Too Smart for our Own Good: The Ecological Predicament of Humankind

by Craig Dilworth

We are destroying our natural environment at a constantly increasing pace, and in so doing undermining the preconditions of our own existence. Why is this so? This book reveals that our ecologically disruptive behavior is in fact rooted in our very nature as a species.
Drawing on evolution theory, biology, anthropology, archaeology, economics, environmental science and history, this book explains the ecological predicament of humankind by placing it in the context of the first scientific theory of our species’ development, taking over where Darwin left off.
The theory presented is applied in detail to the whole of our seven-million-year history. Due to its comprehensiveness, and in part thanks to its extensive glossary and index, this book can function as a compact encyclopedia covering the whole development of Homo sapiens. It would also suit a variety of courses in the life and social sciences. Most importantly, Too Smart makes evident the very core of the paradigm to which our species must shift if it is to survive.
Anyone concerned about the future of humankind should read this ground-breaking work.

This
• Provides the first and only theory of humankind’s development
• Explains that economic and political (military) power have their respective biological bases in individual vs. group territoriality
• Provides the first classification of human into the survival, sexual and social instincts
• Provides the most inclusive characterization of different kinds of population check yet presented
• Explains the importance of the anthropological, archaeological and economic findings of the past 50 years to understanding humankind’s development
• Clarifies the preconditions for human life on earth
• Predicts what will happen to us in the near future

Genres: Environment, Nonfiction, Anthropology, History, Sustainability, Economics

546 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2009

Reviews

[Nina · Rating 5 out of 5]

In perhaps the most important book that no one will ever read, Craig Dilworth explains the development of the human species, its current state, and the (dim) prospects for our future as being the result of a mechanism he has named the Viscious Circle Principle, defined most simply as follows:

"Humankind's development consists in an accelerating movement from situations of scarcity, to technological innovation, to increased resource availability, to increased consumption, to population growth, to resource depletion, to scarcity once again, and so on."

Each turn of the Viscious Circle has allowed us to draw upon more of the resources of the planet and, because of our sexual and social instincts, use these resources to increase our population, requiring us to develop new methods of extracting resources to feed them. Because the Earth is finite, this is ultimately self-destructive, however it is highly unlikely that humanity will be able to escape this pattern, as short-term benefits will always outweigh long-term costs in our calculations because, throughout human evolution, this strategy has generally tended to work in our favor. After we had extinguished the Pleistocene megafauna (by eating them faster than they could breed) we turned to less optimal species of prey and, eventually, to agriculture, with each new technological innovation increasing our population size as the quantity(though not the quality) of food increased. Our population has expanded at the expense of nearly every other species on Earth, with the exception of the plants and animals we have domesticated to fuel our population growth and the parisitic species that live off our scraps. Each turn of the circle has accelerated the process and Dilworth holds out little, if any, hope that humanity will be able to change its course before it eventually smacks into a resource limitation that no amount of human ingenuity can circumvent, at which point a tremendous die-off will occur.

As one might imagine, this does not make for very pleasant reading, unless one is a complete misanthrope. Dilworth's argument is compelling and his evidence is strong. However, I highly suspect that few will bother to read this book and fewer still will be able to agree with him. Pessimism of this magnitude goes against our instincts. Technological innovation has always saved our bacon in the past and the fact that most of us believe this will continue is illustrated by the fact that, not only can a book with a title as asinine as "Infinite Progress: How the Internet and Technology Will End Ignorance, Disease, Poverty, Hunger, and War" be published, but it also is being shelved in the science section of the bookstore. We want to believe in progress because to do otherwise is just too depressing.

[Keith Akers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, what a book! Craig Dilworth is not content just to rehash the standard anguish over the environment, but to show where our environmental problems really come from. They come from our very nature as a species.

This is not Malthusianism, but it is related. It is a "generalized" Malthusianism which incorporates insights from Darwin (whom Malthus influenced) and to a lesser extent Marx. It is part of a new wave of scientific innovations in anthropology, archeology, and economics. The economics portion is represented by the school of "ecological economics" represented most prominently by Herman Daly.

Dilworth introduces and describes his "Vicious Circle Principle" (abbreviated "VCP"). Whenever humans are faced with shortages, instead of adapting to these shortages they come up with something. This can be a new technology, a new way of behaving, a new device, or whatever. The result of this technical tinkering is that -- it works! The shortages are alleviated and in fact a surplus is created. The result of this surplus is that population increases, creating new shortages, and we're back to square one. These shortages can be shortages of food, but do not have to be (thus this is not classic Malthus). This cycle continues until at some point all the earth's resources are exhausted. At that point -- well, that's where we are right now.

Dilworth further shows that the VCP is not some systemic consequence of modern capitalism but in fact is part of our nature as a species -- in fact, it predates our evolution as homo sapiens. He goes back to apes, protohominids, and Austrolopithecus (up to 7 millions ago) to show that this "tinkering" is part of our nature. It is part of our species' "karyotype," a term which he defines but which is hard to understand, and even after staring at the glossary definition and having read the entire book, I'm not sure I could explain it, but I think I have a pretty good idea.

