With each chapter focusing on a slightly different aspect of the same issue of a problem solutions topic but it spends all of its space talking about the problems and none of them talking about the solutions A book like this is worse than useless because a useless book simply wastes one s time and does not provide anything useful This particular book is aggressive in seeking to paint our society s devotion to the search for power in a negative light but without providing any possible solution to it If leisure and civilization require some sort of excess power and energy that are siphoned off by a cultured elite.
Does not draw the obvious conclusion that he wants billions of people to die so that the ones who are left can either be an elite supported by slaves or hunter gatherers who ruthlessly control their population to make the least impact on the earth. This book is about 250 pages long and is divided into thirteen chapters that each serve as their own essays about matters relating to energy The book begins with a short prologue and then begins its discussion by looking at the energy that slaves provided societies for most of human history 1 The author then gets on his hobby horse about people being slaves to energy 2.
This polemic argues that our dependence on inanimate technological slaves powered by fossil fuels is equivalent to humanity s former almost universal dependence on slave labor and just as distorting to society Just as past elites got their wealth and leisure by appropriating the productivity of animals and poor and captive humans so ever greater proportions of humanity use petro energy to raise their standard of living with devices that are like having tens or hundreds of slaves not to mention cheap plastic goods and plentiful food due to an agricultural revolution built on petroleum based fertilizers pesticides and herbicides But this energy resource is finite past its peak and continues to be mostly wasted away frivolously how will humanity adjust to lower energy resources particularly when it s hard to prepare or make realistic plans with the powers that be captured by petroleum dollars Will we return to a small wealthy elite living off rest of humanity Will human population fall without support from current petroleum based technologies It gives you a different perspective whether or not you agree with his individual points 3 1 2 stars Hardcover The Energy of Slaves offers a creative way of looking at fossil fueled industrialism viewing the slave and the enslaver as attached by the same chain and therefore seeing modern people as enchained to the machines that act as our inanimate slaves all powered by energy. Not much of a believer in solar and wind Nikiforuk predicts that in the near future once oil coal and gas run out that society will be less industrial and manual Of course this book came out before fracking when peak oil seemed like a bigger threat to many than climate change. Today the book s basic point stands if for a different reason Perhaps fracking and unconventional production can keep fossil fuels cheap for another decade or two which Nikiforuk didn t seem to anticipate But now climate change requires that we leave most remaining fossil fuels in the ground thus depriving us of their use anyway. Nikiforuk imagines a future where industrial people use 90% less energy than today whether we like it or not That could lead to a new dark age of war pestilence and famine Or if we prepare for it a low energy future could offer simple living close to people and nature that could make us happier than fossil fueled consumerism. While I agree that a future with declining fossil fuels will be one of lower energy overall I m not sure if Nikiforuk is right that renewables will be quite so low powered as he predicts I agree that it s unrealistic to expect that solar and wind will replace 100% of fossil fuels But could they replace 50% In that case we could continue to enjoy some version of an industrial economy on solar and wind though with some cuts in consumption for sure. My main complaint with the book is that in trying to pay attention to a topic that has been unjustly neglected the role of energy in history that Nikiforuk overdoes it and makes the mistake of overestimating the role of energy in history For example he writes that petrostates tend to foster long periods of one party rule and cites the 80 year run of Democrats in charge of state government in Texas But was this really because Texas was an oil state or because it was a southern state In fact all states in the former Confederacy most of which had little or no oil industry were basically taken over by Redeemer governments led by former Confederates in the Democratic Party just after the end of Reconstruction in the 1880s ousting Republicans whom many white southerners hated as the party of Lincoln emancipation and Union Army occupation And these Democrats ruled the South until the mid 1960s It was only when Democrat LBJ pushed through the Civil Rights Act of 1965 that southern whites began abandoning the party for the formerly hated party of Lincoln which recast itself as the friend of white conservatives in the South. That s just one example of many how Nikiforuk s admirable approach of bringing energy out