Here on Earth: A New Beginning (Unabridged) [Audio Download]

This book is about the vision of Tim Flannery, an author I've enjoyed in the past. It doesn't seek to examine evidence of the state of the planet and our impact on it, the book is very much about the conclusions Tim has come to about the planet's fractured ecosystems. On the whole it makes a for a fascinating read as he guides us through evolutionary ideas and the concepts of Gaia as he understands them, and talks about the impact of humans from the first day that they stepped off the African continent. Research into the concept of the 'super-organism' that is the modern human civilisation I found particularly interesting and has prompted me to search out more reading on this interesting subject.
The book fades towards the end though. I had hoped that it would be bursting with insights and trends that would give hope for the future, instead it tends to drift a little, struggling to find concrete reasons to believe that we'll make it. In the end after a really good few days of reading the conclusion seemed to be no more than 'fingers crossed!'

Tim Flannery has some impressive credentials and a worthy reputation to his name, so what ever he has to say should be read dispassionately or with an open mind, otherwise you might miss some of points he is making.
Having said that for certain readers of this book will divide off into those agreeing, those inspired to come off the fence and those annoyed. To start off with Tim Flannery has a sympathy with the Gaia view of the world, although maybe more as one large interdependent community that one single organism. He refers to civilisations as superorganisms, and draws some comparisons between our communities and those of the ants. He is not comfortable with Richard Dawkins' selfish gene thesis, nor does he embrace the idea of Darwinian `red in tooth and claw' to be the only explanation for the development of Life on Earth.
Filled with fascinating details on the history of Life and the interaction of Humanity with other species and new eco-systems he is making the classic environmentalist plea for Humanity to be more careful, sympathetic and empathetic with the rest of the world otherwise it will out very badly for everything; us included. Of course this is not a new theme, but the depth and clarity of his explanations involving a wide and colourful number of examples makes this a most instructive read. Even if you are set in not agreeing with him (and there are aspects I would tentatively question- those superorganisms actually) I am sure you will find facts you were not aware of in the board spectrum of Natural History, which doesn't mean you will be won over, but gosh it's interesting!
And we are spared an inevitable apocalypse some authors resort to, which tends to negate the reason for their writing; Tim Flannery believes the damage can be healed by using our own accumulated intelligence, but it is up to us. Our choice.
I reckon this to be one of the better contributions to the number of the environmental debates currently active and would recommend it to anyone with a genuine concern from any side of the argument, because as well as being informative this is such an entertaining read.

Reading the reviews to date, I'm somewhat intimidated by them, so much so that further comment might seem redundant, given their comprehensive nature.

I like the idea of mnemes, regardless of spelling, and I would suggest that this book ought to be required reading for every child over the age of 11, not just in the west, but anywhere the book can be distributed. This is also a book that ought to be read with Ian Morris "Why the West Rules" and Susan George's "Whose Crisis, Whose Future". Taken together these books make for a more unified narrative than can be expected of any one volume.

The spirit of optimism, the cornucopia of ideas, of possibilities, and the simple belief in our better selves, make this book a powerful antidote to many of the doomsayers and a very necessary corrective to the Darwin-Dawkins settlement. Having said that, we are running out of time, and just as power generation now and into the future needs to embrace a mix of fossil and nuclear fuels together with renewables, so any attempt to rein in existing environmental instabilities, needs to include and engage with techniques of population management as part of the mix. This appears to be one of the last great taboos in our society and we need to get over it and start to act. Tim Flannery speaks of a projected declining global population from 2050 onwards, yet acknowledges the uncertainties inherent in these projections. If the projections are wrong and there is no substantive change in human reproduction, world population will stand at a little over nine billion. Long before then, I would suggest that life as we know it, in the west, will have become largely untenable. To the extent that I have understood them, neither James Lovelock or Jared Diamond appear believe that we can emerge from the current situation with global civilisation intact. We have it seems, already run out of time, particularly with respect to the climate change tipping point.

Crucially, Tim Flannery scarcely takes account of both the power and the intellectual inertia of the people with the means to implement the many good ideas presented in the book, never mind the blind self-interest, outright hostility and determination to adhere to the winner takes all philosophy of this group. To all practical intents and purposes this includes bankers, the very rich and politicians, pretty much all of whom subscribe to various flavours of social Darwinism. Susan George is very strong on the influence of these groups and the global institutions that are their creatures, institutions that militate against a fairer, more equitable social paradigm for a global society.

As I suggested at the beginning, Flannery's ideas constitute a new and vital mneme in themselves and if we can introduce this book to the worlds children, they will be in a much stronger position to both influence and deal with the outcomes that inevitably lie ahead.