A Compelling yet Neglected Book – The Sixth Extinction

The publisher of this blog (Tristan Ewins) is busy right now completing his PhD; But Eric Aarons has been kind enough to provide us with another book review - this time on the book 'The Sixth Extinction' by Elizabeth Kolbert.   Eric Aarons engages with Probert' book - explaining the causes of extinction in the past - and the threat for further extinctions and damage to the natural environment. In essence -  capitalism is viewed as a system which takes growth and consumerism to extremes - in a way which is not sustainable.

  Reviewed  by  Eric Aarons

The author, Elizabeth Kolbert, is a practiced journalist and a widely read science commentator. She has written a book that is not about what may be coming, but what we are already in – a massive extinction of species. We know through scientific research of five of these that occurred before human beings even existed; but the sixth is our very own creation.  We have fittingly described the era we are now living in by the word ‘Anthropocene’, which proclaims that we are now the species that dominates all the rest, not only the animal, vegetable and insect, but also the  mineral coating of rock, water, and soil that enfolds the molten rock that forms most of the plane.

We do not own it, but are its custodians – a concept that includes caring for and looking after, a task with which we have yet to adequately cope.

Kolbert writes a prologue recognising the fragility of the newly evolved (about 200 million years ago) human ape, now self-described as Homo-sapiens (man the wise); but she also specifies the survival talents we possess. We are not especially swift or strong, but are singularly resourceful. We multiply readily, and are equipped to push into regions with different climates, predators and prey. We can cope with difficult terrain and spread worldwide, including to Australia where we had to cope with building some kind of vessel and cross a wide stretch of water without being able to first see the far shore. We encounter very large animals but cope with the dangers they pose, inventing new weapons. Not least, we find the way to make, and up to a point, control fire.          

We leave behind in our their travels collections of our species, which become permanent bodies of people with distinctive physical characteristics and patterns of behaviour (culture), influenced by different surroundings, and patterns of behaviour established, perhaps through influential individuals.

The so-called ‘races’ are not variations on the Homo sapiens species genetic identity, as Noel Pearson correctly pointed out in his recently published Quarterly Essay: ‘A rightful Place: Race, recognition and a more complete Commonwealth’. They are rather significant modifications of physical appearance and cultural behaviour, often relating to climatic and occupational sources.

Extinctions

The French naturalist Georges Cuvier began the close examination of animal extinctions. Employed as a teacher at the Museum of Natural History in Paris, he had time to spare. He used it to examine the extensive collections it held of animal bones and skeletons which were widely collected at the time as curiosities. He noticed, in particular, the value of teeth in identifying various specific species of elephant, noticing, for instance, that ‘the elephant from Ceylon differs more from that of Africa than the horse from the ass or the goat from the sheep.’ (pp. 28-29).

He had discovered extinction – a world previous to ours 

He then posed the question about two large and different skeletons which did not correspond to any known living animal, concluding they must have come from ‘lost’ (that is, now extinct) species. But this posed another question: What could kill off huge animals, far bigger than elephants? The answer he gave was: catastrophes, cataclysms!

This view prevailed for some years, but was questioned by geologist Charles Lyell, who saw all round him mainly examples of peaceful and very slow change. Typically, ‘both’ turned out to be the case.

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This illustrates the human tendency to go to extremes. Indeed, there have been many catastrophes in Earth’s history (though, thankfully, they are infrequent). Past ones, caused by collision with extra- territorial bodies have been located through measuring the amount of the element Iridium, in earth samples. This element exists in small amounts on earth, but is more plentiful in meteors and other larger objects which the earth encounters from time to time.

The last one (135 million years ago) struck a glancing blow on the Yucatan peninsula near the southern end of present Mexico.  It created a ‘nuclear winter’ by the worldwide dust blocking out the sun for a long time. This  killed off the dinosaurs, creating conditions in which mammals could flourish, eventually giving rise to apes, from which we humans emerged, appearing as ‘lords of creation’, but now also the source of massive extinctions,  as we shall see.   

Our first and very own extinction?

It was probably the Great Auk. We ate it.

It was a large flightless bird about 80 cms tall, laying nutritious eggs about 12 cms long, and was  eaten on and offshore. It was a source of soft feathers cruelly pulled out to stuff mattresses, and their oily flesh was used for fuel. When Europeans first found them there were up to one hundred thousand pairs on their favoured island off the coast of Canada, while the last individual was killed in 1844. (page 62) 

From there I pass to Chapter 5 where the author introduces us to the era in which we now are, and act as ‘Monarchs of all we Survey’, designating it as the ‘Anthropocene‘. We skip over some species that are produced by oceans to the oceans themselves (Chapter 6), to the  small island of Castello Aragonese, which has been produced by the very large forces of the northward drift of the African continent. Oceans occupy 70 per cent of the earth’s surface, and there is constant exchange of gases between atmosphere which varies as, through combustion of fossil fuels, we put, increasing quantities of carbon dioxide into the air, forming a weak but nevertheless powerful shell and coral dissolving  acid. 

