Tag Archives: books

Into the Crazy Closet With Roz Chast

by KaiJensonyff Posted on May 5, 2014

Mother Jones

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Plus: Vintage Chast cartoons from the pages of Mother Jones.

You know a Roz Chast character when you see one: a person, often on a sofa, whose bemused, slightly off-kilter expression suggests some deeper angst or anger. The longtime New Yorker cartoonist’s new memoir, Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant?, introduces two real-life characters: her parents, George and Elizabeth, a sweet motormouth who “chain-worried the way others might chain-smoke” and an outspoken assistant principal known for her furious “blasts from Chast.” The book chronicles their reluctant slide into extreme old age, which left Chast, now 59, to sift through decades of emotional baggage and mountains of stuff—like their junk-crammed “Crazy Closet.” Her poignant, funny story will resonate with anyone who’s experienced the roller coaster of an elderly relative’s final years.

Mother Jones: As a child you felt your parents had their own thing going and you were kind of in the way. When did you come to that realization?

Roz Chast: Probably pretty young. I was an only child, and they worked. They’d been together for a very long time before I was born. They were very connected to each other. They were older—chronologically and in a lot of other ways—than my friends’ parents. I never saw my father wear any kind of pants except for, like, man pants, those gray slacks. Forget jeans. Not even corduroys or khakis. When we’d go to the beach, they’d be wearing their street clothes. They weren’t very casual.

A Roz Chast cartoon that appeared in Mother Jones in December 1984 Roz Chast/Mother Jones

MJ: How have your views on aging changed as a result of caring for them?

RC: It’s definitely made me think a lot more about it. Recently I was visiting my son and we went to this huge indoor flea market. At first it was like, This is great, this is wonderful. And then within a few minutes, I just looked around and felt like, I just threw away all this shit. This is all dead-people stuff, crap that people got rid of that was maybe in their old apartment or in their parents house or whatever. Do I want this cute little alarm clock from 1962? Not really. So I just have a different feeling about stuff. And as I get older, it’s not likely to completely go away. I could be wrong. I could decide to suddenly collect cute alarm clocks.

MJ: So you don’t have a Crazy Closet?

RC: Every drawer is like a mini-Crazy Closet. I’m just hoping it doesn’t get that bad. I didn’t go through the Depression like my parents did.

MJ: Were they unable to throw stuff away as a result?

RC: Oh yeah! You didn’t throw away jar lids or Band-Aid boxes. There was a drawer of those amber plastic vials, what pills come in—you might need them for, I don’t know, three cotton balls or something. It was borderline hoarding. They didn’t throw away old clothes. They just shoved things in the closet so everything was pressed. I think I must have been the only person who really understood why Joan Crawford was so upset about the wire hangers. It was just like, She’s right! She’s right!

MJ: Your mom was adamant that she and your dad were “going to 100” together. Do you share that determination?

RC: I really don’t. On the other hand, how would I know what it feels like to be that age any more than a person who’s 25 can understand what it feels like to be 50?

MJ: Your title refers to your parents’ reluctance to talk about aging or dying.

RC: I think it’s pretty representative of our world, our culture. We don’t really talk about it. You just take old people and you put them in a place, and I hope that doesn’t happen to me, but it’s not like I’m actively doing anything to prevent that—which is weird.

MJ: It’s hard to know what the alternatives are, though. You talk, tongue in cheek but also seriously, about how your final years could be made happier: Why not eat all the ice cream you want or take opium or even have hemlock as an option?

RC: I’d rather take opium than hemlock. I sometimes think, once you’re lying there, why not do something that might be fun?

A Roz Chast cartoon that appeared in Mother Jones in May 1988 Roz Chast/Mother Jones

MJ: At what age did you realize you wanted to be a cartoonist?

RC: I used to love to draw things that made me laugh or made friends laugh. When I was 13 or 14, I started thinking, This is what I like to do more than anything else.

