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Collapse by Jared Diamond
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Thanks Lu, for finally getting me to read this book. It's been lurking in my bookshelf for ages. Once I read the prologue, I realised I had seen some of these collapsed societies (although not ones discussed in the book) over the years. I've had the privilege of visiting Sri Lanka's Ancient Cities which are like those romantic lost cities in the rain forest that he describes (the Rain Forest just looks a bit more like Limpopo). I also visited Fatehpur Sikri near Agra in India last year which supported a larger population than London in the 16th century and was subsequently abandoned (probably due to a lack of water).
The nice part of Montana is that one can visualise the scenery - having watched "A River runs through it". I have the book lurking around here somewhere - it's beautifully written.
The part that particularly resonated with me was the section on p58 and onwards on the agricultural industry. There are a large number of parallels to the South African industry (bear with me, I spent 10 years financing farmers until last year).
Similar to Montana, the South African farming population is ageing, the majority of farmers are over 45 and many children are choosing not to follow their parents. Land being the farmer's pension in South Africa as well, the farms are sold to other land uses and/or to other farmers.
The land price issue is also present in various forms. In Mpumalanga (our best agricultural land), farmers can no longer compete with mines on land prices resulting in much prime agricultural land being given over to mining. Similar to Montana, the side effects of the mining is being felt by agriculture in terms of lower water quality, air pollution, less water available etc. And similar to Montana, there is no constructive effort to manage the competing requirements of agriculture and mining. We don't have comparable agricultural land in terms of productivity in South Africa, so this is a problem.
The result is that farmers are driven out of the province to farm more marginal land elsewhere. South Africa is one of those countries scheduled to get warmer with climate change, so the marginal lands will only be available for a limited time.
In terms of the farmers being unable to compete with rich out-of-towners, that effect is seen in places like Limpopo and Eastern Cape. In our case, farms which have traditionally been used for cattle farming is being bought up and turned into nature reserves with 5 star lodges. I think that is a fairly benign outcome since the lodges probably provide more employment opportunities than the cattle farms and it actually returns the land to its original purpose, but it means we have less extensive cattle farming. (which means more feedlots, with higher overall energy consumption to produce the same volume of beef).
Similarly South African farmers are faced with costs increasing faster than commodity prices. So you have farmers being more effective (average yields of South African maize has increased by at least a third over the past 15 years), but it is accompanied by higher use of fertilizer, etc and more capital intensive. We've lost 500,000 employment opportunities in agriculture over the past 10 years.
He also mentions in the prologue the effect of long term weather cycles. In South Africa we are now moving from a 20 year "wet" cycle to a traditionally 20 year "dry" cycle. Those human memories are important that he mentions. During the recent wetter years, farmers started planting maize at higher densities in North West and experimenting with "Mpumalanga" cultivars. During the first real dry season two years ago, the farmers who still planted at lower densities had higher overall yields in the province.
I am looking forward to the next section.
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http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/144fa8...
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/1f7866...
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I really enjoyed the case study of Montana. I also found the agricultural situation very interesting, as it has bearing on my study area. The societies that I look at also had agricultural problems with soil losing nutrients and over-cultivation of land.
The Climate - South Africa was affected by a "Little Ice Age" in the Middle Iron Age and a bit beyond (thus 1300 - 1750). And as I study this time period I find the effects of climate very interesting.
This Little Ice Age is seen as a contributing factor of the decline of 2 great civilizations in southern Africa (Mapungubwe and Great Zimbabwe). A lot about the effects and when climatic cooling actually affected the Iron Age is still debated. But we do see these societies moving to different climates as they just couldn't sustain their populations anymore.
What you are saying about our current weather cycle's is very interesting! I am sometimes so focused in the past that I forget we are having similar problems today.
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I don't have anything major to add from the first chapter of the book but the comments about farming were really interesting. I love the fact that the Eastern Cape has gone toward the game farm idea instead of domestic animals. It is so much better for the land to support animals that were historically there and there is an added benefit of the eco tourism side. The fact that it means game is easily available to eat instead of beef makes me very happy as well.
Of course, there are challenges behind the change but the ones I think about are the fact that you need to be careful to introduce only animals which historically occurred there or you can have problems (savannah warthog is a menace in the area as it is different to the extinct cape warthog). I used to be very anti hunting until I befriended a hunter and had done good deep chats about it. I think now that it can be a good thing as long as it is managed properly.
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Although I know of Easter Island, I really didn't know much about it other than that it had these big statues. (And my most recent interaction with those were confined to a TV programmes on CBeebies called Zingzillas which my daughters watch).
So I found the chapter very interesting. I was under the impression that there were no people living on the island at all, and learnt that there are actually a local population. I was fascinated by the description of the stone chicken houses and the theories on how the statues were moved etc.
His final comment about the Earth being so remote from any other planet and therefore being in a similar situation to Easter Island although on a more cosmic scale really made an impression on me.