The best part of the book is where he talks about human prehistory. Many years ago, I read Mark Nathan Cohen's book The Food Crisis in Prehistory: Overpopulation and the Origins of Agriculture, which deeply influenced me. Dilworth quotes Cohen a lot and clearly approves of his work, as well as of books such as Herman Daly's book Ecological Economics: Principles And Applications which deal with the same subject matter from the point of view of modern economics. It is this reasoning, stretching across multiple disciplines, which is the most convincing, and which convinces me that we are not just dealing with a political or an economic problem. We are dealing with a biological problem.

And what is really interesting is that this guy is a professor of philosophy. By truly delving into many different disciplines, he has done a lot to redeem the ideal of philosophy. This despite the fact that (as revealed in a YouTube video I found somewhere) he doesn't think very much of modern philosophy -- it's still stuck in the pointless analytic trap. He also doesn't think much of humanity's future, and he doesn't talk about what we can do to deal with our ecological predicament. Based on the same YouTube video, he thinks we are heading for extinction and won't be around much longer. But this is a small shortcoming in a book so clearly innovative in so many ways.

Thanks for writing this, Dr. Dilworth.

[Natasha Hurley-Walker · Rating 4 out of 5]

To summarise: we will never innovate our way out of this mess, since it's our innovative nature which got us into this mess in the first place.

I'm now considerably more pessimistic about the chances of technological civilisation surviving the 21st century. And, I don't even feel like it's worth saving! Eesh. So I'm not sure whether can recommend this, since no one wants their friends to be miserable, and unless everyone on the entire planet read it, AND we started on some kind of mandatory testosterone-suppressant and contraceptive drug routine, we're still screwed.

Suddenly David Brin's Glory Season and James Tiptree Jr's Houston Houston Do You Read look like fascinating alternatives to an unending cycle driven by our territorial instincts.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

The essential issue facing mankind is how to provide for the 9 billion people, a whopping 45% increase in population forecasted for 2050. There are 4 general narratives about this issue:
A: Business as usual, the Dick Cheney, Deutsche Bank one;
B. Technology and innovation will allow save us, the Lester Brown Tom Friedman one;
C. Community and Curtailment, Pat Murphy et.al; and
D. Death and Destruction; James Lovelock or as Tom Friedman calls it, the Ecopessimist view.

This narrative definitely falls into one of the latter two. As Tom Friedman begrudgingly acknowledges, the ecopessimists are possibly or even probably correct.

One's view of this book most likely mirrors to which one of the aforementioned narratives one subscribes.

If one views climate destabilization as simply a matter of too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, then one's range of solutions is limited to restricting emissions. If one, however,views climate destabilization as a symptom of a more complex imbalance of humankind's relationship to the planet and its systems, then I think you will find this book especially interesting and even provocative. As opposed to the first reviewer who found the research outdated and incomplete, I found it spot on. The argument is meticulously and methodically developed. The argument is based on a systems-thinking view of the world, one that most people trained in analytical thinking find quite difficult. The argument is based in complexity and complex systems drawing research from many disciplines, namely biology, anthropology, archeology, economics, and philosophy, together into a principle of human development called the Vicious Cycle Principle. To completely bastardize the argument for brevity's sake, we innovate out of need, not desire or surplus, and each innovation consumes more energy and exploits the earth's resources further digging us a deeper hole.

I found the book extremely interesting. But then again, I'm one of those ecopessimists and it confirms my own research and worldview.

Ignore this book at your and the earth's peril. How we think about the biggest issues facing us as a civilization, will determine our fate.

[Robin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sadly, this is an old-hat thesis that humans are naturally destructive. Reminiscent of Tim Flannery; and beefed up with out-of-date and selective research.

The anthropology, archaeology, and much of the ecological data is referenced from secondary sources, much of which is exceedingly poor. I was surprised at just how poor these sections were.

Some parts of it are an interesting read. It's a shame that the research quality is so varied, which sadly reduced this text to an interesting pub chat about an issue rather than a systematically well researched argument. He tries to show that he is extending the work of Darwin in some way by a range of selective citations, but Darwin's views are not consistent with Dilworth's thesis. Disappointing. I wrote the very first review on the Publishes web site, which was deleted after one day. Hmmmm

Despite the negatives, it is worth a read if for no other reason than to get people to think about a serious global issue. And as I say, some of it is interesting.

Robin

[Richard Reese · Rating 5 out of 5]

According to humans, the human brain is a miraculous organ. No other species is even half as intelligent as we think we are. But we’re seriously beating the planet, we’re not having fun, and everything is getting worse. This is called progress. Circle what is wrong with this picture.

Craig Dilworth circled humans. Modern society drove him nuts, because it was so self-destructive. It simply made no sense, from the perspective of the dominant worldview, which worshipped the most incredible organism in the entire universe. How could a creature so brilliant act like this?

Dilworth, a very clever lad, eventually discovered a perspective from which our freaky behavior actually made perfect sense. He called it the “ecological worldview,” and he thoroughly described it in his book Too Smart For Our Own Good.