of the shadows of history and politics sometimes blinds him to factors that aren t really soaked in oil Oil may be important than mainstream historians and political analysts have realized But you can take this project too far and it may be overstating the case to cast energy as the main factor of the history of the last 500 years. Overall though we should be energy aware in our view of history Nikiforuk is right that human slavery and energy slavery share much in common The analogy is a fruitful one that deserves attention Hardcover This book along with The Long Descent which I also read recently have really got my brain whirling as I think about a future with much less energy per capita Neither book puts firm dates on when changes are coming but both are confidant that a world with limited oil is coming and is going to make life a lot simpler and less comfortable I would definitely recommend this book for anyone interested in oil and the future Hardcover The Energy Of Slaves Oil And The New Servitude by Andrew NikforukThis book is among the worst books I have ever read and I do not say that lightly What makes it such a terrible book is that it tries to write a book length essay or series of essays as seems to be the case from our reading of human history and our own experience as people then the only choices mankind can have are to have someone or something serve as slaves to provide a better life for others or we have to live as hunter gatherers with very low populations and population densities to live sustainably on the earth Those are the only options and the author despite ruthlessly pointing out the harm that mankind has done to other people and to the resources of the earth in the search for power discussing the origins of oil development 3 and the servitude involved in our current world 4 The author talks about the unsettling of agriculture 5 as well as ill fated forays into population dynamics 6 The author then spends time talking about the supposed delusions of urban planners 7 and economics 8 as well as the limits of science investment which are own the downturn 9 never stopping to think about his own delusions in saying that California is a successful example of a non dysfunctional petrostate because it suits the author s leftist politics The author then discusses the petrostate 10 heaping abuse on moderate and right of center politics discusses issues of surpluses 11 discusses the relationship between oil and happiness 12 and then writes about Japan and the fragility of the petroleum age 13 The book ends with a wildly wrongheaded epilogue sources acknowledgements and an index What does this book accomplish besides trying to make people feel bad The book seeks to take aim at the elites who drive energy use but the book s author and those who support the book and talk about sustainability are the type of hypocrites who fly their private jets to places like Davos and talk about how ordinary people need to live austere lives without appliances and central heat and air while they spare themselves no luxury Indeed the author criticizes elites who live far higher lives than the earth can support as well as the way that energy sources like oil encourage bloated governments but then advocates harsh environmental regulations that also stem from bloated and wasteful governments even as the author decries the wastes involved in our energy usage The author has a lot of talking points and interviews a lot of equally dim witted neo Malthusians like himself who serve as the people to present ideas because he lacks the courage to state what he supports in this book outright but the book is greatly harmed by it being incoherent In the end what makes a book like this one among the worst ever is its incoherence in that it lacks a logical connection between the points it is making and the evidence that it argues from At the end the author opines about how it was that the Benedictines chose to leave cities and live simple lives not mentioning that it was the catastrophic fall of Rome that brought the simple life back again Is the author really unaware of what he is supporting Hardcover There were a few chapters I did not read of this book for a class this quarter but I am calling it good and finished Honestly was super impressed with the book within this genre it is a 5 star book I am giving it 4. It started off very loftily comparing slavery to our use of energy in the way that it is moral wrong and difficult to change This is a metaphor drawn on again and again throughout And I didn t get it at first and was skeptical but I think it is a great metaphor Basically this idea of slavery being energy people were able to get energy to expand consumption and luxuries beyond natural limits by using free labor so that they didn t need to expend their own energy We used to use slaves now we use energy slaves aka fossil fuels Two really interesting things from that First is an analysis of the fall of the Roman Empire and how that is linked with their inability to keep expanding their borders and getting labor and a need for consumption and separation from labor and work which made the wealth and prosperity increasingly built on less substance and even the way that war was necessary not for glory or whatever