{"id":1320,"date":"2009-11-11T23:50:46","date_gmt":"2009-11-12T04:50:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/s265039441.onlinehome.us\/philpaine\/?p=1320"},"modified":"2018-08-07T21:53:06","modified_gmt":"2018-08-08T01:53:06","slug":"18227-alan-weisman-the-world-without-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=1320","title":{"rendered":"18227. (Alan Weisman) The World Without Us"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Many years ago, when I was a cal\u00adlow sci\u00adence fic\u00adtion fan among oth\u00ader cal\u00adlow sci\u00adence fic\u00adtion fans, we used to walk about the city, talk\u00ading about this and that. A top\u00adic that often came up was: What would hap\u00adpen to the city if all the human beings in it sud\u00adden\u00adly van\u00adished? What would become of the build\u00adings? <!--more-->How quick\u00adly would nature re-assert itself? How long would it take for human struc\u00adtures to crum\u00adble, be engulfed by nature? What would go, what would last? From our lim\u00adit\u00aded stock of knowl\u00adedge, we made our guess\u00ades. It was noth\u00ading new.&nbsp;Sci\u00adence fic\u00adtion nov\u00adels had dealt with the sub\u00adject since the nine\u00adteenth century.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">This book, how\u00adev\u00ader, looks at the prob\u00adlem more sys\u00adtem\u00adat\u00adi\u00adcal\u00adly than our idle spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtions.&nbsp;Weis\u00adman draws on the exper\u00adtise of engi\u00adneers, archi\u00adtects, and sci\u00aden\u00adtists to answer the ques\u00adtion in detail. In the course of his explo\u00adrations, the read\u00ader is grad\u00adu\u00adal\u00adly drawn into con\u00adtem\u00adplat\u00ading some of our most com\u00adplex eco\u00adlog\u00adi\u00adcal prob\u00adlems. Some of the most inter\u00adest\u00ading parts of the book draw on the evi\u00addence of places that have been aban\u00addoned by human beings for polit\u00adi\u00adcal rea\u00adsons, such as the demil\u00adi\u00adta\u00adrized buffer zones between North and South Korea, and an aban\u00addoned urban sec\u00adtion of Cyprus. The site of Cher\u00adnobyl also gets attention.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Most human struc\u00adtures will not last long before they are erased by nat\u00adur\u00adal forces. Mod\u00adern struc\u00adtures, usu\u00adal\u00adly made with shod\u00addy mate\u00adri\u00adals, will go faster than ancient stone struc\u00adtures. Things buried under\u00adground fare best \u2014 the Under\u00adground City beneath Mon\u00adtre\u00adal, for exam\u00adple, will still be there when all signs of the city will have van\u00adished from the sur\u00adface. But one of the most deli\u00adcious ironies is that the last works of human art to exist will prob\u00ada\u00adbly be the first: the bril\u00adliant cave paint\u00adings made at the dawn of human cul\u00adture at Altami\u00adra and Lascaux.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Many years ago, when I was a cal\u00adlow sci\u00adence fic\u00adtion fan among oth\u00ader cal\u00adlow sci\u00adence fic\u00adtion fans, we used to walk about the city, talk\u00ading about this and that. A top\u00adic that often came up was: What would hap\u00adpen&nbsp;to&nbsp;\u2026<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=1320\">Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[946,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-b-reading","category-br-reading-2009"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1320"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1320\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7902,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1320\/revisions\/7902"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}