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The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth's Future de Paul Sabin

The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth's Future

Autor Paul Sabin
en Limba Engleză Paperback – 30 sep 2014

Observăm că dezbaterea despre viitorul planetei este adesea blocată între două extreme: catastrofismul biologic și optimismul tehnologic radical. The Bet oferă cititorului cadrele de analiză necesare pentru a înțelege rădăcinile istorice ale acestei polarizări, folosind ca pivot celebrul pariu din 1980 asupra resurselor naturale. Subliniem că autorul nu se limitează la o cronică a evenimentelor, ci oferă o structură de înțelegere a modului în care ideile economice și viziunile ecologiste au modelat politicile publice americane de la Jimmy Carter la Ronald Reagan.

Suntem de părere că această lucrare este esențială pentru a decoda mecanismele prin care temerile legate de suprapopulare, prezentate în The Population Bomb, s-au ciocnit cu încrederea în ingeniozitatea umană și piețele libere. Cititorul care a aplicat ideile din The Ultimate Resource 2e de Julian Lincoln Simon va găsi aici contextul istoric și politic necesar pentru a înțelege de ce argumentele economice singure nu au reușit să stingă conflictul ideologic. De asemenea, lucrarea completează perspectivele din Prophecies of Doom and Scenarios of Progress de Dr Paul Dragos Aligica, oferind o narațiune mai ancorată în biografiile și confruntările directe ale protagoniștilor.

Poziționăm acest volum ca o evoluție firească în opera lui Paul Sabin. Dacă în Crude Politics – The California Oil Market 1900– 1940 autorul analiza forțele legale și politice din spatele pieței de energie, în The Bet el extinde această perspectivă asupra întregii filosofii de mediu contemporane. Prin utilizarea unor ilustrații alb-negru și a unei documentări riguroase, Sabin demonstrează cum alegerile noastre privind schimbările climatice trebuie să fie ghidate de valori sociale, depășind simplul calcul al prețului metalelor din pariul original.

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Specificații

ISBN-13: 9780300198973
ISBN-10: 0300198973
Pagini: 320
Ilustrații: black & white illustrations
Dimensiuni: 140 x 210 x 22 mm
Greutate: 0.3 kg
Editura: Yale University Press
Colecția Yale University Press

De ce să citești această carte

Recomandăm această carte celor care doresc să înțeleagă de ce suntem atât de divizați în privința ecologiei și economiei. Veți câștiga o perspectivă istorică rară asupra modului în care predicțiile științifice devin arme politice. Este un instrument critic pentru decidenți și studenți la economie, oferind o lecție despre limitele certitudinii în prognozarea viitorului umanității.

Despre autor

Paul Sabin este un distins cercetător la Yale Law School și director executiv al Environmental Leadership Program. Cu o experiență vastă în predarea istoriei economice și de mediu la Universitatea Yale și Harvard Business School, Sabin este recunoscut pentru capacitatea de a sintetiza teme complexe de politici publice. Lucrările sale anterioare, precum Public Citizens, reflectă interesul său constant pentru relația dintre guvernare, piața liberă și mișcările sociale din Statele Unite.

Descriere scurtă

Are we headed for a world of scarce resources and environmental catastrophe, or will innovation and markets yield greater prosperity

In 1980, the iconoclastic economist Julian Simon challenged celebrity biologist Paul Ehrlich to a bet. Their wager on the future prices of five metals captured the public’s imagination as a test of coming prosperity or doom. Ehrlich, author of the landmark book The Population Bomb, predicted that rising populations would cause overconsumption, resource scarcity, and famine—with apocalyptic consequences for humanity. Simon optimistically countered that human welfare would flourish thanks to flexible markets, technological change, and our collective ingenuity.
 
Simon and Ehrlich’s debate reflected a deepening national conflict over the future of the planet. The Bet weaves the two men’s lives and ideas together with the era’s partisan political clashes over the environment and the role of government. In a lively narrative leading from the dawning environmentalism of the 1960s through the pivotal presidential contest between Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan and on into the 1990s, Paul Sabin shows how the fight between Ehrlich and Simon—between environmental fears and free-market confidence—helped create the gulf separating environmentalists and their critics today. Drawing insights from both sides, Sabin argues for using social values, rather than economic or biological absolutes, to guide society’s crucial choices relating to climate change, the planet’s health, and our own.

Recenzii

"In his new book, The Bet, Paul Sabin has managed to write a work of serious historical scholarship about a vexing political issue—and make it read like a character-driven novel."—David Leonhardt, The New York Times, Economix blog

"Valuable . . . clear-eyed."—Jonathan V. Last, The Wall Street Journal

"Provides surprising insights for anyone involved in addressing the world’s 'wicked problems.' Most of all, it gave me new perspective on why so many big challenges get bogged down in political battles rather than being focused on problem-solving."—Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, "The Best Books I Read in 2013," TheGatesNotes.com


"[A] gem of a book . . . Sabin provides a fascinating and highly readable archaeology of political science in America."—Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Not so fast, argues historian Paul Sabin, who in The Bet attempts to use their wager to narrate parallel biographies of Simon and Ehrlich, as well as a US political environmental history of the past half-century. The result is a revealing tale."—Jon Christensen, Nature


"Informative, charming, and highly readable."—Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution

"A wonderful new book . . . and a fantastic introduction to population-resource debates of the late-twentieth century. It will be the required first reading on this topic in my future courses."—Roger Pielke, Jr., The Energy Collective

"An illuminating, judicious, and engaging examination of the conflict between environmentalists and their critics over the past five decades."—Glenn C. Altschuler, Tulsa World

"A joy to read; Sabin weaves a vivid historical narrative rich with classic characters. . . . The Bet is both a cautionary tale and a call to order."—Erle Ellis, Chronicle of Higher Education

"[A] good introduction to the history of modern environmentalism and an object lesson in how such debates become polarized and then locked in place."—Sharon Kingsland, Journal of American History

A Best Science Book of 2013, New Scientist

"The Bet provides an important contribution to canonical works in environmental history and environmental studies. It is a remarkable story of a critical moment in the environmental movement, and Sabin has told it expertly."—Frederick R. Davis, Florida State University

"In telling the story of Ehrlich and Simon's bet, Paul Sabin offers a compelling analysis of two very different, but equally important, ways of understanding the future of humans and the environment that still shape the world of environmental politics today."—Jay Turner, Wellesley College

"Paul Sabin's The Bet is wonderfully conceived, sharply focused and entertainingly executed. In the story of a famous bet between two men of large egos, he manages to touch on the most basic problems we face in trying to come to terms with our current environmental crisis."—Richard White, author of Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America

"A refreshingly readable and consistently insightful portrait of the ferocious American politics of global population and resources since the 1960s – and of two implacable enemies who strangely resembled one another."—J.R. McNeill, author of Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the 20th-century World

"Paul Sabin vividly and creatively explores the  half century battle over environmental policy by telling the story of the clash—and famous 'bet'—between Paul Ehrlich, the prophet of population doom, and Julian Simon, the advocate of technology and  markets. My own wager is that The Bet will also provide a very valuable and timely framework for understanding today’s great environmental debates.  In fact, I will double down on that bet!"—Daniel Yergin, Pulitzer-prize winning author of The Quest:  Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World and of The Prize

Notă biografică

Paul Sabin is associate professor, Department of History, Yale University. He was founding director of the Environmental Leadership Program and is the author of Crude Politics: The California Oil Market, 1900–1940.