but because the Romans needed resources and particularly slaves That analysis in the beginning of the book is super worthwhile to read Second thing I liked is their very compelling argument that the end of slavery in the entire world but specifically the U. S in this analysis was only possible because of the Industrial Revolution with steam engines and later advancements in geology leading to massive mining and use of fossil fuels which gave us an alternative to slavery which allowed us to condemn the moral wrong that it was When tractors could plow the fields powered by oil it was possible for forced human labor to be abolished and replaced Before that no replacement existed so people could not call for an end to slavery without causing widespread famine Morally it is easy to take the high ground if you lose nothing in return but very easy to make the switch if a ethical alternative that is the same to you is made available I think that this argument was fascinating and well articulated in relation to slavery and fossil fuel and even now as we see the clean energy revolution. Anyways I don t want to write too much Would recommend as it had great commentary on energy consumption and our relationship with it thoroughly analyzes the history of oil and ways our systems has made this all problematic It specifically analyzes the doctrines of economics and consumer society environment relationship and how they formed and how they are wrong Talks about things ranging from techno optimism to political citizenship to human psychology to the resource curse and LTG Even talks about the impacts of oil and nonrenewable energy on our culture democracy and wealth inequality Glad I took the class so I could read this book Hardcover Andrew Nikiforuk is a leading investigative journalist who has written about education economics and the environment for the past two decades His work has appeared in a variety of Canadian publications including The Walrus Maclean s Canadian Business Report on Business Chatelaine Georgia Straight Equinox and Harrowsmith. He is the author of the critically acclaimed Empire of the Beetle and the bestseller Tar Sands which won the Rachel Carson Environment Book Award His book Saboteurs Wiebo Ludwig s War against Oil was the winner of the Governor General s Literary Award for Non Fiction His other books include Pandemonium and The Fourth Horseman A Short History of Plagues Scourges and Emerging Viruses His journalism has won seven National Magazine Awards and top honours for investigative writing from the Association of Canadian Journalists. Nikiforuk lives with his family in Calgary Alberta Whether speaking or writing about melting glaciers peak oil the destruction of the boreal forest or bark beetle outbreaks Nikiforuk has earned a reputation as an honest and provocative voice in Canadian journalism. Great book It shows a macro view of energy that exists aside from the axoim scientific definitions kinetic electrical heat etc The book instead uses slaves as an energy medium for work energy Hardcover Reimagining the harnessed power of fossil fuel energy as a multitude of energy slaves creates a compelling metaphor It helped me to grapple with the sheer immensity of our global reliance on cheap oil as well as forcing me to recognize my own undeserved membership in an elite class of energy slaveholders The term energy slaves was first coined in the 1940s to demonstrate our energy dependency by converting it into the equivalent of human slaves American households use the power of several hundred energy slaves on average. Nikiforuk raises some interesting questions asked by other people about the relationship between human slavery and fossil fuels Did the one necessarily predicate the other with slavery laying the foundation for a guaranteed energy surplus which was later taken over by oil Was abolition eventually successful because industrialization had provided viable alternatives to human slaves Or did Rome fail to create steam power something they apparently had the capacity for because of the availability of cheap slaves from their conquered provinces To me the last idea contradicts the first you can t have slavery both causing industrial energy reliance and also undermining the need for it but Nikiforuk is fast and furious with a cascade of experts and statistics in this book so linear argument doesn t always follow this was a slight irritation to me but the author is a journalist not an energy expert himself so I suppose it is to be expected Later in the book we learn that scientific innovation is lower in petrostates which supports the second idea that cheap forms of energy whether they be slaves or oil create a dangerous innovation killing dependency. We wade into a lot of theory about economics the gist of which is that since its inception modern economics has mostly failed to account for the role of energy as a currency in its models Oil seems cheap when you don t account for the millions of years of natural processes that it takes to create it in the first place An introduction to the idea of EROI energy return on energy investment reveals that we are relying on increasing energy intensive means to extract energy in the first place not just oil but biofuel solar and wind also have