MJ: Your work often has people sitting on living-room sofas. In your book, even Death sits on one. Do sofas hold some sort of significance for you?

RC: I just like drawing them.

MJ: The New Yorker is notorious for its weekly cartoon pitch process. What’s your hit-to-miss ratio?

RC: It goes in streaks. I could not sell for three weeks and then sell three weeks in a row and then not sell for two weeks and then sell for one. Bob Mankoff, the cartoon editor, talked once about this experiment with rats and pellets. The rats that pushed down the lever and got a pellet every time would eventually get bored, and the rats that never got any pellets would eventually stop pushing. But where it was random, where they’d push down the lever and get three pellets, and then three pushes and no pellets, and then a push and two pellets—they’d keep on pushing forever. I think about that a lot. I think that cartoonists are the rats with the levers.

Link: 

Into the Crazy Closet With Roz Chast

Posted in Anchor, FF, GE, LG, ONA, Radius, Sterling, Uncategorized, Venta, Vintage | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Into the Crazy Closet With Roz Chast

Is Rising Wealth Concentration Really an Inexorable Trend?

by CALKelseyngmd Posted on April 27, 2014

Mother Jones

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Jared Bernstein tries to explain today why Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the 21st Century has become such a cultural phenomenon. The answer, he says, is a growing sense that “something is structurally wrong with both the economy and the practice of economics”:

Between financial bubbles and busts, the macro-management seems inept and even once the economy starts growing again, the benefits accrue narrowly to the top. In part, it’s a sense that “the fix is in” when it comes to the distribution of growth.

….Against that backdrop, we get a long, carefully researched tome with literally centuries of data across numerous countries showing a pretty inexorable trend of income and wealth concentration and providing a cogent analysis of the mechanics behind those dynamics. At the same time, though Piketty clearly knows his economics, he is quick to dismiss a knee-jerk elevation of assumption-based economic analysis that has led so many policy makers astray in recent years. Moreover, he is not a known partisan who can quickly be compartmentalized and thus distractingly plugged into the existing debate that tends to generate more heat than light.

This puzzles me, because it’s precisely what Piketty doesn’t show. Instead, what he shows is this:

For 1800 years, returns on capital were far higher than growth rates, but wealth concentration didn’t budge over the long term.
In the 19th century, an era marked by relative peace and the explosive growth of the Industrial Revolution, wealth concentration increased steadily, peaking in the Gilded Era.
In the 20th century, following the devastation of the Great Depression and World War II, wealth concentration declined.
Starting around 1980, wealth concentration started increasing again.

Now, Piketty does present good evidence to suggest that the post-1980 trend of rising wealth concentration is likely to continue. With the increasing financialization of the global economy, he believes that returns to capital will stay high; that low inheritance taxes will allow great fortunes to perpetuate themselves; and that sluggish economic growth will limit middle-class earnings gains. This dynamic will take a while to play out fully, but a century from now the relentless forces of r > g will produce a super-rich class with a far, far greater share of global wealth than they have today.

Now, Piketty may be right about this. I think the case he makes is a strong one. Nevertheless, the lesson I took from the book is that wealth concentration is highly variable. It bounces up and down over the centuries, increasing in certain places and eras, and then dissipating via war, famine, dissolute sons, lavish spending, expropriation, dispersion among heirs, disruptive technologies, and so forth. Right now, wealth concentration has been rising for a few decades, and that’s something worth grappling with for all the reasons Piketty lays out.

And yet, I can’t help thinking that on the time scales Piketty writes about, a few decades is a historical blip. There’s simply no “inexorable trend” visible in his data. Instead, there’s a highly speculative projection that the short-term trend of the past 30 years will continue for another century.

It might, but I wish more people would pay attention to just how speculative this is. Perhaps you think that war and expropriation and famine are no longer big threats to concentrated wealth. Perhaps dissolute sons all now have professional money managers and are less likely to squander huge family fortunes. Maybe middle-class wage growth is doomed to stagnate in a world dominated more and more by a highly-educated class managing complex technologies. Maybe disruptive technologies have gotten to the point where they benefit only the 1 percent, shifting wealth from one faction to another but never trickling down to the middle class. (I happen to find this scenario extremely likely, believing as I do that automation is likely to increase returns to capital and depress middle-class wage growth.)

