The preservation of species is largely a moral issue. He would like to say that we have received an endowment from mother nature herself, and certainly from our forebears, and we have an obligation to pass it on as close to intact as we can. Why? So our grandchildren can enjoy walking through a Costa Rican rain forest and marveling at the diversity of colorful frogs and gorgeous orchids just as we can. So they can wake up some spring morning and hear the frogs croaking in a pond near their house.Beyond that, Wilson does as good a job as I have seen in providing a financial justification for preserving biodiversity. Biodiversity implies that there are a number of species in a habitat, which means that if one of them gets in trouble there are others to fill in the gaps. My example would be the way that several species of oaks have filled in the niche formerly filled by chestnuts in eastern US forests. The chestnuts are gone, a tragedy, but we still have climax forest up and down the East Coast. In fact, we have more and more of it as the forest reclaims marginal farmland that has been abandoned. He also explains at length the value of biodiversity, or at least the availability of a vast number of species, for medical research and as a source for genetic engineering. Credit, too, for a realistic, balanced approach to GMOs.Wilson starts out with a wonderfully lyrical open letter to Henry Thoreau, but the style gets rather pedestrian once he gets into the meat of his argument. The book should get five stars because he is so clearly on the side of the angels. However, I think this is less than his best work. It is a bit tedious. So for the writing, not the ideas, I give it only four. It is not up to the almost impossibly high standard he set for himself with "Consilience."

Having learned a lot from other books by the author, I expected much from this one with its promising title. All the greater was my disappointment. This is a good mainstream discussion of the importance of biodiversity. But it suffers from three major faults. The first is a misleading title. The book does not deal with the future of "life" because the future of humanity is not discussed. This is a great pity. Humanity is moving through a phase-jump, acquiring the unprecedented ability to terminate its existence, to change its core attributes, and perhaps to clone itself and also to create life. These "gifts" of science and technology are fateful, also for human action on endangered species. Therefore the problem with the book is not only a misleading title, but missing a variable critical for its actual concern. This leads the second error, namely quite some tunnel vision. Not only is the future of humanity ignored, but the future of the climate is not discussed despite its profound significance for the biosphere, directly and indirectly. If temperatures and sea levels rise they impact on many species and their habitats, including "hot spots" of species diversity. And climate changes will constitute heavy stressor on humanity which will unavoidable receive priority over other biosphere concerns. The third fundamental mistake is the mood of optimism, especially pronounced in the last chapter. All the describe species preserving activities, however important, are inadequate, determined government action being essential as clearly recognized by the author. But such action depends on politics. Here the author becomes utopian, assuming that democratic public pressures and activities of NGOs based on a widely accepted pro-nature ethos will cause political leaders to give species preservation high priority.Public pressures do demand action to reduce visible pollutions and other glaring environmental damages. But, given a global culture of consumerism and the propensity of human being to be mainly concerned with the short range, mentioned by the author as probably hardwired by evolution, no determined large-scale species-preserving action can be realistically expected to result in the foreseeable future from public pressures.The example given by the author of the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea as a candidate for being made into a "wildlife sanctuary of a future unified Korea" (p. 185) demonstrates that he misapprehends geostrategic realities. And the trust he puts in neurosciences to help humanity to "anticipate and step away from political and economic disasters" (p. 156) casts further serious doubts on his outlooks.All this serves to reinforce my view that being an outstanding biologist and naturalist and the ideas of sociobiology and consilience are not enough of a basis for dealing with the realities of humanity. More is needed for designing effective humanity-craft policies - however urgently needed, including for species diversity preservation as ably discussed in this book.Professor Yehezkel DrorThe Hebrew University of Jerusalem

After reading this, I had a MUCH better understanding of why all the global warming and environmental scientist talk is so significant to pay attention to. This would be a great educational piece for so many. Parts were pretty dense, but I had to read this for a book club and was very glad I did!

An essential book for anyone who cares about life on earth.Having previously read Wilson's 'Diversity of Life', I wanted to read this more up to date book. What really strikes me about this writer is his continued optimism that somehow mankind will adopt a different approach to bio diversity and pull back from the brink before wiping out most of the life forms that we share the planet with. I sincerely hope that his optimism is well placed.

Perfect condition. No odour. Very pleased.

Interesting