But it is the rapid rate of increase that is the biggest problem:

If we were adding CO2 to the air more slowly, geophysical properties like the weathering of rock would come into play to counteract acidification. As it is, things are moving too fast for such slow- acting to keep up . . . time is the essential ingredient, but in the modern world there is no time. (Page 123)

The way corals change the world – with huge construction projects spanning multiple generations – might be likened to the way that humans do, with this crucial difference. Instead of displacing other creatures, corals support them. (page 130) 

The Fate of the Megafauna 

As boney skeletons attest, large animals and birds existed on most continents, and in the oceans, including the mighty whales. On Australia’s eastern seaboard many human ‘whale- watchers’ appear to see them in their north-migration season. But there are now no living members of, for instance, the Diprotodon, a giant wombat with a weight approaching that of a smallish elephant.

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The writer of this review is also a sculptor, and to honour this animal made a sculpture of a female of the species out of a 9 tonne block of golden granite. This now stands in the sculpture park of the Campbelltown Arts Centre near Sydney, where children like to ride upon its back.

Discussion was keen about the cause of the extinctions, but now the major cause today, in the author’s view, is that it lies with us ourselves - that is, with the things we do, and the rate at which we do them.

Causes of The SixthExtinction – the one we humans have caused, not nature   

Biological processes, which involve chemical reactions, take time, more time than they do in test tubes, because they have to collect, pass through membranes, then react with others. The changes needed to set in motion the ‘origin of new species’, as postulated by Darwin and Wallace and is now almost universally accepted, likewise take time, far more time since a great number of entities, both living and inanimate are also involved.  

Elizabeth Kolbert is telling us that in our very own age – the Anthropocene – we humans are now changing the world so rapidly that a growing number of species do not have enough time to replicate, because we are changing the outside conditions too fast for them to viably adapt. She points out that ‘caring more’ is welcome, [but] what is important is ‘that people change the world’ [too much, too quickly]. (page 266)                                                                                                      

The Neanderthals

I now return to the text, in particular to the penultimate chapter that deals with the discovery of a new but now extinct species – the humanoid Homo neanderthalensis.  It was named after the Neander valley near Cologne, where it was first discovered in 1856. Later, its bones turned up all over Europe and the Middle East, then as far north as Wales, as far south as Israel , and east to the Caucasus.

They lived in teepees, made clothes of a kind from animal skins (it was  very cold in Europe at the time) and made and used stone tools by flaking. Perhaps most significantly they ‘made love’ as the saying goes, with humans, sometimes producing progeny that lived. We don’t know whether they had a language in our sense, but the most striking fact was how like human beings they could have looked when dressed in human garb. There are a number of pictures in the book of them so garbed in our clothing, and the resemblance is uncanny, perhaps unsettling. 

Elizabeth Kolbert has deliberately labelled the chapter ‘The Madness Gene’, dealing with the human characteristic of ‘going to extremes’. Personally, this reviewer does not consider this trait to be genetically based, though it could be culturally determined by the fact that, for capitalism, there is no limit to the amount of profit that can be made in given circumstances.

The capitalist system is presently in an economic state that has not yet been solved with its current tools, and is faced with a culturally strong group of nearly 2 billion Muslim peoples that it needlessly aroused into a state of enmity - and  that it is finding increasingly difficult to deal with.  

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Each different social system makes a different bed to lie on, or to spring from, and the current one – capitalism – repeatedly demonstrates the power of ‘more’, bigger, deeper, higher, further, faster. But this can’t go on for ever, as it now threatens to do, 

Moderation

This is not a dirty word, but it is often treated with scorn or anger as if it were.

It is, and I think actually has been in the past, a sign of civilisation in our cultural activities of speaking, writing, music making, eating, drinking and personal relations. We actually look for it in the top level of sports, but also savour, and nominate as ‘sporting’, empathetic treatment of one contestant to another who is suffering from some form of difficulty.

I believe, especially after reading the warning alarms sounded by the author in this book, that we should moderate our own behaviour, as a species, in regard to the needs of other species, and of our own, and of future human generations. 

I think her heading of the penultimate chapter about Neanderthals, ‘The Madness Gene’, goes a bit far, even as an exaggeration, to make a good point, and could tend to weaken the necessity to act now! But I offer her my heartfelt congratulations on researching and writing it.

Kissinger’s ‘WORLD ORDER’

above: Henry Kissinger's new book is titled 'World Order'

In this his latest article former Australian communist leader Eric Aarons dissects former US Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger's latest book, 'World Order'.  Relating to his own experiences of the consequences of Kissinger's 'real-politick', Aarons criticises Kissinger in no uncertain terms.