I understand that I’m playing devil’s advocate here, especially since growing income inequality is a topic I write about frequently and I personally find it likely that Piketty is basically right. But I also recognize that his projections—of growth, of returns to capital, and of the persistence of dynastic wealth—are highly speculative. The past 30 years are hardly unique in human history, and previous waves of wealth concentration have not, in fact, lasted forever. I guess I wish that more people would at least acknowledge this. I feel like we should all be spending more time extending and refining Piketty’s results instead of simply assuming that he’s made a slam dunk case for the future of the economy.

Link: 

Is Rising Wealth Concentration Really an Inexorable Trend?

Posted in FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta, Vintage | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Is Rising Wealth Concentration Really an Inexorable Trend?

Quiz: Who’s More Metal, the Cat or the Owner?

by EulahWhitten Posted on April 11, 2014

Mother Jones

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Metal Cats, a new book that compiles photos of headbangers with their felines, made us wonder: Who’s more metal, cat or owner? Take the quiz below, featuring some of the book’s photos, to find out.

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return ret;
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Tabletop.init(
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self.find_aspectratio_for_each_type_of_video_embed(row.question);
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var possible_answers = [];
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var right_or_wrong = (is_correct ? ‘right’ : ‘wrong’);
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row, display_element, row_number, is_correct
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return answer;
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var i, j, sheetName, data;
var quiz = [];

// Find a sheet that _isn’t_ named “Results”.
for (sheetName in tabletop)
if (tabletop.hasOwnProperty(sheetName) && sheetName !== ‘Results’)
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}

data = tabletopsheetName.elements;

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Math.round(Math.random() * possible_wrong_answers.length)
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right_answer_placement.sort();

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var ret = make_default_how_you_did_htmls(quiz_data.length);

var data = tabletop’Results’ ? tabletop’Results’.elements : [];
for (var i = 0; i < data.length; i++)
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console.log(“Invalid number of correct answers: ” + index);
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}

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},
append_question : function(question_index)
var question_data = self.quiz_dataquestion_index;
var question_container = $(‘<li class=”question_container row-fluid question_’ +
question_index +
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);
question_container.append( self.build_question_element_from_row(question_data) );
question_container.append( self.build_possible_answer_elements_from_row(question_data, question_index) );
container_elem.append(question_container);
,
build_question_element_from_row: function(row)
var question_container = $(”);
for (var i = 0; i < self.possible_display_elements.length; i++)
question_container.append(
self.possible_display_elementsi.create_element(row.question)
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return question_container;
},
build_possible_answer_elements_from_row : function(question, question_index)
var answers_container = $(”);

function bindClick(question_index, answer_index, possible_answer)
possible_answer.bind(‘click’, function()
// was it the right answer?
var was_correct = self.quiz_dataquestion_index.possible_answersanswer_index.correct;

// Add correct classes to possible answers
answers_container.find(‘.selected’).removeClass(‘selected’);
$(this).addClass(‘selected’);
$(this).removeClass(‘possible_answer’);
answers_container
.find(‘.answer_’ + answer_index)
.addClass(
was_correct ? ‘correct_answer’ : ‘wrong_answer’
);

//track how many you got right the first time
cheater_answer_trackingquestion_index = was_correct;
if ( typeof(answer_trackingquestion_index) === ‘undefined’ )
answer_trackingquestion_index = was_correct;
cover.find(‘.question_’ + question_index).addClass(
‘first_guess_’ +
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);

self.update_how_you_did_element();

//show new slide
self.display_answer(self.quiz_dataquestion_index, question_index, self.quiz_dataquestion_index.possible_answersanswer_index);

