Hot: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth
By Mark Hertsgaard and Eban Goodstein
3.5/5
()
About this ebook
Hertsgaard has spent the last two decades reporting on climate change for media outlets including The New Yorker, NPR, Time, Vanity Fair, and The Nation, where he is the environment correspondent. His lecture focused on political movements and how environmental advocates can provoke change in public attitudes and on Capitol Hill. Hertsgaard sees 2011’s Occupy movement as a sign of real hope and discussed what climate activists can learn from Occupy’s tactics.
This E-ssential is an edited version of Hertsgaard’s talk and the subsequent question and answer session. While some material has been cut and some language modified for clarity, the intention was to retain the substance of the original discussion.
Mark Hertsgaard
Mark Hertsgaard is the author of books including The Eagle's Shadow. His journalism has appeared in The New Yorker, Times, Harper’s, The New York Times, The Nation, The Guardian, Die Zeit, and many other publications around the world. He is a frequent contributor to National Public Radio and Worldlink TV.
Read more from Mark Hertsgaard
Hot: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bravehearts: Whistle-Blowing in the Age of Snowden Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Eagle's Shadow: Why America Fascinates and Infuriates the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Big Red's Mercy: The Shooting of Deborah Cotton and a Story of Race in America Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Hot
Titles in the series (5)
Global Warming, Politics, and the Media Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClimate Capitalism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSmarter Planet?: IBM's Climate Solutions Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Carbon Control Knob Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHot: Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related ebooks
Global Warming, Politics, and the Media Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClimate Capitalism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Local Politics of Global Sustainability Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPlanning as if People Matter: Governing for Social Equity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsProspects for Resilience: Insights from New York City's Jamaica Bay Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsState of the World 2014: Governing for Sustainability Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSustainability Sutra: An Ecological Investigation Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAnother Politics: Talking across Today's Transformative Movements Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Junctures in Women's Leadership: Health Care and Public Health Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOne Planet, Many Worlds: The Climate Parallax Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGreat Plains Regional Technical Input Report Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Fabric of Resistance: Textile Workshops and the Rise of Rebellious Landscapes in Colonial Peru Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInvesting in Natural Capital: The Ecological Economics Approach To Sustainability Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Wrath of Capital: Neoliberalism and Climate Change Politics Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Finer Future: Creating an Economy in Service to Life Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Nature of Hope: Grassroots Organizing, Environmental Justice, and Political Change Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsChicago Gardens: The Early History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Survey of Ecological Economics Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsActivist Literacies: Transnational Feminisms and Social Media Rhetorics Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWebspinner: Songs, Stories, and Reflections of Duncan Williamson, Scottish Traveller Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe One Culture?: A Conversation about Science Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A History of Pain: Trauma in Modern Chinese Literature and Film Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Once and Future Forest: A Guide To Forest Restoration Strategies Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWelfare for Markets: A Global History of Basic Income Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Growth of Community Land Trusts in England and Europe Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTackling Wicked Problems in Complex Ecologies: The Role of Evaluation Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHumanity's Moment: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFarming for Our Future: The Science, Law, and Policy of Climate-Neutral Agriculture Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Farm Labor Problem: A Global Perspective Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTo Live Peaceably Together: The American Friends Service Committee's Campaign for Open Housing Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Public Policy For You
Just Mercy: a story of justice and redemption Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dumbing Us Down - 25th Anniversary Edition: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The People's Hospital: Hope and Peril in American Medicine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Talking to My Daughter About the Economy: or, How Capitalism Works--and How It Fails Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Diversity Delusion: How Race and Gender Pandering Corrupt the University and Undermine Our Culture Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Capital in the Twenty-First Century Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Abolition of Sex: How the “Transgender” Agenda Harms Women and Girls Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Chasing the Scream: The Inspiration for the Feature Film "The United States vs. Billie Holiday" Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bowling Alone: Revised and Updated: The Collapse and Revival of American Community Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Affluent Society Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5No Visible Bruises: What We Don’t Know About Domestic Violence Can Kill Us Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Truth About COVID-19: Exposing The Great Reset, Lockdowns, Vaccine Passports, and the New Normal Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Apocalypse Never: Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Price We Pay: What Broke American Health Care--and How to Fix It Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Blow Up a Pipeline: Learning to Fight in a World on Fire Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness, and Violence Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5On War: With linked Table of Contents Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nobody: Casualties of America's War on the Vulnerable, from Ferguson to Flint and Beyond Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Social Security 101: From Medicare to Spousal Benefits, an Essential Primer on Government Retirement Aid Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5America: The Farewell Tour Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Hot
30 ratings7 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5just skimmed the beginning of this book before it was due - the beginning might be all that is needed for the naysayers about what we are doing to ourselves with our dependence on oil, gas and coal and the fact that depending on our age either we or our immediate families will feel the impact. Oh if only we could get big oil to use all of the lobby money for alternate energy rather than supporting them and increasing their profits.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5There's a LOT of meat here, a lot of very important information. It's presented in a fairly dense format and is not terribly well-written. From a journalistic standpoint, it's well-done, but it's too dense for a book, in my opinion.
