Footprints: In search of future fossils, by David Farrier
Callan reviews Scottish author David Farrier’s nonfiction exploration of humanity’s signatures on the geologic record.
books
Revisiting Tinker Creek
While my son takes banjo lessons downtown, I stroll Charlottesville’s walking mall and browse the bookstores. Last week, I dropped $40 at one of the used-book stores, walking away with an armful of volumes. Most were intended for my son (a voracious reader in addition to being banjo-philic), but on the shelf I also saw … Read more
Book report
A few more books I’ve read recently…. Why Fish Don’t Exist, by Lulu Miller An interesting volume by NPR’s Lulu Miller – a philosophical biography of the first president of Stanford University, the fish biologist David Starr Jordan, mainly, but also an autobiography of key moments in Miller’s own life. At first, she looks to … Read more
What the Eyes Don’t See, by Mona Hanna-Attisha
I just finished an excellent insider account of the Flint water crisis, written by the pediatrician who brought it to the attention of the wider world. Mona Hanna-Attisha practices medicine in Flint, has a background in environmental activism, and happened to be good friends with a specialist in the management of municipal water systems. An … Read more
Book report
It’s been a while since I’ve checked in with you on recent reads. I managed to read a few volumes over the course of the disjointed, stressful fall semester. Here are a few of the highlights: How to be an Antiracist, by Ibram X. Kendi An important book that explores racism in its many, many … Read more
A Brief History of Earth, by Andrew H. Knoll
A review of Andy Knoll’s newly-published book, “A Brief History of Earth: Four billion years in eight chapters.”
Ms. Adventure by Jess Phoenix
Jess Phoenix first came onto my radar when she ran for Congress in 2018. Since that time, and thanks to Twitter’s ability to connect geologists, Jess and I co-hosted a 2019 Pardee Symposium on geoscience communication at the GSA annual meeting in Phoenix, Arizona. Jess stepped in at the last minute to cover for Iain … Read more
Deep Time Reckoning, by Vincent Ialenti
Stereotypically, I think of anthropologists as scholars who head off into years-long sojourns embedded with indigenous peoples, learning their cultures, practices, and insights. Vincent Ialenti has shown me that modern anthropologists can study other groups too. Ialenti’s population of interest is a modern group of European geoscientists, nuclear engineers, and planners. Together, they are charged … Read more
Under a White Sky, by Elizabeth Kolbert
Elizabeth Kolbert’s third book is now out! Under a White Sky is “a book about people trying to solve problems created by people trying to solve problems.” These problems are environmental problems – they are instances of nature becoming less natural. As humans build cities and plant crops and make waste, we alter the world … Read more
Book report
Four recent reads: on starts, near-future technology, fictional far-future adventure, and the geology of the Archaean Eon.