// track that this was selected last
self.quiz_dataquestion_index.previously_selected = self.quiz_dataquestion_index.possible_answersanswer_index;
});
}

for (var i = 0; i < question.possible_answers.length; i++)
var answer_data = question.possible_answersi;
var possible_answer = $(” +
answer_data.answer +
”);
bindClick(question_index, i, possible_answer);
answers_container.append(possible_answer);
this.note_answer_images(answer_data);

return answers_container;
},
answer_images : {},
preload_answer_images: function()
for (var url in this.answer_images)
var img=new Image();
img.src=url;

},
note_answer_images: function(answer_data)
var image_elements = ‘backgroundimage’, ‘topimage’, ‘bottomimage’;
for (var i = 0; i < image_elements.length; i++)
if (!answer_data[image_elementsi]) continue;
this.answer_images[answer_data[image_elementsi]] = true;
}
self.possible_display_elementsi.name;
},
add_display_in_correct_place: function(container, place_in_display_elements, slide)
for ( var i = place_in_display_elements; i > 0; i– )
if (self.possible_display_elementsi – 1.finder(container).length )
self.possible_display_elementsi – 1.finder(container)
.after( self.possible_display_elementsplace_in_display_elements.create_element(slide) );
return;

}
container.prepend(
self.possible_display_elementsplace_in_display_elements.create_element(slide)
);
},
display_answer : function(question, question_index, answer)
var displayed_slide = question.previously_selected ?
question.previously_selected :
question.question;
var slide = container_elem.find(‘.question_’ + question_index + ‘ .question’);
slide.addClass(‘revealed_answer’);
for (var i = 0; i < self.possible_display_elements.length; i++)
var display_value = self.possible_display_elementsi.name;
if ( answerdisplay_value !== displayed_slidedisplay_value )
if ( !answerdisplay_value )
self.possible_display_elementsi.finder(slide).remove();
else if ( !displayed_slidedisplay_value )
self.add_display_in_correct_place(slide, i, answer);
else
self.possible_display_elementsi.finder(slide).replaceWith(
self.possible_display_elementsi.create_element( answer )
);

}
}
},

create_cover : function()
cover = $(‘#’ + self.container);
container_elem = $(”);
cover.append(container_elem);
container_elem.addClass(‘quiz_container’);
container_elem.css(‘padding’, ‘0px’);
,
update_how_you_did_element: function()
var right_answers = 0;
var user_answers = self.cheating ? cheater_answer_tracking : answer_tracking;
var unfinished = false;
for (var i = 0; i < self.quiz_data.length; i++)
if (typeof(answer_trackingi) === ‘undefined’)
unfinished = true;

if (user_answersi)
right_answers++;

}
var html;
if (unfinished && typeof(this.not_finished_html) !== ‘undefined’)
html = this.not_finished_html;
else
html = this.results_dataright_answers;

how_you_did_element.html(html);
}
};
return quiz.init(quiz_data, results_data, options);
};

$.fn.quiz = function(quiz_data, results_data, options)
if (!options) options = results_data; results_data = null;
if (!options) options = ; }
options.container = this.attr(‘id’);
this.quiz = $.quiz(quiz_data, results_data, options);
return this;
};
})(jQuery);

var quiz = jQuery(‘#quiz_container’).quiz(‘0Apogs1tjp7w0dEZLUnB3QTJYVVdjUDJMUTZXU2ZzMmc’);
Photos from Metal Cats by Alexandra Crockett, published by powerHouse Books.

See original article: 

Quiz: Who’s More Metal, the Cat or the Owner?

Posted in Anchor, FF, GE, LG, ONA, Oster, Radius, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Quiz: Who’s More Metal, the Cat or the Owner?

