The Age of Catastrophe

by Ebert, John David

• ISBN13: 9780786471423
• ISBN10: 0786471425
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-08-30
• Publisher: McFarland Publishing

Summary

Disasters, both natural and man-made, are on the rise. Indeed, a catastrophe of one sort or another seems always to be unfolding somewhere on this planet. We have entered into a veritable Age of Catastrophes which, in the 20th century, grew both larger and more complex, to the point where disasters are now routinely planetary in scale and scope. The old days of the geographically isolated industrial accidents, of the sinking of a Titanic or the explosion of a Hindenburg, together with their isolated causes and limited effects, is over. Now, disasters on the scale of Hurricane Katrina, the BP oil spill or the Japan tsunami and nuclear reactor accident, threaten to engulf the very order of civilization. This book analyzes the efforts of Westerners to keep the catastrophes outside, while maintaining order on the inside of society. These efforts are presently breaking down, as Nature and Civilization have become so intertwined they can no longer be clearly separated. Catastrophe is everywhere, and natural disasters, moreover, are becoming increasingly more difficult to differentiate from man-made.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. v
Introduction: The End of Natural Disasters	p. 1
A Brief Note on Civilization's Loss of Command Over its Environment	p. 11
Disasters of Paleomodernity	p. 17
The Sinking of the Titanic and the Fate of the Mobile City	p. 20
On the Hindenburg Disaster and the Technologization of the Soul's Descent to Earth	p. 28
Disasters of Neomodernity	p. 37
The Plane Crash at Tenerife: What it Unconceals	p. 40
The Disaster at Bhopal and the Collision of the Biosphere with the Chemosphere	p. 50
Being-Outside-the-World: Thoughts on the Space Shuttle Disasters	p. 61
Back from History: Some Implications Regarding the Accident at Chernobyl	p. 72
The Amsterdam Cargo Plane Crash and the Derailment at Eschede: Parallel Accidents	p. 85
The Aum Shinrikyo Nerve Gas Attacks as an Attempt to Recode Japanese Society	p. 97
The Columbine Shootings and the Absence of Meaning	p. 109
Planetary Scale Disasters	p. 125
On the September 11 Terrorist Attacks	p. 129
Hurricane Katrina and the Flooding of New Orleans	p. 139
Sichuan, 2008: The First Man-Made Earthquake	p. 150
A Satellite Collision in the Exosphere: Some Ontological Consequences	p. 161
Tiny Blue Globe: Reflections on the BP Oil Spill	p. 168
On the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake, Tsunami and Fukushima Meltdown	p. 177
Postscript: Global Accident	p. 185
Appendix: A Disaster Timeline	p. 191
Chapter Notes	p. 197
Bibliography	p. 207
Index	p. 213
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