Wasted World

by Hengeveld, Rob

• ISBN13: 9780226326993
• ISBN10: 0226326993
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-04-01
• Publisher: Univ of Chicago Pr

Summary

All systems produce waste as part of a cycle-bacteria, humans, combustion engines, even one as large and complex as a city. To some extent, this waste can be absorbed, processed, or recycled-though never completely. In Wasted World, Rob Hengeveld reveals how a long history of human consumption has left our world drowning in this waste. This is a compelling and urgent work that traces the related histories of population growth and resource consumption. As Hengeveld explains, human life (and population growth) depends not only on mineral resources but also on energy. People first obtained energy from food and later supplemented this with energy from water, wind, and animals as one source after another fell short of our ever-growing needs. Finally, we turned to fossil energy, which generates atmospheric waste that is the key driver of global climate change. The effects of this climate change are already leading to food shortages and social collapse in some parts of the world. Because all of these problems are interconnected, Hengeveld argues strenuously that measures to counter individual problems cannot work. Instead, we need to tackle their common cause-our staggering population growth. While many scientists agree that population growth is one of the most critical issues pressuring the environment, Hengeveld is unique in his insistence on turning our attention to the waste such growth leaves in its wake and to the increasing demands of our global society. A practical look at the sustainability of our planet from the perspective of a biologist whose expertise is in the abundances and distributions of species, Wasted Worldpresents a fascinating picture of the whole process of using, wasting, and exhausting energy and material resources. And by elucidating the complexity of the causes of our current global state, Hengeveld offers us a way forward.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. ix
Natural Processes	p. 1
The Nature of Life: Making Waste	p. 3
Nature Goes in Cycles	p. 15
Ongoing Processes in the Human Population	p. 23
Population Growth and its Limitations	p. 25
The Growing Problem of Mankind	p. 27
Population Growth and Agricultural Production	p. 28
Population Growth and Industrial Production	p. 47
Agribusiness and Corporate States	p. 57
Exhausting and Wasting Our Resources	p. 71
Peak Oil and Beyond	p. 72
Limited Resources	p. 86
Man-Made Waste	p. 94
When It's Gone, It's Gone	p. 106
Exhausting and Wasting Our Environment	p. 121
Our Freshwater is Running Out!	p. 122
Polluting the Air and Warming Our Climate	p. 136
Deforestation and Its Consequences	p. 153
The Loss of Biodiversity	p. 163
Wasted Land	p. 173
Toward a Collapse of Our Society?	p. 185
Processes within the Human Population	p. 187
What is Overpopulation?	p. 188
Bursting Out of Eden	p. 202
Urbanization	p. 214
Migration	p. 220
The Spread of Diseases	p. 229
The Dynamic Structure of Society	p. 241
Processes within the Global Society	p. 253
From a Concrete to an Abstract World	p. 254
The Energy and Information Content of Society	p. 264
Can Our World Population Collapse?	p. 278
The Persistence of Mankind	p. 293
Another Future for Our Human World?	p. 295
The Road We Took, and the Way Forward	p. 296
Epilogue. The Emperor's New Clothes	p. 307
About the Author	p. 313
Acknowledgments	p. 315
Selected Bibliography	p. 317
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