Quick Reads: "The Humor Code" by Peter McGraw and Joel Warner

by LinTarleton Posted on March 28, 2014

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

The Humor Code

By Peter McGraw and Joel Warner

SIMON AND SCHUSTER

Searching for the essence of humor is a delicate business: Dig too deep, and you kill the joke. Fortunately, Peter McGraw, an irrepressible psychology prof, and Joel Warner, his straight-man scribe, deliver entertaining answers to nagging questions like: Do unhappy people make better comedians? Are some things too horrible to laugh at? And how do you win The New Yorker cartoon contest? Despite getting heckled by colleagues in the surprisingly serious field of humor studies and bombing as a stand-up comic, McGraw lays out a convincing theory about how humor works and why it’s an essential survival mechanism.

This review originally appeared in our March/April 2014 issue of Mother Jones.

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Quick Reads: "The Humor Code" by Peter McGraw and Joel Warner

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David Sive, a Father of Environmental Law, Dies at 91

by Myrna Posted on March 19, 2014

Mr. Sive argued precedent-setting cases and helped establish a string of environmental advocacy groups when such issues had barely penetrated public consciousness. Continued here:  David Sive, a Father of Environmental Law, Dies at 91 ; ;Related ArticlesRetro Report: The Battle Over the MedflyWhite House to Introduce Climate Data WebsiteBy Degrees: Scientists Sound Alarm on Climate ;

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David Sive, a Father of Environmental Law, Dies at 91

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Elizabeth Warren Pens a Book, Is Still Totally Not Running for President

by Larissaiyb Posted on March 19, 2014

Mother Jones

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It’s been a busy first year in the Senate for Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). Since she entered the Congress in January 2013, she’s become a liberal hero, a frequent YouTube star who turns dull congressional hearings into viral hits. She’s pushed the government to lower interest rates on student loans. Protected vets from financial scams. Introduced legislation to protect poor people searching for a job. Called on banks to reveal their donations to think tanks.

Somehow she’s also found time to write a 384-page book. Next month Warren will release A Fighting Chance, which, according to the AP, will tell her whole life story, dating back to her early life in Oklahoma to her time setting up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and her first year in the Senate. Warren will embark on a brief book tour in Massachusetts after the book’s publication on April 22.

Warren is already a prolific author, having published eight books before she ever ran for office. But those other writing ventures were an outgrowth of her academic career. Her new book appears purely political, the sort of hagiographic biography politicians pen to position themselves for a future run at higher office. Barack Obama published The Audacity of Hope, at around the same point of his career in the Senate. Mitt Romney wrote No Apology: The Case for American Greatness in 2010 to gear up for his 2012 campaign. Hillary Clinton is set to release a book in June.

Warren has said, time and again, that she has no intention of moving into the White House. “I’m not running for president and I plan to serve out my term,” she said at a December press conference. But politicians have a long history of ignoring their previous denials when circumstances change. Barack Obama frequently dismissed the notion that he’d seek the presidency so early in his career, only to ditch those denials and announce a campaign in 2007. It’s unlikely that Warren would challenge Clinton should Clinton, as expected, run in 2016. The Massachusetts politician joined her fellow female senators in signing a letter urging Clinton to run for president again. But, should she pass on another bid, Warren could always change her tune.

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Elizabeth Warren Pens a Book, Is Still Totally Not Running for President

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See what environmental problem Robert Redford and Will Ferrell are fighting about

by Myrna Posted on March 19, 2014

This fake fight has a good cause. Visit link: See what environmental problem Robert Redford and Will Ferrell are fighting about ; ;Related ArticlesHow to make zero carbon cheeseCrowdsourcing an online compendium of small farmer innovationA Map of History’s Biggest Greenhouse Gas Polluters ;

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See what environmental problem Robert Redford and Will Ferrell are fighting about

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By Degrees: Scientists Sound Alarm on Climate

by Myrna Posted on March 17, 2014

A stark new report seeks to cut through confusion and awaken the public to the urgency of the dangers of global warming. Excerpt from:   By Degrees: Scientists Sound Alarm on Climate ; ;Related ArticlesObservatory: A Chickadee Mating Zone Surges NorthCharlie Porter, a Solitary Adventurer Who Reshaped the Ascent of a Monolith, Is Dead at 63West’s Drought and Growth Intensify Conflict Over Water Rights ;

