Alan Weisman - The World Without Us

as expanding bubble, 275

exploration, 16

I Love Lucy broadcasts, 253–54

Pioneer spacecrafts, 249, 252

transhumanists and, 243–44

Voyager spacecrafts, 248–51, 254

Spanish-American War, 174

Spinney, Laura, 165–66

stainless steel

deterioration of, 18

Stalin, Josef, 10

Statue of Liberty (NYC), 37, 246–47

Sterling Chemical, 135

accident at, 136

Stevenson, Dennis, 31

Styrofoam, 118, 131

subways, 24–26

and earthquakes, 105

flooding in, 25–26, 35–36

Istanbul, 105

Montreal, 105

Moscow, 105

New York City, 25–26, 35–36, 105

San Francisco Bay Area, 105

Suez Canal, 174, 175

Sunim, Hyon Gak, 189

Takada, Hideshige, 124–25, 125

Tamar River, 112

Temple, Stanley, 197–98

Teraina (Washington), 259, 260

Tesla, Nikola, 252, 254

Texas

Brazos de Dios River, 142, 143

Galveston, 135, 143–44

Houston, 132, 133–34, 134–35, 141–44

petrochemical industry, 132–33, 135–36, 136, 138–40

Ship Channel, 134, 135, 140–41, 142, 143

Texas City, 135–36, 136–38

Valero Energy Corporation and, 136

See also

Gulf of Mexico

Texas City Prairie Preserve, 140–41

Texas Gulf coast

discovery of oil, 135

salt dome storage caverns, 133

Texas Petrochemical, 132–33

Thompson, Richard, 112–14, 115–16, 117–18, 123, 125

Thoreau, Henry, 148

Thorson, Robert, 146

Three Mile Island Plant (PA), 212–13

Tikal (Mayan site), 223

Titan, 269

toxins

chemical fertilizer, 74

DDT, 74, 129, 159, 196

Dieldrin, 74

Dioxins, 156

EDCs (endocrine-disrupting chemicals), 124

heavy metals, 29, 31, 158, 159, 221

insecticides, 74

PAHs (polyaromatic hydrocarbons), 156, 165, 267

PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls), 125–26, 156, 159, 267

trash and garbage

Garbage Project (Great Britain), 119

Hopi Indian Reservation, 120

horse latitudes (North Pacific Subtropical Gyre), 121, 122, 123–24

landfills, 119–20

newspapers as, 119–20

tires, 130–31

tree-of-heaven.

See Chinese ailanthus tree

trees

Bialowieza, 10, 11, 12–13, 13–14, 247

Chinese tallow tree, 140–41, 143–44

deforestation, 42

Harvard Forest, 148–49

nonnative invaders and, 29–30

resurgence of, 27–28

Rothamsted Research, 162–65

Tsavo (Kenya)

Mzima Springs, 77

and the slave trade, 77–78

tsetse flies, 77

Waata bushman and, 77

as a wildlife refuge 78

World War I and, 77–78

Tsavo River, 77

tsetse flies, 77

Tumamoc Hill, 55, 57, 65

Turkey

archeological discoveries, 106, 107, 108–9

Cappadocia, 106, 108–9, 109–10

construction standards in, 103–5

earthquakes, 102–5

See also

Ankara;

Cappadocia;

Cyprus;

Istanbul

Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, 96

Twilight of the Mammoths (Martin), 66–67

U.S. Census Bureau, 197–98

U.S. Department of Energy, 209

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 194, 258

U.S. National Academy of Sciences, 123

Ukraine

fallout from Chernobyl, 216

ultraviolet rays, 203–4

Uluçan, Hikmet, 98, 98–99, 99–100

UNESCO, 2

Union of Concerned Scientists, 161

University of Arizona, 55

University of Virginia, 55

uranium, 201–2

natural decay, 202–3

and X-rays, 202–3

uranium-235

half-life, 205

uranium-238 (U-238)

half-life, 205

storage of, 206–8

surplus, 205–6

Valero, 135

Valero Energy Corporation and, 136

Varosha (Cyprus), 91–92, 92–93

abandoned hotels, 91–92, 93–95, 94

without humans, 96–97

Vaux, Calvert, 22, 30

VHEMT (Voluntary Human Extinction Movement), 241–43

Vietnam

Agent Orange and, 156, 183

vinyl

deterioration of, 17

Volk, Tyler, 39–40, 41

von Leibig, Justus, 151–52, 153

Von Braun, Wernher, 16

Voyager spacecrafts, 248–51, 252, 254

Golden Record messages on, 249–51, 251

Waata bushman, 77

war

Agent Orange and Vietnam, 156, 183

Contra War (Nicaragua), 183

and ecosystems, 183

See also ,

Korea

Ward, Peter, 231–32

Washington, George, 181

Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) (NM), 206–8, 208–9

West Virginia

mountaintop removal, 221–23, 222

Western, David, 78–82, 82, 271

White Holly

research vessel, 255–58, 259–61

Why Big Fierce Animals Are Rare

(Colinvaux), 257

Wilbert Funeral Services, 238

Wildlife Conservation Society, 22

Wills, Edwin, 199–200

Wilson, E. O., 129, 189, 190

Wilson, Michael, 50–51

windows

deterioration of, 17

Windscale (U.K.)

nuclear accidents at, 208

wood

deterioration of, 17, 18

woolly mammoths, 63, 83

World Population Program, 272

Wrangel Island (Arctic Ocean), 62–63

Wrangham, Richard, 46

Wright, Ronald, 165

X-rays, 202–3

Yong-Un, Ma, 183–85, 188, 189

Zápara Indians, 1–3

An Echo in My Blood

Gaviotas: A Village to Reinvent the World

La Front era: The United States Border with Mexico

THE WORLD WITHOUT us. Copyright © 2007 by Alan Weisman. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.thomasdunnebooks.com

www.stmartins.com

Portions of this book have appeared previously in different form in Discover Magazine and the Los Angeles Times Magazine.

Book design by Ellen Cipriano

Weisman, Alan.

The world without us / Alan Weisman.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-34729-1

ISBN-10: 0-312-34729-4

1. Nature—Effect of human beings on. 2. Material culture. 3. Human-plant relationships. 4. Human-animal relationships. I. Title.

GF75.W4S5 2007

304.2—dc22

2007011565

10 9 8 7 6 5 4

Printed on recycled paper

An original illustration is missing.