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Apocalyptic Planet: A Field Guide to the Future of the Earth, by Craig Childs
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2013 Orion Book Award Winner
2013 Sigurd F. Olson Nature Writing Award Winner
Ours is not a stable planet. It is prone to sudden, violent natural disasters and extremes of climate. In this exhilarating exploration of our globe, Craig Childs goes to where the apocalypse can be seen now. From the driest deserts of Chile, through the genetic wasteland of central Iowa, to the site of the drowned land bridge of the Bering Sea, he uncovers cataclysms that tell us what could be next: forthcoming ice ages, super volcanoes, and the conclusion of planetary life cycles. Childs delivers a sensual feast in his descriptions of the natural world, and undeniable science that reveals both the earth’s strengths and frailties. Bearing witness to the planet’s sweeping and perilous changes, he shows how we can alter the future, and how the world will live on, though humans may not survive to see it.
- Sales Rank: #160255 in Books
- Published on: 2013-07-02
- Released on: 2013-07-02
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.00" h x .80" w x 5.30" l, .63 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 368 pages
Amazon.com Review
Guest Review for Apocalyptic Planet from Neil Shubin
Neil Shubin is author of Your Inner Fish and the upcoming The Universe Within. He is provost of The Field Museum as well as professor of anatomy at the University of Chicago, where he also serves as an associate dean. Educated at Columbia, Harvard, and the University of California at Berkeley, he lives in Chicago.
Part field guide, part love letter, and part biography of Earth, Apocalyptic Planet looks at our ever-changing world to find refreshing and eye-popping insights in the most unlikely places. In glacial ice, rocky mountains, and dusty outcroppings on the desert floor, Craig Childs uses cutting-edge science to reveal the dazzling changes our planet has experienced. Seas have come and gone; mountains have risen only to fall; while whole continents have moved, split, and crashed into one another. The 4.67-billion-year-history of Earth has seen whole worlds collapse, with others born in their remains. Planetary apocalypse is the way of the world; our very presence on the planet has been shaped by cataclysm.
Craig Childs walking on the desert or climbing a mountain is like a gourmand at a sumptuous feast: the sensual delight with which he relishes the world around him gives the rest of us a vicarious thrill, even hunger. You just want to turn over that rock he sees, move dust to expose an ancient artifact, or scale the cave wall in front of him. Childs delights in the details of the rock, sand, and ice, and in them he finds stories as large as the planet itself. In his hands, the main casualty of apocalypse is our familiar view of Earth: it is impossible to read Craig Childs and see the world in the same way again.
A Look Inside Apocalyptic Planet
From Booklist
Childs traveled the world to destinations both exceptional and mundane seeking clues to what life will be like in the future on our increasingly unstable planet. Ruminating on our distant past and present changes, he blends climate science, natural history, literary references, and personal reflections to create an immensely evocative sense of time and place. From Greenland’s glaciers to a blistering hot Iowa cornfield (a place Childs characterizes as suffering from “genetic exhaustion”), he immerses himself in parts of our world that scientists endlessly study but we willfully ignore. He consults great minds, cajoles friends into sharing his adventures (with often hilarious results), and brings his mother along in an attempt to gather clues and form conclusions about the end of the world as we know it. Surprisingly, this is not a work of darkest sorrow but rather an engaging exploration of the land beneath us and the sixth mass extinction that scientists agree is underway. Always curious, Childs went out in the world to learn “in the presence of apocalypse,” taking readers along for the intriguing ride. --Colleen Mondor
Review
Praise for Craig Childs' Apocalyptic Planet
“A fascinating travelog of an excitable, seething and perilous planet where catastrophes are frequent. . . . In chapters packed with vivid descriptions and lyrical language, Childs tells tales not merely of droughts and ice ages, but of globe-swallowing deserts and planet-freezing cold spells. . . . [A] thoroughly enjoyable book.”
—Science News
“Fantastic. . . . Childs’ new book is like no other you’ll ever read about the ‘end of the world.’. . . [Apocalyptic Planet] pulls off the near impossible, placating our concerns about the end of life as we know it—which won’t be nearly as dramatic as we think, turns out—while also rousing us from complacent slumber.”
—The Salt Lake Tribune
“Apocalyptic Planet is a planet-smashing success in its ability to annihilate your cozy notions of stability.”