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By Degrees: Scientists Sound Alarm on Climate

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Quick Reads: "The Bargain From the Bazaar" by Haroon K. Ullah

by Jatiancecab Posted on March 8, 2014

Mother Jones

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The Bargain From the Bazaar

By Haroon K. Ullah

PUBLICAFFAIRS

Western discussion of Pakistan tends to focus on geopolitics and terrorism. In this refreshing break from the policy stuff, Haroon Ullah, a Pakistani American scholar and diplomat, tells the story of a middle-class family struggling to stay united as violence, political turmoil, and extremism threaten to tear the country apart. The book reads like a novel—whose rich dialogue, colorful characters, and vivid descriptions of Lahore blend seamlessly with historical context to offer glimpses of a Pakistan we rarely see.

This review originally appeared in our March/April 2014 issue of Mother Jones.

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Quick Reads: "The Bargain From the Bazaar" by Haroon K. Ullah

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Elizabeth Kolbert: "Humans Will Eventually Become Extinct"

by JuliusI82gkpps Posted on February 4, 2014

Mother Jones

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Things have been pretty boring, extinction-wise, since an asteroid killed off the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Until humans came along, that is. Most folks might not know it, but there’s an mass extinction happening right before our eyes, and guess who is causing it? To better understand this madness, The New Yorker‘s acclaimed climate journalist and author Elizabeth Kolbert clomped through the tropics, crawled into the caves at Lascaux, and emerged with a new book, The Sixth Extinction, which will be published by Henry Holt & Co. on February 11.

Also read Julia Whitty’s 2007 cover story on mass extinction and the hazards of vanishing biodiversity.

Kolbert’s book brims with the fascinating and harrowing details of humanity’s brutal and pervasive impacts on other species. Did you know, for instance, that “before humans finally did in the Neanderthals, they had sex with them”? Well they did. And as a result, Kobert writes, most of us are part Neanderthal—up to 4 percent.

No matter what Donald Trump says, it’s clear that global warming is rapidly changing conditions on our planet. But there are other large-scale effects at play. For instance, acidification of the oceans and rampant deforestation, both human-caused, are putting serious strain on ecosystems, and some of them are on the verge of crashing. As one ecologist put it, “we’re busy sawing off the limb on which we perch.”

Ultimately, Kolbert says, humans, too, will go extinct. I recently reached the author at home in Western Massachusetts to get a better grasp on the scale of the problems our descendants will face.

Mother Jones: I was fascinated by your discussion of the “perception of incongruity,” and how humans create more and more elaborate explanations to account for contradictory evidence. Where does this turn up in the modern debate on extinction?

Elizabeth Kolbert: Even very smart people can try to shoehorn new information that just doesn’t fit into an existing paradigm. For a long time the story that we’ve been telling ourselves is that humans are just another animal. We evolved from other animals and our place in the universe isn’t particularly special. What I’m trying to convey in the book is that we are unusual. We turn out to be the one species altering the planet like this, and that puts people back in the position of being responsible for what happens. There’s a big resistance to the idea that we could be such a big deal. The Earth is big. There are huge natural forces that have worked over geological time. But it turns out, when you look carefully at the geological time you can’t find anything like us.

MJ: Is it still the case that we don’t have a general theory of mass extinction?

EK: Yes absolutely. We can’t say that when x happens we get a mass extinction. To the extent we understand mass extinction, one has been caused by glaciation event, one has been caused by a massive climate change, and one has been caused by an asteroid. These events turn out to have no precedent.

MJ: So even though it appears cyclical…

EK: It is not cyclical at all! That whole idea has been debunked. It’s completely random as far as we can tell.

MJ: The people you came across during your investigation bring so much expertise and color to the book. What was your sense of their feelings toward the extinction? Alarm? Cynicism? Anger?

