“If control is the problem, then, by the logic of the Anthropocene, still more control must be the solution” -Elizabeth Kolbert
Elizabeth Kolbert's book, Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future, her third and final book to be covered in this series of articles—the first on Field Notes from a Catastrophe and the second on The Sixth Extinction—grapples with this paradoxical idea and acts as the culmination of her environmental journalism and exploration of the Anthropocene up until this point. After my second read-through of the text, I think it serves as a great standalone book and a phenomenal addition to her growing portfolio of work—her latest book, H is for Hope, and the 10th anniversary of The Sixth Extinction were both released since I started my critical readings for these articles, showing her environmental journalism is ongoing.
Kolbert writes in a way that makes it clear there is nuance to everything. There is an excitement that comes across in Kolbert's discussion of human ingenuity in solving the problems people created, but it always has an underlying current of melancholy. It feels at once to have the bleakest outlook on humanity's future and the most hopeful. In my opinion, this book is the most infused with Kolbert's emotions and ponderings about humanity's impact on the planet. Kolbert breaks the book up into three sections, each with a focus on solutions in the area she is discussing, as well as containing a second meaning. The first section, “Down the River,” opens with her commenting on how rivers are too good at being used as metaphors. There are two chapters in this section in which she discusses the many problems faced by American rivers, such as the deterioration of the Louisiana coastline caused by levees blocking river flow. The section quickly illustrates Kolbert's complex feelings about man-made solutions to man-made problems and uses the section to ask the reader if humanity and the environment are already being sent down the river with no return from climate catastrophe. The following sections, “Into the Wild” and “Up in the Air,” are similar in that they express not just the content of the chapters within their sections but also reflect the deeper feelings and questions that Kolbert infuses her work with.
Under a White Sky is a book about the complicated nature of trying to find solutions to man-made problems. Throughout the book, she talks about the variety of ways people have tried to find solutions for many problems faced by Earth's ecosystems, which had unintended consequences that just created a new set of problems. An example that stood out is how Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring had the beneficial effect of reducing pesticide use in American environments, but her alternative solution of having biological agents go against each other led to the introduction of the invasive Asian carp into Arkansas and eventually other American waterways. One of the key points of this book is that interventions do not always go as planned.
Kolbert connects back to The Sixth Extinction with additional insight into the ways people grapple with extinction. In the book's second section “Into the Wild,” there's a chapter on the Devil’s Hole pupfish. Like with the Amazonian amphibians discussed in The Sixth Extinction, people have gone so far as to create an artificial environment to help the pupfish thrive. Unlike with the amphibians, there is no particular benefit for these animals to exist outside of the single small ecosystem they inhabit. Kolbert asks throughout the chapter why we fight to preserve these species. Not every species is a keystone species or beneficial to large ecosystems and yet Kolbert points out that when we as people feel directly involved with the demise of another species, we feel the need to save it. The growing demand for water for settlements around Devil's Hole, the only naturally occurring habitat for the pupfish, makes people directly responsible for what happened to them. One of the poignant points in this section is that empathy and a sense of responsibility go a long way in preserving a species.
The story of the pupfish is just one of many complicated cases she covers: selective breeding of super corals, started by her late friend, marine biologist Ruth Gates, and using CRISPR technology to lessen the potency of cane toad toxins in Australia are two of the cases that she shares to show how genetic engineering is a way to catch animals up to changing environments. The super corals are meant to be a way to preserve coral reefs in an ocean that grows more acidic by the day. Crossbreeding more resistant colonies of corals can help create a population of coral that can survive the changing ocean. The less toxic cane toads would still be enough to get animals that eat them sick but would not kill them, allowing animals to learn and pass on that knowledge that cane toads are not edible, which is something that has been hard for native Australian wildlife, and wildlife in other regions where cane toads are invasive. Genetic engineering is a powerful tool people have in the fight to preserve ecosystems, and yet neither of these examples, as Kolbert points out, tackles the root causes of the issues but rather are our attempts to adapt to the world as it is now and will soon become.
The final case I want to discuss, and the namesake of the book, is the use of solar geoengineering with reflective particles in the sky. This example stood out to me because it is the clearest example of how a solution is simultaneously a problem. Distributing these particles throughout the atmosphere can have the effect of reflecting sunlight away from the Earth, cooling it down. Solar geoengineering is described in the book as an almost inevitable solution, yet like many of the solutions talked about throughout the book, it is only a bandage. To continuously use airplanes to distribute new particles throughout the sky as old particles fall not only raises carbon emissions even more, but also increases the number of particles needed to reflect sunlight. Any global catastrophe or war that prevented this distribution would also cause temperatures to increase drastically in a short period of time. The most striking change to Kolbert is that these particles would likely turn the sky white, hence the title of the book. The sky of the near future could be white. I believe Kolbert chose this example to end the book with as well as to name the book after because it is such a good example of the themes of solutions and problems, as well as a powerful piece of imagery to make people think about the future we are quickly approaching.
Under a White Sky, and all of Elizabeth Kolbert's books for that matter, are books I strongly recommend. Not only do they have incredibly interesting and well-written accounts of things going on on our human-controlled planet, but Kolbert infuses her work with her own reflexivity, making them feel like they are actively trying to engage in conversation with the reader. I hope you will consider having that conversation yourself by giving these books a read.
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