Immoderate Greatness by William Ophuls

Immoderate Greatness by William Ophuls

*Immoderate Greatness* explains how a civilization's very magnitude conspires against it to cause downfall. Civilizations are hard-wired for self-destruction. They travel an arc from initial success to terminal decay and ultimate collapse due to intrinsic, inescapable biophysical limits combined with an inexorable trend toward moral decay and practical failure. Because our own civilization is global, its collapse will also be global, as well as uniquely devastating owing to the immensity of its population, complexity, and consumption. To avoid the common fate of all past civilizations will require a radical change in our ethos-to wit, the deliberate renunciation of greatness-lest we precipitate a dark age in which the arts and adornments of civilization are partially or completely lost.

William Ophuls served in the United States Army for eight years. Before getting a PhD in political science from Yale University in 1973, he worked for the U.S. Foreign Service in Washington, Abidjan, and Tokyo. He authored *Ecology and the Politics of Scarcity* in 1977, which received two awards and helped to launch the area of environmental politics. He became an independent academic and author after temporarily teaching at Northwestern University. Since then, he has written four volumes about the ecological, social, and political issues that modern industrial civilization faces. He spends his time meandering in nature, whether in his native California or in the mountains of Europe, when he is not at his writing desk.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781479243143
ISBN 10	1479243140
Title	Immoderate Greatness
Author	William Ophuls
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Year published	2012-12-28
Number of pages	118
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.