Books and literature – Page 26 – a sibilant intake of breath

Changing Images of Man

First published in 1974, and available for free online, Changing Images of Man is a kind of philosophical reflection on science and how human beings understand themselves. While it does touch on some interesting ideas, the degree to which it is fundamentally lacking in rigour or discipline means that it is also choked with nonsense, impenetrable jargon, and pointless speculation. In short, it does not have the feel of a text whose ideas have been borne out by subsequent history. Rather, it is more like a monument to a kind of faddishness that has long since become dated, though elements endure in the more superstitious aspects of contemporary culture.

Much of the book concerns environmental issues: specifically, how human civilization can cease to be such a destructive force, and how ecology is affecting science in general. Neither discussion is very satisfying. The former discussion focuses on a kind of caricatured extension of the Beatles going to India to lean yoga and discover themselves. While significant transformations in human behaviours and self-understanding may well be necessary to generate a sustainable society, the perspective on those changes offered in this work doesn’t seem either plausible or compelling to me. The latter discussion exaggerates the degree to which the study of complex dynamic systems challenges the practice of science: while they are certainly more challenging to study scientifically than systems that are more easily broken down and understood in terms of constituents, science is nonetheless proving increasingly capable of dealing with complex systems like climate and ecosystems, and is doing so without the kind of radical extension and modification endorsed by this book.

Much of the book is no more comprehensible than a random string of pompous-sounding words strung together in a grammatical way. It seems telling that the chapter on ‘feasibility’ is the least accessible and comprehensible of the lot. The report perceives a crisis in science that I don’t think existed at the time it was written, and I do not think has emerged since. Complex phenomenon are being grappled with using enhanced versions of conventional techniques, while UFOs and psychic phenomena have been effectively rejected as quackery, due to the absence of any good evidence for their existence. Basically, Changing Images of Man is an exhortation to abandon rigorous thought in favour of a kind of wooly inclusiveness, exceedingly open to ideas that are too vague to really engage with. The book has a naive counterculture tone, overly willing to reject what is old and unthinkingly embrace novel concepts that register with a 1960s/1970s mindset. While the questions it considers are generally good and important ones, the answers provided are vague, preachy, and largely useless.

The White Man’s Burden

William Easterly’s The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good seeks to refute utopian notions of what can be done with foreign aid and military interventions by citing evidence from past disasters. In his analysis, the planners who develop and implement foreign aid plans lack the capability, incentive, and ability to provide what is really needed by the poor. Rather than continuing to empower them in seeking grand solutions, mechanisms should be established through which ‘searchers’ can create meaningful initiatives to deal with specific, tractable issues. One paragraph sums up the basics of Easterly’s view of development:

Even when the West fails to “develop” the Rest, the Rest develops itself. The great bulk of development success in the Rest comes from self-reliant, exploratory efforts, and the borrowing of ideas, institutions, and technology from the West when it suits the Rest to do so.

He argues that Western states should abandon their pretences and most of the approaches they have deployed so far. Because of the fundamental linkages of accountability they create, Easterly holds that markets, rather than bureaucracies, are the ideal mechanism for serving human needs. He does not, however, have an excessive faith in the ability of effective markets to emerge: stressing that they can do so only when social, legal, and political conditions are appropriate. Given that the complexities of these things aren’t even understood in relation to long-standing markets in developed states, he argues that it is unrealistic to try to develop and deploy market creation plans in poor states.

One somewhat curious aspect of the book is a focus on countries which is sometimes too rigid, with less consideration of the economic breakdown within them. Almost always, the most authoritative measure of a country’s success is taken to be the level of GDP and the rate of GDP growth. Comparatively little consideration is given to the distribution of wealth or income. Claims made about different forms of poverty reduction could have been more comprehensively examined through a combination of aggregate data and considerations of distributions.

Easterly acknowledges that health is an area where aid has done unusually well – partly because health problems lend themselves to the kind of high-accountability, distributed solutions he favours. Efforts to eradicate certain diseases with vaccines and medication demonstrate that big, expensive efforts are sometimes justified. Recognizing that, the book is highly critical of health efforts that fail to take into account local conditions. It is also very critical of spending money on AIDS treatment. Easterly argues that such treatment costs about $1,500 a year, in total, with only a few hundred of those dollars for the generic first-line drugs themselves. Since both preventing the transmission of AIDS and treating other diseases can extend the total number of years of human life much more efficiently, he argues that funding AIDS treatment is a gross misallocation of resources. He also argues that it is important to counteract entities that are doing enormous amounts of harm: such as the Christian organizations that push governments and NGOs to back away from condoms, or those that promote useless abstinence education programs. Other education programs can be enormously more effective: such as teaching prostitutes about AIDS and how to prevent it with barriers.

