I know the climate change debate is emotionally charged, but the ugly politics and paranoid thought processes that flow from it are breathtaking. People have become so blinded by their own sense of righteousness that it often makes rational debate all but impossible. What’s doubly disappointing is when this behavior is exhibited by those who…Continue Reading…
There’s a fascinating, informative discussion thread on the dynamics of societal collapse over at The Oil Drum, prompted by a very readable 10,000 word essay on the fall of the Roman empire, cleverly entitled, “Peak Civilization.” This is really complicated stuff that the news media utterly fails to convey, preferring instead to focus on single-cause…Continue Reading…
So the battle is joined: “The complaint has no merit at all,” Jared Diamond tells Science magazine in an exclusive interview published today, referring to the $10 million lawsuit filed against him and The New Yorker, for his April 2008 piece on a blood feud in Papua New Guinea. The Science story is only available…Continue Reading…
Hey, quite a spectacle over at Savage Minds, with a bunch of anthros, (apparent) journos and one sculptor/art historian-turned bloodhound ripping each other to shreds. People, people, is that any way to run a truth squad?
The wolf-pack is tearing away at Jared Diamond. Opportunity knocks: part of the reason…is to reclaim some of the ground among general readers lost to “experts” like Jared Diamond. With this series, StinkyJournalism.org and SavageMinds.org seek to capture that wider general audience for writings about anthropology. If the first essay is any indication of what’s…Continue Reading…
Anthropologists are fretting over the Jared Diamond fallout. Dudes, you can’t have it both ways; you can’t engage the public (which is what many of you want) without risking that your work will be interpreted in ways that you never intended. Diamond is an easy straw man because he’s not a member of your club….Continue Reading…
Some months ago, Joseph Tainter published a withering essay entitled, “Collapse, Sustainability, and the Environment: How Authors Choose to Fail or Succeed.” The title is a clever play off of Jared Diamond’s 2005 best-seller. Anyone interested in an overview of collapse literature and a counter-perspective to the current popularizing of the concept should read Tainter’s…Continue Reading…