By Eric Aarons

Henry Kissinger wastes no time in getting to the point of this important book from the first page. His aim is to restore the ‘World Order’ or ‘American Consensus’ that had been firmly established in the last decade of the 20^th Century. Doing that, to which he himself had been closely attached, he might have thought  of questions of his own reputation that would not go away.

Kissinger wants  to  feature as the trusted and fearless adviser who,  given the opportunity    and means (sometimes as Secretary of State), would seek out the realities and truths of difficult international situations, even if the President did not like what he advised.  Readers  can make up their own minds whether or not Kissinger acted on this principle.

As capitalism developed worldwide, so did the impulse for the formation of ‘states’ – that is,  sovereign bodies of people  holding a defined territory,  politically ordered in a known way, and with a set of unofficial but powerful  ‘rules of behaviour’ – a culture – that might also distinguish them from neighbours. States had therefore to make agreements at least individually with each other,  hopefully with all .

This was no simple matter because tradition had already become fixed on many relevant aspects of these matters in medieval and feudal times. The most important of these were the virtually endless wars within and between countries that had prevailed in feudal and medieval times, mainly centred on religion, but with land also in the picture.

Capitalism featured competition, but also needed forms of cooperation to facilitate and promote business enterprise, while the new ‘states’ had only the traditional ones attached to the family, and thus to marriage relationships and rules of inheritance. These, though still featuring in relations between states, were inadequate for the task of setting  general rules for relations between them.

Henry Kissinger defines ‘world order’ as a state of affairs in which a majority of states reach some (peaceful) agreement on the conduct of the relations between them. – that is, what each of them prohibits or permits – what each of them may do or must not do. He places the origin of this concept in the Treaty of Westphalia (1648). which, concluding the ‘30 years religious war, providing  an opportunity to begin a new era in which agreements instead of wars could establish some form of ‘World Order’ embracing at least most of Europe and the United States of America. 

This seems plausible,  in that, following the universal war throughout  Europe waged by Napoleon in the wake of the 30 years (religious) war, the treaty ending this period of history, had the opportunity to  establish the principles that could guide, as  justly as deemed possible, the principles that all nations might  accept.

Looked at soberly, and with due deference to the achievements of Westphalia, the sort of ‘World Order’ Kissinger holds up today as his preferred model is not worth the paper it is written on, and in any case has zero chance of coming into effect. It depends on the existence of one nation that stands above all the rest in military might, backed by a population that is ready to  make the necessary sacrifice of lives, material treasure, and ethical probity (torture doesn’t fit here) to deal with wrong-doing  by its citizens and those of other states.

Chile

Chile was a major test for Henry Kissinger, in which he performed worse than miserably. By happenstance, I had a connection in the build up to this, having been elevated to a leading position in the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) after I had returned after studying three years in China. For internationalist  educational purposes I was chosen, along with a journalist, Pete Thomas, to attend as observers of the Congress of the Chilean Communist Party in 1965. This was shortly after the Socialist Party leader, Salvador Allende had run a close second for President of Chile, and it was thought he would likely be elected next time. We had a  number of assignments and instructions, including proceeding later to Moscow and discussing our worries about the growing split with China,  Soviet treatment of writers and artists, the existence of anti-Semitism,  and the unpersoning of Nikita Khruschev after he had let out the truth about Stalin’s dictatorship.                                        

There were difficulties in getting a flight from Mexico to Chile, so we did not actually attend the Congress, but had significant discussions with a number of the leading cadres, including about the likely behaviour of the Army. They told us that it had never intervened in Chilean politics before, and believed it would not do even if Allende did win the next election, but we urged them not to be too sure.

Allende did win, and had begun making significant economic and political changes when  General Augusto Pinochet led an army coup, surrounding the Presidency, and shooting dead Allende who had armed himself with a rifle and was shooting back on September 11, 1973. Thousands were immediately arrested and taken to a sports arena where they were immediately killed and/or tortured. Shortly after that, Pinochet invented the practice of taking captives up in a plane and dumping them directly into the Atlantic Ocean, and to this day there are ‘disappeared people’ being sought by relatives and loved ones.

Kissinger assured Pinochet of his support, and to this day it is not clear whether it was President Nixon who had directly ordered Kissinger to arrange the coup, or had it suggested to him by the latter. Public Radio International (PRI) has a program (‘The World’) which conducted a long interview with Kissinger on the day marking  the  41^st anniversary of the coup, but said ‘when we raised the subject of Chile today, Kissinger cut us off.’ What other unsavoury secrets is he hiding?

The invasion of Iraq.

Kissinger declares now (September 11, 2014, PRI) that ‘he would not have supported the Iraq war if he had known then what he knows now’. He obviously asked only those favouring the war though there were plenty of  prominent  people thinking  otherwise. He can only blame himself, but doesn’t.