—Bookotron
“[Childs] is the best science writer I’ve come across in years, capable of not just capturing an image but doing it in a way that stays with you long afterward. . . . Engrossing. . . . Childs is the central character in his story, and his observations provide entertaining context for the calamities he contemplates across the globe.”
—Juliet Eilperin, The Washington Post
“Apocalyptic Planet is transformative but never boring. Craig Childs takes us places we’d never go in our right minds. But afterward, we will never again regard our spaceship Earth in the same parochial light . . . he paints compelling pictures of what has happened in the past to destroy civilizations and life on land and sea. Then he forecasts what might occur in the future. Besides recounting his expeditions including a perilous, heart-pounding run down a swollen Tibetan river, Childs leavens his captivating chronicle with impish humor, scientific opinions, eco-studies, statistics and facts.”
—Austin American Statesman
“A rip-roaring, gorgeously written look at the deep nature of the death of the planet by ice, fire, heat, species extinction—and these are just some of the ends that have already come to pass. Part travelogue, part thought-experiment, [and] a good dose of craziness with regards to going into very dangerous places without preparation.”
—Bookotron
“Apocalyptic Planet [is] quite a trip.”
—Robert Krulwich, NPR
“Apocalyptic Planet deals with a kind of brutal truth that is almost never talked about, in politics, culture or even much in science—that the Earth’s history is a story of huge, violent natural disasters and extremes in climactic conditions, and that there’s no reason to believe that the future will be any different.”
—Santa Cruz Sentinel
“Compulsively readable.”
—Flagstaff Live
“Childs’s work has a way of elevating and astounding his listeners. . . . His writing is at once sensual and scientific.”
—Telluride Inside podcast
“Scientific, yet personal and passionate, Apocalyptic Planet will excite readers. . . . An illuminating look at several possible scenarios for the end of the world as we know it.”
—Shelf Awareness
“Apocalyptic Planet looks at our ever-changing world to find refreshing and eye-popping insights in the most unlikely places. . . . Craig Childs walking on the desert or climbing a mountain is like a gourmand at a sumptuous feast: the sensual delight with which he relishes the world around him gives the rest of us a vicarious thrill, even hunger. You just want to turn over that rock he sees, move dust to expose an ancient artifact, or scale the cave wall in front of him. Childs delights in the details of the rock, sand, and ice, and in them he finds stories as large as the planet itself. In his hands, the main casualty of apocalypse is our familiar view of Earth: it is impossible to read Craig Childs and see the world in the same way again.”
—Neil Shubin, author of Your Inner Fish
“Childs blends climate science, natural history, literary references, and personal reflections to create an immensely evocative sense of time and place . . . an engaging exploration of the land beneath us . . . intriguing.”
—Booklist
“A mesmerizing and provocative look at our ever-changing, ‘everending’ planet. . . . Childs’s lively writing reveals awesome, otherworldy landscapes.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Craig Childs takes an Edward Abbey-esque journey across our rapidly changing globe. Apocalyptic Planet is lyrical, informative, and full of surprises.”
—Elizabeth Kolbert, author of Field Notes from a Catastrophe
“An elegant and absorbing account of just how violently the earth can change—this is a very good book to read as we start to watch global warming provide a new shock on this scale.”
—Bill McKibben, author Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet
Most helpful customer reviews
53 of 56 people found the following review helpful.
Adventure at the End of the World
By R.W.W. Greene
I've long been fan of big real(or at least realistic)-life adventure stories. As a kid I read Thor Heyerdahl's "Kon Tiki" at least seven times and devoured books by Farley Mowat, Jack London and Mark Twain. I read about sea voyages and shipwrecks, desert crossings and awkward portages, glacier ascents and trips into the bowels of the earth. It was the next best thing to being there, and as close as I could get from my home in rural Maine.
Somewhere along the way, partly awakened by the Reagan administration, I became aware of how transitory these places and adventures were, how using the wild often means using it up, and that mankind has the power to kick the crap out of the planet without the self-control not to. I transitioned from adventure and exploration tales to studying the apocalypse through "Alas, Babylon," "On the Beach," "No Truce with Kings," "Shadow on the Hearth" ...