The book completely ignores environmental issues, which I see as a major problem. Climate change is a huge threat to development, and carries many risks of poverty and conflict. Easterly rightly criticizes planners everywhere from failing to anticipate the eventual consequences of the AIDS epidemic, and taking preventative action beforehand. Inadequate global action on climate change threatens to produce a much worse problem. When the book praises Beijing for having eight beltways around its core, it highlights the difference I have seen in other places between pro-growth development economists and others who are more concerned about the environmental consequences of such unbridled activity. While environmentalists are often insufficiently concerned with poverty reduction (sometimes monstrously suggesting that keeping most people in poverty is a good way to lighten the environmental burden), economists are often guilty of ignoring the real impacts and enormous threats associated with being unconcerned with sustainability.

Easterly’s suggests that organizations that provide or distribute aid need to be much more focused on particular, comprehensible tasks and that mechanisms must be in place to evaluate their effectiveness at serving the interests of the people who are the targets of the aid. They should concentrate on providing basic needs in a direct way: things like medicine, seeds, roads, textbooks, and medical staff. Results should be evaluated using scientific approaches (both randomized trials and statistical analyses) conducted by truly independent organizations. The concept of ‘development vouchers’ which could be given to poor people and then used in exchange for development services, from an organization selected by the recipients, is an example of the same general kind of thinking.

The book’s style deserves some criticism. It is written in the form of dozens of little sections, each a few pages long. It can also be rather repetitive. Sometimes, Easterly’s points of rebuttal are glib or unconvincing, delivered in an offhand way without a great deal of logical or empirical justification. That being said, his overall conclusions are well supported by a great deal of statistical, historical, and anecdotal evidence.

In the end, the book is one that ought to be read by all those with a serious interest in international development, and the relations between the developed and developing world. While it is not universally convincing, it is a useful contribution to the overall dialogue and a sensible rebuttal to the excessive idealism (even utopianism) or some plans and political positions. The book is also interesting insofar as it considers what elements produce stable and prosperous societies, and which characteristics lead to misery and stagnation. Those are lessons that can be sensibly applied even within the states which already consider themselves to be fully developed.

Amazon’s sudden homophobia

In a rather despicable move, Amazon.com seems to have decided that all texts pertaining to homosexuality are somehow obscene. As a result, they have been removed from sales rankings and lists of best sellers. The top result for a search on the term ‘homosexuality’ now leads to A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality, followed by several other Christian texts offering to ‘cure’ homosexuality. Farther down, there are some books that are positive towards alternative forms of sexuality, including what I have been read is the most banned book in America at the moment: And Tango Makes Three, the true story of two male penguins at the Central Park Zoo in New York who raise a chick together.

Amazon initially claimed that ‘adult’ material had to excluded from “searches and best seller lists.” Obviously, this censorship is deeply inappropriate and Amazon now says it was an error. Until they sort it out, I certainly won’t be buying anything from them.

[Update: 15 April 2009] According to The Globe and Mail, the Amazon rankings have been restored.

Book club, month two

The first month of the non-fiction book club is coming to an end, and I will be posting my review of Easterly’s The White Man’s Burden on Wednesday. As such, it is time to start choosing a second book. I have the following nominees:

1) Speth, Gus. The Bridge at the Edge of the World: Capitalism, the Environment, and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability.

2) Jaccard, Mark. Sustainable Fossil Fuels: The Unusual Suspect in the Quest for Clean and Enduring Energy.

3) Cherry-Garrard, Apsley. The Worst Journey in the World. (About a failed Antarctic expedition)

What else would people consider reading?

Dark Sun

The whole technical and chilling history of atomic weapons is reviewed in Richard Rhodes’ Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb. Released in 1995, it is based substantially on documents that became available after the end of the Cold War, documenting the development of nuclear and thermonuclear bombs in the United States and Soviet Union, as well as delving into issues of international politics, espionage, and delivery systems.

Most people are likely to find some aspects of the book tedious, while others are fascinating. For instance, I noted all the descriptions of design details of nuclear and thermonuclear issues with interest, but found a lot of the minute descriptions of espionage activities tedious (especially descriptions of nearly every meeting between the atomic spies and their contacts). That said, the book will certainly offer good rewards to anyone with an interest in some aspect of nuclear weapons or the Cold War.