a problematic EROI ratio when it comes to maintaining current energy consumption levels The emerging message is that energy consumption needs to be vastly scaled back in order for the outcome to not be a major decimation of the human population One study indicates that the individual happiness consumption threshold in other words the level which once you consume above you don t gain any further happiness is 7 barrels of oil per year The average American consumption is 50 barrels So clearly there is room for improvement to phrase it in a giant understatement Yes this book has me feeling a little scared and depressed about what the future look like but also really really curious Is it possible that I m living in a pivotal generation A generation obliviously living like kings actually better than most kings in history on the cusp of things changing dramatically Part of me sees the silver lining that running out of so called cheap energy might help us put the brakes on totally ruining the planet An abrupt halt to economic growth is better than the extinction of life due to an unlivable planet right One other nitpick about the book I d like to raise Nikiforuk writes that we the modern energy surplus wielding elites take immediate offense at any discussion about the carbon emissions of their mechanical servants I dislike this straw man argument If this were true who is reading this book Surely there must be a better explanation for our collective inaction than this fictional immediate offense One that comes to mind is the evolutionary argument that humans are wired to think about the short term watch the documentary Breath of Life Am I quibbling Does it matter whether we are immorally apathetic versus merely constrained by our reptilian heritage I think it s the difference between reading this book and taking away a vague and unproductive conclusion that we are shitty humans versus wondering and investigating how we as humans can outsmart our own biology Hardcover The kind twin of Ezra Levant Hardcover I like the basic thesis and the beginning of the book The rest of it got further afield and didn t give me much to pursue the thesis of how essentially petroleum and other forms of fossil energy have come to replace slave labor and we rely upon that labor I am grateful for that connection which makes eminent sense but would have liked to see a stronger rest of the book Hardcover The Energy of Slaves Oil and the New Servitude 2012 By Andrew Nikiforuk Canadian Non Fiction Earth s new Master is an urban beast and its slaves are the world s resources Andrew Nikiforuk We are brought along into facts figures unconventional ways of looking at how the egress of oil has forever altered humanity s path For example how could we maintain today s standard of living without use of our precious utility of oil and its easily harnessed horsepower Up until a few centuries ago brute manpower was basically the engine powering up civilization This energy was essentially the driving as well as limiting factor determining the pace of progress Great ideas like the wheel or the horse plow were really very few and far between In answer to the former question one would need over 700 human slaves each to maintain our current typical lifestyle As Andrew points out Ancient civilizations routinely relied on shackled human muscle Slaveholders viewed critics as hostilely as oil companies now regard environmentalists Yet when the abolitionist movement finally triumphed in the 1850 s it had two invisible allies coal oil Unfortunately about 2 3rds of the way through this book begins to veer a hard left from the interesting tidbits on oil muscle ancient equivalents and other interesting associated topics The author gently morphs his focus into the single exhausted argument of the little guy against big oil themes As controversial and worthy of note that topic may well be we have a myriad of books on that subject already I was thoroughly enjoying my history lesson up until then It cost him a star on the rating chart sorry pal. By John Archibald November 2012 Hardcover By the winner of the Rachel Carson Environment Book Award Ancient civilizations relied on shackled human muscle It took the energy of slaves to plant crops clothe emperors and build cities Nineteenth century slaveholders viewed critics as hostilely as oil companies and governments now regard environmentalists Yet the abolition movement had an invisible ally coal and oil As the world s most versatile workers fossil fuels replenished slavery s ranks with combustion engines and other labor saving tools Since then cheap oil has transformed politics economics science agriculture and even our concept of happiness Many North Americans today live as extravagantly as Caribbean plantation owners We feel entitled to surplus energy and rationalize inequality even barbarity to get it But endless growth is an illusion What we need Andrew Nikiforuk argues in this provocative new book is a radical emancipation movement that ends our master and slave approach to energy We must learn to use energy on a moral just and truly human scale, Published in Partnership with the David Suzuki Institute The Energy of Slaves Oil and the New Servitude
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