The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet

The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
分享
扫描下方二维码分享到微信
打开微信,点击右上角”+“,
使用”扫一扫“即可将网页分享到朋友圈。
作者: 作者
出版社: Picador
2018-01
ISBN: 1509884173 或 9781509884179
定价: 180.00
装帧: 平装
开本: 其他
页数: 608页
正文语种: 英语
  • In just three decades - by about 2050 - the human population of the Earth will reach ten billion. This will present fundamental, even elemental, problems: How to feed ten billion? How to provide ten billion with water? How to keep ten billion warm in the cold and cool in the heat? And how to do all this without irreparably harming our planet? To explore these challenges, Charles C. Mann goes back to the 1950s and 60s and vividly brings to life two individuals who established the distinct schools of thought that still dominate our ideas about these issues. On the one hand is `the Prophet', ecologist William Vogt. Crippled by childhood polio, Vogt spent years struggling through the remotest regions of Latin America - including, memorably, the hellishly beautiful guano islands of Peru - to assemble what became the basic ideas behind today's global environmental movement. Environmentalists who have followed Vogt's lead see the world as bound by immutable biological limits and our rising affluence as a threat. Unless humankind drastically reduces consumption, they argue, our growing numbers and appetite will overwhelm the planet's ecosystems. On the other hand is `the Wizard', Norman Borlaug, the legendary plant-breeder who in 1970 won the Nobel Peace Prize. Born into abject poverty, Borlaug became the primary figure in the `Green Revolution' of the 1960s, which used new agricultural technology to raise global grain harvests, helping to avert tens of millions of deaths from hunger. Today, he has become the emblem of `techno-optimism' - the view that science and technology, properly applied, can help us produce our way out of our difficulties. To those who take Borlaug's position, affluence is not the problem but the solution. Only by getting richer and smarter, they say, can humankind invent and apply the new discoveries that hold the key to a prosperous tomorrow. Can we bend nature to our will or are we, like all other species, bound by its inexorable laws? Mann tackles this crucial question with eloquence, clarity and evenhandedness, exploring Vogt and Borlaug's ideas before turning to the fundamental problems raised by rising human demands on our planet and the possible solutions that each approach would demand. Ranging from Mexico to India, across continents and the earth's oceans, from the past to the present and future, brilliantly original in concept, wryly observant and deeply researched, The Wizard and the Prophet is essential reading for readers of Noah Juval Harari's Sapiens or Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel, for anyone interested in how we got here and in the future of our species.
                                     Charles C. Mann, a correspondent for The Atlantic, Science and Wired, has written for Fortune, the New York Times, Vanity Fair and the Washington Post, as well as for HBO and `Law & Order'. A three-time US National Magazine Award finalist and the author of three previous books. 1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus won the US National Academies Communication Award for the best book of the year, and both that book and its sequel, 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created, were New York Times bestsellers. He lives in Amherst, Massachusetts.
  • 内容简介:
    In just three decades - by about 2050 - the human population of the Earth will reach ten billion. This will present fundamental, even elemental, problems: How to feed ten billion? How to provide ten billion with water? How to keep ten billion warm in the cold and cool in the heat? And how to do all this without irreparably harming our planet? To explore these challenges, Charles C. Mann goes back to the 1950s and 60s and vividly brings to life two individuals who established the distinct schools of thought that still dominate our ideas about these issues. On the one hand is `the Prophet', ecologist William Vogt. Crippled by childhood polio, Vogt spent years struggling through the remotest regions of Latin America - including, memorably, the hellishly beautiful guano islands of Peru - to assemble what became the basic ideas behind today's global environmental movement. Environmentalists who have followed Vogt's lead see the world as bound by immutable biological limits and our rising affluence as a threat. Unless humankind drastically reduces consumption, they argue, our growing numbers and appetite will overwhelm the planet's ecosystems. On the other hand is `the Wizard', Norman Borlaug, the legendary plant-breeder who in 1970 won the Nobel Peace Prize. Born into abject poverty, Borlaug became the primary figure in the `Green Revolution' of the 1960s, which used new agricultural technology to raise global grain harvests, helping to avert tens of millions of deaths from hunger. Today, he has become the emblem of `techno-optimism' - the view that science and technology, properly applied, can help us produce our way out of our difficulties. To those who take Borlaug's position, affluence is not the problem but the solution. Only by getting richer and smarter, they say, can humankind invent and apply the new discoveries that hold the key to a prosperous tomorrow. Can we bend nature to our will or are we, like all other species, bound by its inexorable laws? Mann tackles this crucial question with eloquence, clarity and evenhandedness, exploring Vogt and Borlaug's ideas before turning to the fundamental problems raised by rising human demands on our planet and the possible solutions that each approach would demand. Ranging from Mexico to India, across continents and the earth's oceans, from the past to the present and future, brilliantly original in concept, wryly observant and deeply researched, The Wizard and the Prophet is essential reading for readers of Noah Juval Harari's Sapiens or Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel, for anyone interested in how we got here and in the future of our species.