EK: That’s a really good question. I think alarm is a good word. I think there’s real sadness. If you’re a conservation biologist in many fields these days, you’re seeing your study subject disappear. People are in the position where they’re chronicling radical decline, and that is not a position that conservation biologists want to be in. Frustration would be another word. Things that evidently should be done are not being done. There’s also fascination. Grim fascination. We are seeing changes that should take thousands of years. That is amazing from a scientific point of view.

MJ: You write about a phenomenon called “overkill,” where first we killed off the megafauna—the large animals—and then the Neanderthals. If we accept the hypothesis that modern humans are responsible for the demise of these species, does that mean the sixth extinction has been happening ever since we came along?

EK: Yes. Laughs. how’s that for an answer? You know, we’ve been around for 200,000 years. Some people would say there’s even evidence that our ancestors were part of extinction in Africa, but I think that’s heavily disputed. It’s pretty widely accepted that the Australian megafauna were done in by people. That was 40,000 years ago. But when you look at the vast sweep of history, it will all be compressed down to this tiny little layer.

MJ: Given this timescale, it seems like an everyday person might struggle to grasp mass extinction, since you can’t actually see the degree to which it is happening in our time. How do you get around that?

EK: There’s this idea of shifting baselines. It was coined by a guy named Jeremy Jackson. It’s the idea that every generation takes what it sees, and says, “Okay, well, that’s the norm.” The fact that 100 years ago there were many more species? Well, that’s been erased because you weren’t here for that. That problem is really severe. Most of us live in parts of the world where we don’t expect to see much, and we wouldn’t necessarily notice things that are crashing. Bats are crashing, and if you’ve been watching even in one brief lifetime you would notice that there are many fewer bats. If in your lifetime you watch a species go extinct, or plummet almost to the point of extinction, that is a sign that something really serious is going on.

MJ: The book kind of shows us how these animals are getting screwed at every turn. In one chapter you write about how the world is changing in ways that force species to migrate, and at the same time creating barriers to that movement. Is this something of a perfect storm?

EK: We don’t entirely know yet. But if you’re asking in the abstract, “What could you do to really mess up a lot of species?” it would be hard to design a better system than the one we’ve got. Practically everything is on the move now, in some way, because of climate change. And they’re going to run up against all these man-made barriers. We’ve completely changed the rules of the game. The territory they’d like to move to just isn’t there.

MJ: After spending time with with Suci, the Sumatran rhino, you wrote about experiencing a “flicker of interspecies recognition.” Would you attribute part of the human callousness towards the plight of animals to a scarcity of that experience?

Elizabeth Kolbert Barry Goldstein

EK: Really interesting question. I don’t know the answer to that. We have all this Paleolithic art that suggests that our ancestors really venerated animals and that they depended on wild animals to survive—as opposed to domesticated animals that we depend on. Would it radically change things if we had more rhinos in our midst? I kind of suspect it would. You know, a rhino is a grand animal. And if we did have more experience with that, as opposed to factory-farmed cows….On the other hand, the colonists who came to this country and saw the amazing herds of buffalo and slaughtered them very close to the point of extinction, which seems impossible to imagine, because the herds were so great. So that would be countervailing evidence.

MJ: At one point, you note the possibility that “eventually travel and global commerce will cease.” What does that suggest about the future of humans on this planet?

EK: Humans will eventually become extinct. People treat that as a radical thing to say. But the fossil record shows us that everything eventually becomes extinct. It depends what “eventually” means. But the idea that were going to be around for the rest of global history… I don’t think there’s any scientist who would suggest that is true. It could be millions of years from now. We may leave descendants that are human-like.

MJ: Is this book a call to action?

EK: I very carefully avoided saying what it was. What I’ve laid out requires action commensurate with the problem. We’re talking really huge global-scale change, and I did not feel that I had the prescription for that kind of action so I’m going to leave it to the reader.

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Elizabeth Kolbert: "Humans Will Eventually Become Extinct"

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