This site was launched in November 2010. Posts that are dated earlier than that originally appeared in Brace for Impact, the blog associated with my book of the same name, published in 2009. This site is a personal enterprise, having no connection with any other company or organization. For more information about my books, or to buy them, go here.
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Note to Readers May 13, 2024
The precious few folks who are still checking here for content deserve an apology and an explanation. I apologize for stiffing you for so long. And I want to explain.
I have been writing about the imminent collapse of industrial civilization in this space for 15 years, since the publication of my book on the subject, Brace for Impact. During that time I have often been asked if I have grown tired of making predictions that never come true. The answer is in two parts: 1) I do not make predictions, I am not qualified to do so, I report on the predictions of others; and 2) almost all of the predictions I have reported here are coming true, with the speed and immutability of a glacier.
The fact is that I am pretty much burned out on this issue. As was the case 15 years ago, the seas are still rising, the storms still intensifying, the forests are burning, the deserts spreading, the topsoil disappearing, emissions are setting new record highs every year, we are still running out of oil (despite the relentless hype to the contrary) and governments are steadfastly ignoring all of it. In all this time, no meaningful action has been taken by our (US) government, or any other that I know of, to confront the multiple existential threats. The issue barely appears in public polls about “issues.” In one recent political poll, only nine percent of registered voters identified climate change as an important consideration.
Back when my book was published, the people who were crying out the equivalent of “The British are coming!” were outliers. Many scientists knew we were right, but did not wish to “alarm the public” — by which they meant to endanger their sources of funding — and for years they mumbled about how things were going to get really bad if we didn’t do something real soon. “Real soon” passed some time in the 1970s, when “the British” passed us and left us in the dust while we were riding our turtles at top speed to warn the home team.
Now, as climate refugees begin to stream across the country, as funds for disaster relief become scarce and home insurance becomes prohibitively expensive or unavailable in stricken regions, as sea water invades coastal cities, towns, farms and aquifers, as summer temperatures soar to the limits of human survival in some of our major cities, the public discourse is about the price of gas, the threat of immigrants and womens’ rights to an abortion.
Whenever I try to write again about these steadily advancing threats, I find I have said what I have to say already, and I cannot find a reason to keep repeating myself.
Meanwhile, I have been writing in other venues about another lifelong interest of mine — politics. And while I have found no reason to be optimistic about the fate of our civilization in the long term, I am upbeat about the prospects for temporary relief offered by this year’s national elections. Once again I find myself taking an outlier’s position, but this time the outcome is within our grasp and will manifest in seven months.
Whenever I have written about politics here the reaction from the regulars has been, well, tepid. But there aren’t many regulars left, and rather than leave a black hole here I propose to make my case in the next few months about the only institution in our country that is more endangered by its suicidal stupidity than industrial civilization — the Republican party. I am fully aware that this is the same thing as rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, but it is either that or, as one couple on the sinking ship famously did, just go to bed and wait for the end.
If politics is not your cup of tea, I’m sorry yet again, but that is what floats my boats at the moment.
The Daily Impact
Thank you so much for the time and effort you must put into this site. I have been checking in regularly since I first discovered it. Many write about the environment as though it somehow existed outside of a corporation-dominated political system. It seems to me we need to replace our systems of power if we are to have any hope of saving our environment. The corporate elite and their supporters in government are madmen and they will not stop until they have everything — or until they are stopped.
Thank you for what you do,
Faith
I am unable to comment on this post, or any post, so I’m replying here.
I haven’t gotten Tom’s emails for a year or two, so I just assumed the worst. I’m thrilled to see you’re still with us Tom! I’d like to re-subscribe but I get an error. Can anyone help?
Just found your blog, what a gift. after i’ve done some more reading i’m sure i’ll chime in when i have something to add. At this point, i think of world problems as i used to think about my horses, “if I want another horse, how many more acres will i need to fence?” Hunters around here have a similar way of seeing it though i doubt many of them realize it, “if we don’t shoot the deer, they will over populate, over graze and starve.” Mother Nature, bitch that she can be, is not sentimental about her creatures; if they over populate, they starve. Capitalism, the mother of these dastardly coorperations that promote growth, growth, growth is not sentimental either. want to guess who wins?
i’m going to buy your book as soon as i get some money in my checking account which i use only for ebay. just sent you a facebook friend request.
