The World Without Us has one a fantastic premise. It had to be the easiest book pitch of recent memory. Veteran science reporter Alan Weisman imagines what the world would be like if we (humans) simply checked out one day, say next Thursday. For simplicity, neither nuclear weapons nor global warming are the source of our demise in this nifty thought experiment. A hypothetical sudden mass extinction leaves the world as we know it today without its current dominant species.

Some reviewers have criticized Weisman for a lack of focus. BGB’s own Shaft wrote that he had to give up on the book for losing the thread of the premise. I’d agree that the chapters could have been tightened up to remind the reader where they are being led and why it was important to understanding the big picture. That said, I found this book so fascinating, I didn’t mind the author going off on a tangent one bit.

The book begins with a discussion of how structures fail. Your house, any house, has no more than a 100 year life span (more like 15-20) without you in it actively keeping water out. The buildings in New York City would suffer a similar fate, although it would be undermined by flooding subway excavations that erode the foundations of buildings and streets from below. It’s sobering to realize how transient the things that we consider fairly permanent really are.

In imagining what Manhattan may revert back to, Weisman cites the work of the Manhatta Project. The Manhatta Project is creating 3-D models of what the island looked like before it was settled. By collecting soil data from grids throughout the island, the Project is reconstructing what a pristine Manhattan might have looked like - and might look like again.

In imaging what kinds of structures might last longer than 100 years, Weisman points to the buildings that have survived the longest. The examples of pyramids and ancient stone structures (like old churches and fortifications) suggest that similar buildings have a future. Weisman is banking on underground structures in the proper environments to hold up the longest. He cites the example of Cappadocia an underground network of “villages” that extend as deep as 18 stories beneath the ground in Turkey. The BLDG BLOG has more.

Weisman also imagines what species would move into take over our niche as the dominant species. Weisman notes that the Americas were once home to megafauna - ancestors of the elephant, hippopotmus, and other animals it is difficult to imagine living in these parts. Some scientists postulate that our arrival in the Americas doomed megafauna. In our absence, would these creatures find their way back to their ancestral homes? Weisman cruelly points out that our pets wouldn’t have much of a future in a suddenly wild world.

To show us what the world could become without our help, Weisman also takes the reader to places that have been people-free for decades - or longer. A primeval forest in Poland/Belarus has been protected since the 14th century. Weisman points out how this forest differs from places that we think of as pristine, like the Amazon rainforest. The DMZ separating North and South Korea has been people-free for over 50 years. In that time it has become one of the most bio-diverse places on earth. I, for one. love reading about places like this.

In the oceans, Weisman imagines what the recovery of reefs around the world would be like by joining a group of scientists visiting the most remote reef in the world. Kingman Reef is located 932 miles southwest of Hawaii. It is thriving, but it is also collecting junk from around the world.

The trash and hazardous materials that we’ll leave behind is perhaps the dark spot on this mostly “silver-lining” scenario. The chapter on the persistence of plastic is truly depressing and has made me redouble my efforts to swear off plastic grocery bags forever. The breakdown of our chemical producing infrastructure would cause some serious problems in some locales (like Texas City) - at least for a time.

Weisman points to Chernobyl as an example that at our worst, our impacts may only be temporary. The area around the Ukrainian nuclear facility, mostly uninhabited now, has seen an increase in wildlife. Time heals all wounds - eventually.

While it may seem like I’ve given a summary of the entire book, I’ve barely scratched the surface of the material presented. The author comes at the problem from just about every conceivable angle. If you prefer a well-organized and linear narrative, you might want to take a pass on this one. However, I found the book to be endlessly fascinating and a great read.