The World Without Us
by: Alan Weisman
Publisher: Picador (2007)
$21.00
Staff Pick by comrade: PM
In The World Without US, Weisman lays out the results of his exhaustive research on the thought experiment: what would happen to the world (flora, fauna, ecosystems, infrastructure and buildings, etc.) if humans disappeared? Around this centerpiece, Weisman reports on ancient underground cities, the horrifying fate of plastics, little known prehistories, and more. In the end, this book is as much the story of humankind's disastrous rise and the impact of our present practice as it is a hypothesis about the world without us.