  • 作者简介:

                                     Charles C. Mann, a correspondent for The Atlantic, Science and Wired, has written for Fortune, the New York Times, Vanity Fair and the Washington Post, as well as for HBO and `Law & Order'. A three-time US National Magazine Award finalist and the author of three previous books. 1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus won the US National Academies Communication Award for the best book of the year, and both that book and its sequel, 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created, were New York Times bestsellers. He lives in Amherst, Massachusetts.
查看详情
目前没有书店销售此书
相关图书 / 更多
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Black Book of Buried Secrets
Riordan;Rick
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Technique of parents innovation and independent parents cultivation in sugarcane cross breeding
吴才文
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Hongqiao Story: A Record of Whole-process People’s Democracy Practices in Local Communities
上海市长宁区虹桥街道全过程人民民主基层实践基地 作者;中译语通信息科技(上海)有限公司 译;上海人大全过程人民民主研习实践基地
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Ecological Relations of the Vegetation on the Sand Dunes of Lake Michigan(密歇
Henry Chandler Cowle
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The 14th Five-Year Plan for Vocational Skills Training
中华人民共和国人力资源和社会保障部
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Laws of the People\'s Republic of China (2020)
全国人大常委会法制工作委员会
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Ugly Duckling 丑小鸭 (精装本)—小学英语戏剧绘本
[澳]詹姆斯 · 宾 (澳)吉莉安 · 法拉蒂
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Computer and the Brain 计算机与人脑
John von Neumann约翰·冯
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Last Firehawk 2 :The Crystal Caverns:火鹰传奇
Katrina Charman
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Real Thief
William Steig
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Wizard of Oz 绿野仙踪(精装本)(小学英语戏剧绘本)
[澳]詹姆斯·宾 (澳)吉莉安·法拉蒂
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
The Pied Piper of Hamelin 花衣魔笛手(精装本)(小学英语戏剧绘本)
[澳]詹姆斯·宾 (澳)吉莉安·法拉蒂
您可能感兴趣 / 更多
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
2024年日历 早餐星球 今天早餐吃什么
ChargeWu
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
CTF实战:技术、解题与进阶
ChaMd5安全团队 著
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
纽结理论(影印版)
Charles Livingston
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
边喝边写
Charles Bukowski
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
电路基础(英文版·原书第7版)
Charles K. Alexander
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
战场误伤
CharlesKirke
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
早餐星球 好看好吃又好瘦的健康早餐攻略
ChargeWu
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
洛克伍德-格林成人骨折(第8版)(上、中、下卷)
Charles M.Court-Brown James D.Heckman 原著
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
创伤麻醉精要(第2版)
Charles,E.Smith 著;卞金俊、薄禄龙 译;Albert,J.Varon 著,
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
Julia高性能科学计算(第2版)
Changhyun Kwon(权昌贤) 著;徐国栋 、李琦 译
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
岩土地震工程三维时空分析理论(英文版)
Changwei、Yang、Guotao、Yang、Jianjing 著
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Conflicting Visions of the Future of Our Planet
汗青堂丛书056·埃及、希腊与罗马:古代地中海文明
Charles、Freeman 著