He discussed the various theories on whether the population originated from South America or Polynesia. There is a section devoted to it in The Seven Daughters of Eve: The Science That Reveals Our Genetic Ancestry where they describe how mitochondrial DNA was used to track the various ancestors on those islands and I think determine the settlement pattern. My mother has our shared copy of the book, so I wasn't able to verify my memory accurately. That's another great book to read, by the way.
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Secondly it makes me sad to remember that the Redhouse River Mile which is the oldest Mile swim in the country is now swum in the Sundays River because the water at Redhouse is too toxic. The guys at the Aquarium tell me that I don't want to get access to their data or I would very quickly so my ocean swims.
Lastly I am just frustrated by how politics work. The people who ultimately make the decisions actually don't know what they are talking about. They claim to get info from scientists but I'm pretty sure they don't understand much of it. I work in the public sector so I have first hand knowledge of this. Our director was basically forced out by the unions. We got a replacement for a year ago had been deputy director with us a few years back before moving to another museum. He refused to stay after the year so they set us this guy who was apparently great because in his numerous years in the department he had worked in most of the sections. Head Office officials could not see that by staying in one section you can become an expert in that area. Instead we got someone who knows little to nothing about museums who must manage a large understaffed museum which incorporates two specialist zoos. Even for someone with museum experience that's a huge job. He is doing the best he can but the fact that he is all they could give us is unacceptable.
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I think the other problem with science and politicians stem from the fact that on some subjects there is just too much information and some of it will be contradictory. So unless you are actually a scientist by trade or you have some system to identify the really important stuff, you get information overload and eventually nothing gets done, because all the piles of evidence are debated, but nobody has the ability to make a decision. It's not limited to politicians and definitely not to South African ones.
A few years ago, some Scandinavian scientist did an exercise on global warming where they did the cost-benefit analysis on some of the main causes and potential actions basically to be able to point politicians in a direction, because so few decisions were made. And even when decisions are made, the side effects may not always be understood.
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My knowledge of Pitcairn is limited to my (very limited) knowledge of Mutiny on the Bounty and that pretty much consists of having seen the tomb of Captain Bligh in the churchyard in London - the church is now the Museum of Garden History.
I found he descriptions of the intra-island trade very interesting and the whole process that they use to compare stuff across islands to decide the origin thereof. We tend to think that trade is a modern invention dependent on modern transport and logistics, but it has been around for centuries.
On the other hand, the chapter reminded me that Nation is one of my favourite Pratchett's and I haven't read it in ages. So many books to read...
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This was all new to me. I've read references to the settlements in books over the years (mostly just as landscape descriptions), so I found this very interesting. I would love to know if there is some animals that leave similar middens than the packrats in Southern Africa for you to use in your work, Lu.
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I was amazed at how many statues there were! I thought there were only like 6 or something. I knew nothing about the island, so it was really fascinating!
What fascinated me was the zooarchaeology side! So many dolphin bones! I want to dig there! :)
PS: Slowly getting back into things, but I fear the next few days might be busy :(
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Again, I knew that the Mayas existed in South America, but was very vague about the details. The nice part of this chapter to me was that it grounded them for me in a specific area. The similarities with Easter Island in terms of temples and statues playing a major role and using up so much resources are striking. (of course, not much changed since then - we call it Nkandla...) In all the chapters I find the descriptions of the farming techniques interesting, but don't need to explain the details.
I am aiming to read a chapter a day, because I don't have a big chunk of time coming up to read a large part of the book in one sitting. At least I am maintaining momentum now. When is you exam, Lu?
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Greenland
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/44d054...
Driving around modern day Iceland
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/514062...
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It is what I specialize in :) Basically it is an archaeologist that looks at animal remains and identifies them. So I look at tons of tiny bones and give it size, specie, sex etc.
zooarchaeologists also look at food distribution patterns, animal products, anything to do with animal remains that you can think of!
I focus on domesticates in the last 2 thousand years or so. My thesis is on the importance of goats and sheep compared to cattle, as well as quantification methods of bones and if they can be compared etc. (A LONG story lol)
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That sounds so interesting! Well then you would be quite qualified for the Norse part of the societies. Quite a bit is devoted to why cattle was unsuitable for the Iceland and Greenland climates, how they became status symbols and how sheep took over as main livestock species and how they deduct this via the bones.
I finished the section on the Norse societies. In general I find it fascinating how the different specialist areas- pollen/zooarchaeologists/anthropologists/climatologist etc all contribute to increase the overall understanding of these societies and places.
I've known about the Orkney islands Norse background and I've known that the Norse discovered America before Columbus. It was interesting to understand why the Norse society in North America didn't survive long enough to claim that massive landmass for themselves. (Think of the alternate history one can write about that one!)
The descriptions of live in Iceland and Greenland made me think of the quote that life is "Brutal and short and then you die". It must have been such a hard live to survive those conditions - one continuous slog to ensure that every task that needs to be done to survive gets done on the right time. There won't second chances.