The last few pages really ought to be read by everyone. They document the shocking behaviour of Curtis LeMay and the Strategic Air Command (SAC) in the period prior to the Cuban Missile Crisis, as well as during it. At the time, LeMay and some of his commanders could use nuclear weapons without presidential authority; they were also obsessed with striking first, and generally convinced that war with Russia was inevitable. Perhaps the most shocking actions detailed are LeMay’s strategy of flying nuclear-capable bombers over targets like Vladivostok, in the Soviet Union. They were running drills and taking photos, but it looked to the Russians exactly like an atomic attack. I don’t think Rhodes is wrong to suggest that, had the Soviets done something similar in America, the SAC would have launched an all-out attack against them. Rhodes marshals compelling evidence that LeMay did, at times, seek to provoke a nuclear war through initiatives like these flights and the provocative American ballistic missile test undertaken during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

The book’s closing also laments the enormous amounts of sacrifice made to build up these massive, threatening stocks of weapons. The Oak Ridge and Hanford complexes, producing fissile materials, used more energy than the Tennessee Valley Authority, Hoover, Grand Coulee, and Bonneville dams could produce together. One year of expanding the facilities required 11% of US nickel production and 34% of the output of stainless steel. All told, Rhodes estimates that the arms race cost America over $4 trillion, which could have otherwise been put to productive uses. On the Soviet side, the story is far more appalling: with thousands of slaves being terrorized and irradiated in the drive to match the American weapons complex. The irony is that, while generals and arms manufacturers clamoured for ever-more warheads, politicians on both sides of the Iron Curtain had already come to understand that the weapons could never be used. Indeed, Rhodes’ account provides a nice counter-argument to the view that all politicians are short-sighted and lacking in wisdom.

All told, Rhodes’ account is an excellent one: historically rigorous, but alive to the human issues raised inevitably by the subject matter. It’s a book that is deeply relevant in a world where US-Russian tensions are growing, weapons are proliferating, and a terrifying number of bombs are still deployed on 15-minute hair-trigger alerts.

Competitive games and collaborative results

Because it was recommended in a blog I read (though I cannot remember which), I am reading Herb Cohen’s You Can Negotiate Anything. While the book is quite dated in terms of views on race and sex, it does contain some interesting observations, many of which relate closely to politics and international relations. For instance, the author asserts that: “In order to achieve a collaborative result in a competitive environment, you have to play the game.”

What this suggests is that approaches that are superficially unifying, like Obama’s call for post-partisanship, are either naive or ploys in a system where trust is always conditional and ephemeral, as it is between political parties. It also speaks to the game theory reality that, in a situation where one party is considering only their own interests, while the other is trying to strike an equitable balance, the outcome will tilt in the direction of the selfish party: after all, people on both sides of the negotiation are thinking about the selfish party’s interests, while those of their counterparty are only getting half the attention.

When it comes to climate change, it does seem necessary to ‘play the game.’ Voters and politicians have been exposed to the chilling scientific projections ad nauseum, and yet very little real action has been undertaken at a global level. North America and Australia are particularly laggard, when it comes to doing something concrete. Of course, recognizing the need to engage in ‘game playing’ doesn’t put one much closer to having an effective strategy to overcome status quo opposition and bring the behaviour of firms, states, and individuals in line with what basic sanity demands.

Free book on the oil sands

Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent is a book written by Andrew Nikiforuk, a Calgary journalist. The publisher, Greystone Books, has decided to make it available as a free PDF until Friday, March 20th. The book’s description suggests that it is very critical of the oil sands industry, overall:

This out-of-control megaproject is polluting the air, poisoning the water, and destroying boreal forest at a rate almost too rapid to be imagined. In this hard-hitting book, journalist Andrew Nikiforuk exposes the disastrous environmental, social, and political costs of the tar sands and argues forcefully for change.

Getting the PDF requires that you give them your email address. Of course, you can always buy the book if you prefer.

More about this is on Gristmill.

Book club logistics

I must say that I am surprised with the number of positive responses to my post about starting a book club. Of course, it is encouraging to see that so many people would be interested in the coordinated reading of non-fiction.

It seems to me that two things need to be decided: the dates on which book reviews should be written up and posted, and the first book we should all read. I propose that we answer these, at least for the first month, by means of an opaque participatory, but not entirely democratic, process. Namely, I propose that people nominate dates and books and, once a good number of people have commented, I will select something that doesn’t seem too far out of line with the consensus.