This book also tips into the bathetic on more than one occasion as Hertsgaard talks about fatherhood and the fact that his own personal, perfect, adorable princess of a child will be dealing with climate change. And though he does admit that there are other children in the world, one gets the sense that he doesn't find them nearly as important as his own princess. And, sure, we all feel that way to some degree, but journalistic integrity demands we at least try to suppress it a little whilst reporting on a topic we are trying to present as universal.
I'm perhaps focusing on the negatives so I can avoid talking about the primary message of this book, which seems to be that we are screwed as a planet. Deeply, irremediably screwed. Unless we all wake up by noon tomorrow and change our ways- and somehow I'm doubting that the corporations who now own my country are going to be cooperating with that.
Hertsgaard offers some crumbs of hope, but they are merely crumbs. I can't imagine my grandchildren's world, but life seems to be heading back towards "nasty, brutish and short" in a big hurry.
So: 4 stars for content, 3 for writing and 1 for sentimentality. Averaged out. - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5An intensely troubling view of the future, and a survey of what damage has already been done. A vital book for understanding our future.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Oh shit! We've messed up our grandchildren's planet. I'm taking a pledge not to fly anymore.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Upsetting but necessary reprting on the implacable disaster we're facing unless something dramatic is done in the very near future about our use of fossil fuels and other sources of greenhouse gases. Hertsgaard uses speculation about the future his young daughter will face as a effective, and moving, pivot for his reporting on the current state of climate research. Most hopeful moment: the aggressive 200-year Dutch government (and people) to mitigate and adapt to cliamte change. Most depressing: Hertsgaard's account of the disappointingly tepid actions of the Obama administration and the criminal resistance of the Bush administration to any action at all.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This book took me quite a while to read. Not because of its length or complexity, but because of the subject matter. Climate change is one of the most important issues facing our planet, but because of the enormity of the consequences, it is also one of the scariest.“In triggering climate change, humanity has unwittingly launched a planetary experiment. Because this experiment has never been run before, and because it involves extremely complicated systems, knowing exactly how it will turn out is impossible.”All of the science and scientific predictions in “Hot” agree that the results will be far from good. There is no disagreement that climate change is here and that it means dire things for many parts of Earth, the only thing that remains to be seen is how dire. Because of all of this, I had to read “Hot” in parts. I could only take bits at a time…and some bit were easier than others. I am lucky enough to live in an area where one of the people profiled as being a positive force regarding climate change is laying good groundwork for our region going forward. I could focus on those successes and the things that the author outlined that individuals could do as I read the parts about what would occur if nothing was done.I liked that Hertsgaard puts his daughter and another child at the forefront of this book. Because climate change is a gradual occurrence, it easier for many people to take the “I’ll think about that tomorrow” approach. But when again and again, Hertsgaard reminds the reader that tomorrow is alive in the children of today, it makes it harder and harder to push the reality away. We save mementoes, heirlooms and money for our children’s future – it’s hard to disagree that we need to make sure that the world they will inhabit shouldn’t be saved for them as well.I was very interested to read that, “Bangladesh has done more over the past twenty years to understand and adapt to climate change than any other country in the world except for Great Britain and the Netherlands.” Which is amazing to me as well as ironic because, “There is a terrible injustice at the heart of the climate problem: climate change punishes the world’s poor first and worst, even though they did almost nothing to bring it on.”Though