Book Summary:
Collapse looks at how societies fall. It examines the reasons behind the fall of societies like the mayans and the Vikings plus the lessons we can learn from them.
Related Book Summaries:
Philosophy For Life – Jules Evans – Book Summary
Antifragile – Nicholas Nassim Taleb – Book Summary
Quotes:
In contrast [to trees and fish], oil, metals, and coal are not renewable; they don’t reproduce, sprout, or have sex to produce baby oil droplets or coal nuggets.
Book Summary Notes:
- Over consumption of natural resources can lead to societal collapse.
- The Moai statues of Easter island are relics left over from a society that essentially committed ecocide. By the time Europeans arrived on Easter island they found the local inhabitants had overused the local resources, this resulted in a collapse of the local population.
- Poor leadership can also hasten societies decline and collapse.
- For the Mayan leaders when a crisis of overpopulation and food shortages struck, the leaders were more focused on bolstering their own power instead of helping their people.
- Societies that fail to adapt to environmental changes due out.
- When Vikings moved to Greenland they tried to bring their livestock with them, Greenland however has minimal grazing land and is ill suited for livestock. Viking society also focused on collecting status symbols like tusks, which took time away from more necessary activities such as farming.
- The Tikopians by contrast removed pork from their farming activities in favour of the lower cost fish and vegetables.
- Japanese leaders in another example recognised that trees were being cut down far faster then normal at the time, by acting to slow down the forest removal and increase the speed of replanting, Japan is still home to very large thriving forests.
- In a more recent example, by industrialising at a fast rate, China has faced quality declines in both air and water. 8% of Chinas GDP is spent treating issues stemming from this.
- Despite these tales from our past we still continue to act as though over population and lack of resources will never be an issue for us. Ultimately corporations will not be the ones taking responsibility for acting, it will come down to the small choices each individual makes.