For dates, I nominate either the 7th of every month, or the 15th of every month, starting in April. For books, I nominate the following, in no special order:

Easterly, William. The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good.
Speth, Gus. The Bridge at the Edge of the World: Capitalism, the Environment, and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability.
Diamond, Jared. Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed.

I may suggest some others while the discussion is ongoing.

‘Book club’ idea

If you count the time spent reading, my book review posts are certainly the ones that have the most effort invested in them. Yet, they generally fail to spawn any substantive discussion. Generally, this is because most readers won’t have read most of the books in question. As a result, any discussions are based around things I happen to mention in my post, rather than the overall content of the book in question.

As a solution, I was wondering if anyone would be interested in a monthly non-fiction book club, to be operated through this and other blogs. We would choose a book per month, read it, and then all write posts and/or comments about it. That way, some substantive discussion of the material could take place. I would be most keen about books in subject areas covered on this site, but am not fundamentally averse to trying something more unusual. Even fiction might be considered, provided it is of a practical variety.

Would anyone be interested?

Eating the Sun: How Plants Power the Planet

Oliver Morton’s exploration of the nature and consequences of photosynthesis makes for a remarkable and informative book. It is divided into three sections: one covering the span of a human life and covering the scientific investigation of photosynthesis; one on a planetary timescale, describing the evolution of the climate, atmosphere, and life; and one on the timescale of a tree’s life, covering the changes humanity has induced in the carbon cycle, and the ways through which the climate change crisis can be overcome. The book is strongest when it comes to putting scientific information into a poignant and comprehensible form that is almost poetic. Arguably, it is weakest in terms of its analysis of what needs to be done in response to climate change.

Eating the Sun contains many sections that are highly technical: descriptions of the biochemistry of photosynthesis, the geological and climatological processes that have taken place over billions of years, the scientific methods through which both have been explored, and more. It can also be quirky, philosophical, and personal. For instance, there are asides in which the author explains his aesthetic preference for one or another scientific theory, such as how photosystems I and II in plants came to be integrated. The combination is not unlike that found in Michael Pollan’s work, where an educated non-expert with a talent for writing adopts the task of explaining technical issues and making their significance clearly felt.

The book features a great deal of discussion of the Earth as an integrated chemical and energy system, including consideration for many different forms of ‘Gaia hypotheses’ – most of them far less teleological than James Lovelock’s earliest work, which (probably wrongly) attributed a kind of agency to the planet as a whole. Of particular interest, among the non-telelogical variants, is combination of the anthropic principle with the idea of systems that self-regulate. It may well be that there are planets where physical and chemical processes do not remain constrained between life-compatible bounds over the long term. Of course, there are no living and intelligent observers on these planets to make note of them.

On climate change, Morton fails to appreciate the rapidity with which mitigation must occur. He contemplates what would be necessary to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, whereas we will actually need to make great strides towards stabilizing concentrations by then. Rather than the seven Pacala-Socolow wedges required to produce a flat emissions profile, many more will be needed to begin the decline towards zero net emissions. His calm descriptions of global concentrations of carbon dioxide passing 500 parts per million (ppm), with associated temperature increases of up to four degrees Celsius, fails to portray what a catastrophic outcome this would be. These days, those committed to avoiding change of more than two degrees are advocating concentration targets around 350 ppm.

Morton’s discussion of mitigation technologies also offers scope for criticism; in particular, his discussion of nuclear fusion, fission, and hydrogen fuel cells is fairly superficial and fails to take into consideration some of the major limitations associated with each technology. In particular, he fails to consider the practical and economic issues associated with hydrogen as a fuel. That being said, he strongly makes the point that, in the long run, it will be necessary to move from an economy powered by the built-up solar reserves in fossil fuels to one largely powered by the current energy available in sunlight: whether that energy is directed towards the production of electricity, biomass, or fuels.

At times, the level of detail in Eating the Sun can be overwhelming. In particular, I found that some of the passages about biosphere-atmosphere interaction or long-term geological trends required close and repeated reading to be understood. For the non-practitioners at whom this book is aimed, such knowledge is not likely to be long-lasting. At the same time, by providing such clear and vivid detail, Morton grants a worthwhile understanding of the history and nature of the scientific processes through which we have uncovered so much about the world. As with the very best scientific writing, this book makes you feel both awed about the complexity and power of the world and impressed with the ingenuity that has gone into better understanding it. The book is highly recommended to anyone with an interest in the history of the planet, the nature of the carbon cycle, or science generally.