There was a time, long ago, when everyone’s ancestors lived with the ecological worldview, and some tribal people still do. In the last 40 years or so, a few civilized people have been rediscovering it. New ideas emerging from anthropology, archaeology, and economics have revealed that “primitive” living was awesome in many ways. Life was not “nasty, brutish, and short.”

Our wild ancestors were well nourished, very healthy, and enjoyed a leisurely way of life in an endless unspoiled wilderness. The air was clean, the water was pure, the rivers were filled with salmon, and there were countless mastodons and mammoths. The Upper Paleolithic era (40,000 – 25,000 BP) may have been the high point of the human journey. In many ways, it’s been downhill since then.

Unfortunately, the billions of people who now live with the mainstream worldview would be insulted by Dilworth’s theory, because it perceives civilized people in a most unflattering manner. Fortunately, people who are capable of thinking outside the box are starting to tune in to the new ideas and gasp with excitement — coherence at last!

Anyway, in the beginning, when our ancient ancestors still lived in trees, everything was just great. Then the climate got toasty, forests disappeared, and many of our tree-dwelling relatives went extinct. Our ancestors’ bodies were perfect for living in trees, but comically unsuitable for life on the ground. We were an easy lunch for hungry predators. We couldn’t outrun them, but we could stand up and shower them with rocks. Our new career had begun.

Our hands, eyes, and brains co-evolved. Branches became throwing sticks and spears. Rocks became projectiles, hammers, and cutters. We kept inventing more and more tools, and accumulating them. Eventually we became dependent on tools for our survival — a dangerous tendency, magnified by our limited powers of foresight. Mistakes are often our best teachers.

Hunter-gatherers were able to thrive for vast periods of time without trashing the land because they lived sustainably. Infanticide was moral because it prevented the misery of overpopulation. It would have been immoral and antisocial to keep a newborn when the No Vacancy light was on (chimps and gorillas also kill newborns). It wasn’t murder because a newborn did not become a person until the family decided to accept it.

Dilworth hammers on the obvious benefits of voluntarily limiting population, because it’s such an important idea. The mainstream worldview disagrees, of course. Living in a temporary bubble of abundant food and energy can make big throbbing brains forget many things. But when the dark ages return, the notion that every human life is sacred will promptly walk off the stage.

Using terrible weapons of mass destruction — the lance and the javelin — we hunted our way to every corner of the planet, eliminating most of the large animals. Then we switched to bows and arrows and chased the smaller stuff. Then we moved to shorelines and lived on aquatic critters. Up against the wall, because of population pressure, we made the fateful decision to till the soil and enslave plants and animals. This brought an end to a long era of relative stability (slow-motion growth).

There was a pattern here, and it went all the way back to when we first became tool addicts — necessity was the mother of invention. Dilworth called it the vicious circle principle (VCP): “Humankind’s development consists in an accelerating movement from situations of scarcity, to technological innovation, to increased resource availability, to increased consumption, to population growth, to resource depletion, to scarcity once again, and so on.” It was a merry-go-round that kept spinning faster and faster. We created a monster that never stopped eating and expanding.

With the arrival of agriculture, voluntary population control faded, and our numbers rose sharply. Farmers were into growth, because there was safety in numbers. Warfare was becoming an extermination game, and small conservative communities were sure to be erased and replaced by big, dynamic, pro-growth societies. It was like an arms race, where villages were absorbed into chiefdoms, which were absorbed into kingdoms, which were absorbed into empires. Grow or die!

As societies grew, they became more complex, and more socially stratified — a small group of well-fed elites, and a large group of serfs and slaves that lived near starvation on a meager diet of bread or potatoes. Women lost status. Contagious diseases became very popular.

Dilworth wished that non-renewable resources never existed. Life would be dramatically better today if we had never had access to metals and fossil carbon. He believed that we passed the point of no return when folks started pounding on metal. This sparked a perfect storm of industrial insanity. I’m inclined to think that the point of no return had more to do with the domestication of plants and animals, which radically changed our relationship with the family of life.

Dilworth does not believe that radical changes in philosophy and worldview will happen in time. “Consequently human civilization — primarily Western techno-industrial urban society — will self-destruct, producing massive environmental damage, social chaos and megadeath. We are entering a new dark age, with great dieback.” Will we survive?

I’ve only scratched the surface here. This book is a big cornucopia of ideas. It’s time we took off our blinders. It’s time we quit pretending that the huge oncoming super-storm doesn’t exist. It’s good to be present in reality, thinking clearly, and teaching our huge brains the amazing magical juju of foresight.

[Muhammad al-Khwarizmi · Rating 4 out of 5]

The most depressing book I've ever read. Will probably continue to challenge my mental well-being for years hence.

[Steve Hansen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dilworth is a professor, originally Canadian, now at Uppsala University in Sweden. The book is a very thorough and minutely detailed analysis of human history, evolution and economics in the fatal predicament we find ourselves in. He focuses on what he calls the VCP - vicious circle principle: new technology enables exploitation of new resources, which enables new population growth; the resources get depleted, which calls forth new technology aimed at new resources. He views the stages of human history in terms of this cycle.

[Yanick Punter · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this but think it is already outdated and somewhat flawed.