Human Nature: Nine Ways to Feel About Our Changing Planet

The feelings covered, one per chapter, are: Wonder, Anger, Guilt, Fear, Grief, Surprise, Pride, Hope, Love.

She is a scientist but she entertains with her storytelling and includes characters & stories from the myths and from literature and from people’s biographies and general history. She writes about her life too. This is a book about a serious subject but it’s fun to read.

There is humor. She is funny. She’s also an engaging storyteller, about her own life and the life of the planet and she’s an excellent writer.

Late in the book there is an unexpected turn where she writes about something going on in her personal life and her health. She also sums things up in a way that finally helped me understand why I felt confused while show more reading much of the book. It was hard to tell exactly what she thought because what she said throughout had been all over the place. My favorite thing she said about her prognosis for the climate is what she calls her “delusional optimism” and I wish I’d read that early on and then the rest of the book would have made more sense to me.

She is much more optimistic than me and her opinion does not hold as much weight with me as I would have expected because she doesn’t base all her opinions on the scientific knowledge she possesses. As I see it, she subscribes to a lot of hopium. (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hopium) She does acknowledge the dire nature of the climate crisis and is often sober about it but says she doesn’t think things are doomed. A lot of what she proposes would rely on a lot of people behaving better than they ever have so her hopefulness, such as it sometimes is, was not contagious for me. I do understand. She has two young children whose future she seems to find it difficult to consider. She also points to some successes. I’d had no idea that if the ozone hole had not been diminished how horrible the ramifications would have been. She does admit that what has to be done now is more and different than what we’ve accomplished in the past, yet some of her reasonable ideas of what we can do don’t go far enough, in my opinion and, what with our current lack of leadership and with what I’ve seen of people unwilling to sacrifice and make changes, and few with the will to do what’s necessary, or even realize the true situation, I’m not even convinced she believes enough will happen. It seems she wants to motivate people and I hope that she does.

I wanted to start & finish this book in 2025 but I thought that this book would be difficult to get through in just a few days but it wasn’t. It was a page-turner. It’s definitely geared toward a lay audience. I wouldn’t say that it’s dumbed down but it’s accessible and a fast read.

This could have been a grim read but I did not feel depressed when reading it. I also didn’t feel any more galvanized than usual but I hope that other readers will. I’m glad that this book is available and I hope that it will be widely read.

4-1/4 stars show less

Thanks Ecco for the gifted ARC book.

You’ve got to be feeling something(s) about climate change. (Hopefully not apathy!)

In Human Nature, Marvel uses emotions to discuss the history and science of climate change including where the planet is headed. Part pop science, part memoir, her writing offers a sort of blueprint for processing how we feel about the dire state of our world and its future changes, taking the reader through nine different emotions. I enjoyed this format.

Marvel is a climate scientist and it’s clear that she’s extremely knowledgeable about her field of study, though there’s no need for a deep scientific background in order to read this book. Things are explained in an accessible manner.

It’s not all doom and show more gloom. Marvel provides hope without being saccharine. Lots of topics are used to further the climate discussion such as sequoia groves, Roman emperors, mythology, and volcanoes.

There’s an importance to connecting human emotion with climate crisis. We can have all the scientific data in the world at our disposal, yet without strong human feelings to prompt action, nothing will become of it.

This is a book for readers with a vested interest in our evolving planet (really, I hope everyone cares!). Definitely a thought-provoking read. show less

This is a somewhat quirky little book, but in the best possible way. Part of the problem with dealing with climate change is the time scale and the magnitude. It can seem both insurmountable and something to worry about after we deal with the current set of urgent crises. It's therefore easy to either succumb to doomerism or become an insufferable scold.

Marvel starts out by refuting the hold-outs, in a furious tirade. She clearly explains the science, and supplements it with personal anecdotes and real world examples. There's hope and grief, anger and frustration, resignation and fortitude.

Everyone should read this book. Novices and skeptics will learn about the science, the stakes, and what can be done. Jaded readers and experts will show more be reminded of the human side of the issue, and how to build upon and move beyond the science and the policies to reach people in different ways. show less