Iceland merits a comment on the fact that, having managed to contain their environmental issues, and improving their quality of life over time, they then nearly destroyed their economy in the 2008 financial crisis through a combination of greed and mismanagement. If you are interested, here's the best summary I ever read on that subject: http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/fe...
Finally, the description of the Inuit and how their adaptions to life in Greenland and the technology they used allowed them to survive was fascinating. I must say, it sounds like the Norse really were quite a grumpy bunch!
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The one thing this book does test/expand is my geography knowledge (and I had it as a matric subject). I didn't know Tikopia existed, but would love to see it after reading the book - it sounds like a kind of Hanging Gardens/Eden in the Pacific ocean. I'd love to see the result of the very detailed inter planting of trees that they have on the island.
New Guinea is better known, but more famous on the cannibalism aspect than the agricultural practises that are described here. I agree with the comments that colonialists hugely under estimated the complexity of some of the existing agricultural practises in many locations of the world and that it has taken decades for some of that knowledge to filter into the global knowledge base.
The section on how Japan dealt with its environmental challenges is interesting and it is indicative that you do not need a modern society with modern tools to be able to implement changes and improve management practises. I think very often people think that you need complex tools (and a lot of workshops/meeting, etc) to solve some of the problems, when some very basic tools would work. (Google maps is just very convenient to add to that tool set etc).
Japan is also interesting in that it solved some local issues, but created some international problems in the process - whaling being prominent. It is indicative of how integrated some of the natural systems are and how solving one problem may have unexpected consequences.
Agricultural contributes a very small part of Japan's GDP these days, but it is one of the most subsidised sectors in the world economy (which rather wants to be done). Rural voters also have a disproportional say in government in Japan.
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Chapter 3:
I really liked this chapter! All the archaeology is fascinating! All those bones, what I wouldn't do to analyze them. And then the chemical analysis was very interesting and how they tied it all together.
I would be TERRIFIED to go in one of those canoes. Can you imagine traveling for days on end in a little thing like that?
I find early trade very fascinating, and it is also one of the topics I'm studying for my exam on Thursday.
What I also found interesting is the environmental damage these people were causing. So often I forget that it is just modern day people with all the smoke and pollution, but that ancient societies also managed to impact on their environment the same way.
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I find the various different stories so interesting and love the way they figure out what probably happened from weird and wonderful methods.
I want a canoe, but not sure I want one that I need to wear and I don't plan on going out of Algoa Bay in it...
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I remember the Rwanda massacre, but since it coincided with the 1994 elections, I don't think South Africa was that focused on it. I didn't realise the population density is as high as that.
As far as I know, there are many people who ascribe the Somalia/Ethiopia/Eritrea conflicts and situations mainly to environmental factors. There is competition for very scarce water and different agricultural practises (herdsmen who travel with livestock in search of water and food vs pastoralists who grow stuff in fixed locations) and the tensions plays out between the countries.
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Now this was a great chapter!
- The denchocrhnology (sp) fascinates me! I have always wanted to know more about it. And now I know a bit more about how it works!
- The packrat middens are so fascinating and gross, I would love to study something like that!
@Carolien - none that I am aware off. I wonder if the paleontologists deal with something like this in SA... I'll ask someone :)
- I find the deforestation theory very interesting, and I'll use this as an example if I have to, tomorrow in the exam.
- Cannibalism - I find it intriguing that anthropologists want to ignore the fact, and it makes me think if under extreme condition I would resort to it. I'm not sure tbh. Would you guys?
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I'm flying to Perth tonight and then onto Darwin. My husband and I are driving from Darwin to Adelaide over the next 8 days! I'll be back on the 6th and let you know how it went. (Fortunately I have just read the chapter on Australia so can have a look at some of the salt lakes on the way!)
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I'm leaving to a workshop/conference tomorrow, so hopefully I get some reading done while there, and you return to some comments about the book :)
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http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/23/opi...
Before I read the book, I probably wouldn't even have looked at the article, now I am quite interested.
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GPS has been a marvel in SA! We use it for some much: mapping of large sites, stone walls especially etc.
But yea I can see how GPS'ing can be negative in other countries.
Oh yea we also GPS some distance from the site, in our reports, to also avoid this type of thing.
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The impact of technology is amazing. I read an article a while ago on how Prof Lee Burger and his team is using Google Earth to identify potential fossil sites for investigation in the general Sterkfontein area.
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Yea Google Earth is amazing! We all use it now for sooo many things :) Also 3D scanners and 3D printing! It is amazing what archaeologists are doing with technology now :D
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SA Book & Challenge Lovers
Books mentioned in this topic
The Singing Line (other topics)Nation (other topics)
The Seven Daughters of Eve: The Science That Reveals Our Genetic Ancestry (other topics)
The Sculptors of Mapungubwe (other topics)
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (other topics)
Because this is such a hectic read full of detail it might take some time for us to get through and discuss. I suggest we discuss it by chapter. As you read a chapter and want to comment, please post and say Chapter 1 and start off the discussion :)
I will probably start tomorrow.