Dangerous Years, David W. Orr
Dangerous Years, David W. Orr
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Dangerous Years
Climate Change, the Long Emergency, and the Way Forward

Author: David W. Orr

Narrator: Danny Campbell

Unabridged: 10 hr 34 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 01/03/2017


Synopsis

This gripping, deeply thoughtful book considers the future of civilization in the light of what we know about climate change and related threats. David Orr, an award-winning, internationally recognized leader in the field of sustainability and environmental education, pulls no punches: Even with the Paris Agreement of 2015, Earth systems will not reach a new equilibrium for centuries. Earth is becoming a different planet—more threadbare and less biologically diverse, with more acidic oceans and a hotter, more capricious climate. Furthermore, technology will not solve complex problems of sustainability.

Yet we are not fated to destroy the Earth, Orr insists. He imagines sustainability as a quest and a transition built upon robust and durable democratic and economic institutions, as well as changes in heart and mindset. The transition, he writes, is beginning from the bottom up in communities and neighborhoods. He lays out specific principles and priorities to guide us toward enduring harmony between human and natural systems.

About David W. Orr

David W. Orr is Counselor to the President and Paul Sears Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Oberlin College. Prominent in the creation of the Green Campus movement, he cofounded the Meadowcreek Project, the Oberlin Project, and the journal Solutions. He lives in Oberlin, Ohio.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Morten on February 11, 2017

I found nothing to disagree with in this book. Literally nothing! This is sad considering the bleak picture of our current predicament that Orr paints; the sheer scale of the corruption of societal governance that he identifies. His account hinges on the idea of a "long emergency" tied to the triple......more

Goodreads review by Brendan on November 20, 2017

This is not my first Orr-led rodeo, and I would argue this is perhaps his worst book I have encountered yet. That's not because the ideas in this book are bad, merely a dense aggregation of green consciousness rhetoric that covers a lot of the bases. However, Orr does gloss over/ignore environmental......more

Goodreads review by Elizabeth on February 17, 2017

Lot's of great info here, which is sometimes scientific, but still easy to understand. I wish that every American would read the chapter titled "Denial," because Orr brings up some excellent reasons why we choose to "not believe" in climate change. Here is one that resonated with me: "Americans, in......more