Thank you, Mary, and welcome to our (crashing) world.
Seems to me that far more people sit around and talk about or document our collapse – far far fewer try to take meaningful action?
That’s because little meaningful action can be taken anymore, if by ‘meaningful action’ you mean doing something to prevent the collapse.
On the other hand, we can warn individuals to prepare for the collapse by presenting the facts about it. That would surely count as one type of ‘meaningful action’ in which this blog is engaged.
BRILLIANT!
Just rambled into your website. Appreciate the level of realism, informed reflection, and judgement variously suspended — or not. Thought you might find this – http://www.rogetlockard.com/bwf/prologue.php – from my website above, of interest — along with its predecessor from the mid-’80s, here: http://www.rogetlockard.com/pdf/AlcoholicEarth.pdf
Their underlying thesis grapples with the question, “If we’re so smart, why are we hastening to our doom?” The answer eschews blame and elevates human longing — while understanding how shortcuts to fulfillment are our downfall — as usual.
Here’s one take on that:
Craving & Longing
When I am in my addictive consciousness,
I don’t merely want the object
of my craving; I want
‐ I cling to ‐
the craving itself.
*
For, while I confuse the object of my craving
with fulfillment,
the craving itself
is confused with longing.
*
And my being knows
that longing is essential,
and sacred.
Thanks for being here.
In The Fall of the Leaves, you refer to radioactive leaks from nuclear power plants harming trees. There is absolutely no radiation leakage from nuclear power plants that harms anyone or anything. That is simply a fact. The pouring of sulphur dioxide from coal fired power plants into our atmosphere
The emissions referred to are not of radiation, but of radioactive Carbon 14 and cesium. SAee the article linked in the piece, and see http://nuclear-news.net/2015/04/03/nuclear-power-plants-continuously-emit-carbon-14-to-the-environment/.
Completing my input – SO2 from coal plants produces acid rain which is a major player in the harm to our forests.
I think we’ve gone way past the point where we can still compose pseudo-Haikus to indulge our idle fancies on the nature of things. Some practical advice on how to prepare for the coming mess ought to be a whole lot more helpful.
Well, then again, perhaps we’ve finally reached the point where there’s really nothing we can do anymore besides compose pseudo-Haikus to indulge our idle fancies… (Shrugs.)
The post by me immediately above was intended as a response to Roget Lockard’s post.
Vacation* is over, time to get back to work. Yep, I’m old and tired too, but I gotta’ keep on keeping on.
* I guess you scholar types call it ‘sabbatical’. Well, whatever the hell you call it, time’s up – start typing!
Oh all right. Dang it.
Don’t make me come out there!
Oh, all RIGHT!
OK, I get it; with so little of import going on in the world lately, why bother to comment?
Apparently ur not writin any more posts. I don’t mean to dis you but I seen this comming. and I don’t want to catastrophize the situation – I mean, who would even notice that the disintegration of the english language might be linked to the slow collapse of our society. Cause? effect?..Who knows or even cares….Anyway, I gotta go next store and pay my daughter back some money she borrowed me last month to buy some spinners for my camero. Ya see, my pal Vince got some for his car and it made me jealous.
I ordered a copy of Brace for Impact (from an independent bookseller, not Amazon); it just arrived, and I look forward to reading it.
Tom, I hope you’re still alive and more-or-less well.
I was perusing some of your posts in light of the recent election. In one, you write, “why isn’t anyone taking him (Trump) seriously, let alone quaking in fear?”
My answer: Trump is quite old given the task before him. He is burdened with the emotional maturity of a five-year-old and is a Gemini to boot; this means that his personality tends to vacillate between active and passive modes – an asset to an artist or actor, but of little use to an administrator.
Additionally, while clever at times, he lacks true intelligence. He is both unread (therefore ignorant) and incompetent. Such would account for his many business failures. And of real courage he knows little.
In these respects, he shares little with the likes of Hitler, other than certain sociopathic tendencies and alcohol abstinence.
I’ve come to believe that Trump’s ascent is more of a symptom than a cause. I doubt that his impact will be as tumultuous as many believe. America, as we have come to know it, has been on its way down hill for some time. You know this.
True, Covid and Trump represent inflection points of some note, but the writing has been on the wall for perhaps decades.
Frankly, Tom, I’m happy to be an old man. I believe you and I have lived thru the best of the America experience.
Ta!