Craig Childs' new book, "Apocalyptic Planet," provides grist for both of my mental mills, reminding me that, yes, we're destroying our ecosystem in multiple ways, while showing me that the author had a hellishly awesome time finding out about them. The book is terrifying in some respects (who knew that corn was coming to get us, too?) and reassuring in others (our world may be ending, but there are others that won't -- and still more that won't get going until we're dead and fossilized.)
The book is at its best when it has characters, when Childs can show the danger of his situations through the people around him: his mom, his step dad, the photographer who walked into a volcano and into the driest place on earth with him, the poor son of a bitch Childs conned into wandering with him into corn purgatory. The slowest bit is likely the first slog through the desert, as I suppose a slog through the desert would be, but the book picks up quickly after that and never slows again.
Childs' narrative is informative and clear, detailed, color-filled and poetic. But "Apocalyptic Planet" is a book that begs for pictures and maps, and I hope publishers find a way to bring them to us soon (An enhanced-digital version? A glossy coffee-table edition? I'd happily buy either.)
It's interesting -- considering that our culture of couches, obesity, CNN bullet points and easy listening is slowly destroying both our environment and minds -- that a single book can remind us that the world is very much alive and that many adventures remain.
26 of 27 people found the following review helpful.
Amazing
By Tom Madsen
Mr. Child's books just get better and better. His research is a beautiful combination of academia and total physical immersion. Not being a specialist, like so many of the real life characters in the book, he is able to connect the dots of many different disciplines and lay it out in layman's terms. I found the book to be highly entertaining and highly educational.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful.
Gazing Into The Crystal Ball
By Richard Reese (author of Understanding Sustainability)
Craig Childs is a nature writer and globetrotting adventure hog. He’s been thinking a lot about apocalypse lately. It’s hard not to. The jungle drums are pounding out a growing stream of warnings — attention! — big trouble ahead.
The Christian currents in our culture encourage us to perceive time as being something like a drag strip. At one end is the starting line (creation), and at the other end is the finish line (judgment day). We’re speeding closer and closer to the end, which some perceive to be the final Game Over for everything everywhere. Childs disagrees. “We are not on a one-way trip to a brown and sandblasted planet.”
He was lucky to survive into adulthood still possessing an unfettered imagination, and he can zoom right over packs of snarling dogmas that disembowel most folks who attempt to think outside the box. In his book Apocalyptic Planet, he gives readers a helpful primer on eco-catastrophe. The bottom line is that Earth is constantly changing, and it’s not uncommon for change events to be sudden and catastrophic.
He purports that the big storm on the horizon today is not “The Apocalypse.” It’s just one more turbulent era in a four billion year story. Out of the pile of planetary disasters, he selects nine examples, travels to locations that illustrate each one, and then spins stories. Each tale cuts back and forth between his adventures at the site, and background information from assorted sources. It’s an apocalypse buffet.
Deserts are a quarter of all land, and many are growing now. History tells us that they can expand and contract rapidly, taking out societies in the process. Four out of ten people live in regions prone to drying up. New Mexico once experienced a drought that lasted 1,000 years. Beneath the driest regions of the Sahara, pollen samples indicate that the land was once tropical savannah and woodlands. A few years ago, Atlanta, Georgia (not an arid region) came close to draining its water supply during a long drought.
Glaciers are melting at rate that alarms people who think. Childs visited the Northern Patagonia Ice Field, where hunks the size of buildings were crashing down off the edge of the dying glacier. Enormous volumes of melt water are raising the global sea level. He also visited the Bering Sea, where the old land bridge is now 340 feet (103 m) underwater. Beringia was once a broad treeless steppe, home to an amazing community of megafauna. If climate change eliminates all ice, the seas could rise another 120 feet (36 m) or so, and major rivers will run dry from lack of melt water. About 40 percent of humankind resides near coasts. Nobody knows how fast the seas will rise, or how much.
The planet has been smacked countless times by asteroids. Many believe that the dinosaur era was terminated by the Chicxubal impact on the Yucatan Peninsula. There are many, many objects zooming around in space that could hit us, but Childs recommends that our time would be better spent worrying about catastrophic volcanic eruptions. There are daily eruptions from 200 active volcanoes. Extreme eruptions have loaded the atmosphere with dust, blocking out sunlight, leading to winters that lasted for years. Humankind once had a close call with extinction when Mount Toba erupted 73,000 years ago.