there are some very hard and necessary truths in “Hot”, Mark Hertsgaard does a good job in walking the reader close to the ledge, but then showing them there is a ladder there. He deftly shifts the focus between the science of what will probably happen in the next fifty years to the actions that are being taken around the world to minimize and deal with the impacts. He does not let the reader off the hook or pretend that everything will be fine – but leads them to the blueprints of how things can be better.I applaud the author for taking this subject on, especially with the concerted and highly funded campaign of lying with which climate change deniers are assaulting the world. This is about us, but more importantly, it is about our children. Not the children of tomorrow, but the children we are raising and protecting and loving today. “We are responsible for laying the foundations that future generations will build on, somewhat like the mason’s who laid the foundation of the European cathedrals that took several centuries to complete. They knew they would not live to see the final product of their work, but they also knew they needed to do very solid, precise work because of all the weight that was going to be placed on top of their work.”We, too, need to take this long world view. We need to understand that tackling climate change is not only our most important challenge as a people but also possibly our greatest triumph.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mark Hertsgaard's book Hot is written much in the same style as Bill McKibben's Eaarth, wide ranging popular journalism with a mixture of science, history, current affairs, argumentation and autobiography.Hot differs from Eaarth in being slightly more upbeat by focusing on positive examples and trends already underway towards mitigation of the effects of global warming. This is an important distinction, between efforts to stop/slow global warming, and efforts to mitigate the effects of global warming. For example he looks at Dutch plans for keeping the ocean at bay - for the next 200 years! Though he says if it rises more than 6 feet, even the vaunted Dutch engineers will throw up their hands and swim away.Some things I learned include: "100 year flood" doesn't mean once in 100 years, but a 1 in 100 chance of happening every year (a big difference). Lloyd's of London has been told by an internal science report to expect 3 feet of sea-level rise by 2050. 80% of CO2 comes from the richest 20%. In a hotter future, the best places to live in the USA, Hertsgaard recommends New York City, Chicago and King County, Washington - because of current leadership and mitigation efforts already underway.This isn't a canonical book because much will be outdated in a few years, but for those wanting to keep up with some of the latest developments at the local government and corporate level (ca. 2005-2009), it has some great reporting. Since Hertsgaard is based near San Francisco, there are a bunch of California examples, a coda to McKibben's Vermont-focus in Eaarth.
Book preview
Hot - Mark Hertsgaard
iStockphoto.com
Introduction
On December 7, 2011, Mark Hertsgaard participated in The National Climate Seminar, a series of webinars sponsored by Bard College’s Center for Environmental Policy. The online seminars provide a forum for leading scientists, writers, and other experts to talk about critical issues regarding climate change. The series also opens a public conversation, inviting participants to ask questions and contribute their own thoughts.
Hertsgaard has spent the last two decades reporting on climate change for media outlets including The New Yorker, NPR, Time, Vanity Fair, and The Nation, where he is the environment correspondent. His lecture focused on political movements and how environmental advocates can provoke change in public attitudes and on Capitol Hill. Hertsgaard sees 2011’s Occupy movement as a sign of real hope and discussed what climate activists can learn from Occupy’s tactics.
What follows is an edited version of Hertsgaard’s talk and the subsequent question and answer session. While some material has been cut and some language modified for clarity, the intention was to retain the substance of the original discussion.
HOT
Living Through the Next Fifty Years on Earth
Seminar by Mark Hertsgaard
There have recently been a lot of notable developments concerning climate change. The Durban Climate Conference is underway right now. And here in San Francisco, where I live, the