Indonesia

On December 6, 1975, Kissinger accompanied President Gerald Ford to Jakarta on a ‘friendly visit’. Next day, as their plane departed, the Indonesian President, Suharto, launched  his army on East Timor, which had just been given its independence by Portugal. 200,000 East Timorese were killed, and many atrocities committed. The aim was to use East Timor as a launching pad to then annex the western half of New Guinea which was mineral-rich  (In These Times April, 2000). Kissinger was also on the Board of the New Orleans based Freeport McMoRan gold and copper mine in West Papua, which was also notorious for its poor environmental record.

The full story of the struggle for East Timor’s independence is too long to relate here, but the CPA had a proud record, and even John Howard eventually also played a part in it.

The Future?

The inadequacy of Henry Kissinger’s ideas of what a new World Order should aim for stands out. But the loss of the United States of America as the keystone of its arch of power is crystal clear, and is self-inflicted. Since Vietnam (1975), it has waged several major wars, and has not won a single one. Humanity must seek a new path, and the ‘battle  for  civilisation’ that Tony Abbott speaks about (The Australian, October 5, 2014) is far too limited to effect major change.

The one example there is room for here, is outlined in a book The Sixth Extinction, well written by Elizabeth Kolbert (Bloomsbury). The title comes from the knowledge that there have been five major extinctions of life on earth caused naturally, but the sixth, now  occurring, is self-inflicted. It is caused, says the author, by the fact that humans are changing conditions on earth more rapidly than most species can cope with, including  many  of us. The term ‘Great Moderation’ was used recently by economists just as the GFC (Great Financial Crisis) was about to erupt. Many humans, especially the top 1 percent who get as much as the rest of us put together (Oxfam), now need sufficiency rather than more; bigger is not always better, softer is often preferable to louder. . . 

I trust you will get my drift.

Kissinger’s notion of a ‘New World Order’ included non-interference in each other’s internal affairs.  Including choice of religion, political system, economic conduct and other similar arrangements, and general self-determination. This worked reasonably well for about a century , until it was violated by none other than Kissinger himself. It is not clear that was his decision, backed by various political leaders (particularly those of the United States,) that he had influenced.

Again: this was to interfere in Chile’s internal affairs by prompting, then urging on an officer of the Chilean armed forces, General Augusto Pinochet, to stage a coup, overthrow and kill the newly  elected President of Chile, Salvador Allende.

Conclusions

By his silence on this issue of the Chilean coup, Kissinger re-endorses the views he expressed to Pinochet in 1976: ‘ We want to help, not undermine you. You did a great service to the West in overthrowing Allende ‘ (Wikipedia).

The organisation Public Radio International (PRI) has a program called The World. Forty one years to the day after the coup  – September 11, 1973 – they organised a long interview  with Kissinger, but towards the end they asked him about Chile. They report That he cut them off without saying a word. Is he hiding or protecting a dead President?, hmself? Or both?

Thankfully, Kissinger is no longer in the position of chief adviser and organiser of action for  an American President . Even more important, times have changed, and humanity  has more options, and especially no  need of a new super-state, strong enough in weaponry, economic ascendancy, financial solidity and a fragile rectitude  towards other states. With the rectitude, and a psychological disposition, to keep all the rest of the world’s  nations in line.

Public Radio International (PRI)  also asked Kissinger about The Iraq war . He replied: “If I had known everything then that I know now, I probably would not have supported it.” An evasive reply if there was one. In fact, many people, some with actual knowledge, questioned the assertion  that Saddam Hussein had nuclear weapons. Who did Kissinger talk to at the time?

In any case, Kissinger’s interpretation  of Muslim capacities, as he writes even now, reveals  the dismissive, even contemptuous  attitudes held by ‘leading’  American and many other westerners. They had better learn fast if they seek to construct a new ‘World Order’.

Kissinger, to his credit for once, gives what I take to be a fairly accurate account of the long term thinking and vision of a number of Eastern and Middle Eastern states. Taking Persia (now Iran) he says:

So (in 1979) when an accepted state in the Westphalian system, turned itself into an advocate of radical Islam after thje Ayatollah Khomeini revolution, the Middle East regional order was turned upside down. (Page 149).

I doubt that he saw this at the time  (when he was directly attached to the White House). But, particularly now we have a situation deriving from that invasion in 2001, which has mushroomed into a major world-wide problem  that has to be tackled on more than one front. The Australian government has decided on a half-baked war with the muslim world based on the atrocious practice of decapitating  those they regard as enemies on full-view TV.

‘The  book is well worth reading, and those doing so will learn a lot about how experts in international relations operate. Unfortunately, there is no promise of a turn for the better in the rest of this decade.’