Did Alan Weisman’s book The World Without Us get your mind spinning about what our planet would look like if we just suddenly disappeared? Well, get ready to spin some more, courtesy of a new book by University of Leicester geologist Jan Zalasiewicz.
Titled The Earth After Us: What Legacy Will Humans Leave in the Rocks?, Zalasiewicz’s book explores what an alien geologist might be able to learn about our species from the geological record. And, like The World Without Us, it sounds like a fascinating — and sobering — read.
Zalasiewicz offers this perspective from our imaginary geologist of the future: “There is no doubt now. An organized culture arose, and settled on the land surface. We have little detail yet, and are now excavating. It seems to have been extremely shortlived. I suspect the site would not have been discovered at all had it not been associated with one of the perturbation events that we have been trying to decipher.”
The concept offers a serious cautionary tale for us humans, according to the University of Leicester’s news release about the book.
“Looking to the distant future gives us a warning for the present: our activities have already left a significant footprint on the planet, and not a flattering one. It is not too late to limit it. We would not wish to be dubbed by future explorers the ‘amazingly clever and utterly foolish two-legged ape.’ ”
While Zalasiewicz’s geology-focused perspective is a fresh one, the idea of what legacy humans will leave behind isn’t. Recall, for example, Percy Bysshe Shelley’s classic work, “Ozymandias”:
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
‘My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
You can learn more about Zalasiewicz’s book at the Oxford University Press Website.
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Shirley Siluk Gregory
Shirley Siluk Gregory, a transplanted Chicagoan now living in Northwest Florida, represents the progressive half of Green Options' Red, Green and Blue segment. She holds a bachelor's degree in Geological Sciences from Northwestern University but graduated in 1984, just when the market for geologists was flatter than the Florida landscape. Just as well, though: she had little interest in spending her life either in a laboratory or, heaven forbid, an oil field. So, of course, she went into journalism. After extremely low-paying but fun and educational stints at several suburban Chicago weeklies and dailies, Shirley and her then-boyfriend/now-husband Scott found themselves displaced by a media buyout and spending the next several years working as freelancers. Among their credits: The Chicago Tribune, a publication for the manufactured-housing industry, and Web Hosting Magazine, a now-defunct publication that came and went with the dotcom era. Shirley's always been concerned about nature and conservation (and an avid pack-rat, as her family can attest to), but became even more rabidly interested in the environment primarily due to two factors: the growing signs that global warming was real and threatening, and the birth of her son, Noah, in 2003. Suddenly, the prospect of a world that might not be quite as habitable in 40 or 50 years took on a whole new, and personal, meaning. Living where she lives now also helped light the fire of Shirley's environmental awareness: her hometown was severely damaged by Hurricane Ivan in 2004, and beaten up again by Hurricane Dennis in 2005. That, and the fact that she and her family were vacationing in New Orleans until the day before Katrina -- and spent 12 hours driving home for a trip that normally takes 3 -- has made Shirley deeply appreciate how fragile our lifestyles are, and how dependent they are on sound management of natural resources and sustainable living practices. That's why she's become a passionate reader and writer about all things green and sustainable.
2 Responses to What Will Earth Look Like in 100 Million Years?
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I think it would be awesome to see what the future would be like. How people have changed and what technology there is.
Humans have already left an indelible imprint on this planet that will no doubt influence how any future explorers judge us. I do not think it will paint a flattering picture but who knows? Perhaps that future archaeologist will herself bare our own DNA.