Climate change is likely to affect the movement of the planet’s tectonic plates. As glaciers melt and dam reservoirs evaporate, there will be less weight on the land below, allowing it to rise. Tectonic shifts can lead to earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and altered ocean currents and weather patterns.
All civilizations are temporary outbursts of overbreeding and harmful lifestyles. On a visit to Mayan ruins in Guatemala, Childs discussed their collapse, the result of a combination of factors. “The issue, ultimately, was carrying capacity.” Over the years, I’ve often seen people sharing their opinions of the Earth’s carrying capacity for humans. Estimates usually range between 100 million and 15 billion, as if there is one correct answer.
Actually, the long-term carrying capacity is constantly changing, and these days it’s getting smaller and smaller. Ocean acidification, chronic overfishing, and other harms have sharply reduced the vitality of marine ecosystems. Chronic forest mining, soil mining, and industrialization have sharply reduced the vitality of terrestrial ecosystems.
The fossil energy bubble enabled a huge temporary spike in carrying capacity, but as we move beyond peak, we’ll discover that the long-term carrying capacity is far less than it was 10,000 years ago, when the ecosystem enjoyed excellent health. Climate change is likely to reduce it further still, as large numbers of plant and animal species go extinct.
There have been five mass extinction events in ages past, and we are now in the sixth. Childs takes us on an amusing visit to the site of a catastrophic mass extinction, the state of Iowa, where 90 percent of the ecosystem has been reduced to agriculture. He and a buddy spent two days hiking through fields, dwarfed by tall stalks of corn (maize), during a week of blast furnace heat.
They were looking for signs of life besides corn, and they found almost none. The ecosystem was once home to 300 species of plants, 60 mammals, 300 birds, and over 1,000 insects. “This had historically been tallgrass prairie, one of the largest and most diverse biomasses in North America where a person on horseback could not be seen for the height of the grass.” The sixth mass extinction is unlike the previous five, in that it is the result of human activities, an embarrassing accomplishment.
Yeast devours sugar and converts it into alcohol and carbon dioxide. When yeast are added to a vat of freshly pressed grape juice, they plunge into a sweet paradise, and promptly produce a bubbly population explosion. The alcohol in the vat will keep increasing until it reaches toxic levels, at which point the yeast experience a mass extinction event, the tragic consequence of living in an artificial environment constructed by thirsty alcoholics.
Childs believes that civilization and human domination of the planet waited until recently because we thrive in warm weather. Humans evolved in a tropical climate. Eventually, we migrated into non-tropical climates, and developed the skills and technology necessary for surviving in chilly weather, but the ice ages were a time of struggle, not a sweet paradise. Then, a freak thing happened. The weather got warm, and stayed warm, for 10,000 years. Suddenly, we were like yeast in grape juice. Yippee!
The 800-pound gorilla in this book is climate change, and concern about the decades that lie before us. Childs cites the views of a number of scientists, and they are all over the place. A loose cannon at the EPA says that global warming is a hoax, but the others agree that the climate is warming, and humans are the primary culprits. Some think that we’ve passed the tipping point, and all ice will soon be gone. Others think that if emissions are reduced, disaster might be avoided. One is sure that technology will fix everything — geoengineering will allow us to control the planet’s climate like a thermostat. Another says that humankind will be gone in 100 years.
Climate history tells us that global temperatures commonly swing up and down, sometimes as much as 10° to 12°C. Huge temperature swings lead to extinctions, but life on Earth has persisted. The current jump in temperature is unlike the previous ones in that it is the outcome of human activities. It is the result of a unique combination of factors. Humans are unique in being able to adapt to a wide variety of ecosystems, but ecosystems are far less adaptable to sudden climate shifts. Agriculture is on thin ice, as are seven billion people.
In a hut on the Greenland ice sheet, Childs had a long chat with José Rial, a chaos researcher and climate change scholar. Rial understands that nature is highly unstable, and quite capable of rapid and unpredictable changes. “What we study doesn’t always help us predict very much, but it helps us to understand what is possible.” Childs added, “He knows that the actual future is the one we never expect.”
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