Imagine a world where people don’t exist. Just imagine it for a moment. Alan Weisman, in his seminal work “The World Without Us” does more than simply imagine what our world work be if all humans simply disappeared overnight, he extrapolates the data available and paints an image of that human-void Earth that is at once exciting and startlingly frightening at the same time.

Focusing on New York in the first part of the text, Weisman scares us into believing we are not the “chosen” species, in fact, we are living on borrowed space … and time, for that matter, as with the rising climate changes, a world without humans could quickly become a reality.

His often pessimistic approach toward humanity, obviously – for why else would he look into the crazy world of an urban jungle returning to the jungle from whence it came – is a tale that we should all take great care to understand. We are not as permanent as we may believe, or want to feel.

Take Manhattan, arguably the global center of the current world. Here, he tells of the days and hours it would take to see the changes nature would inflict upon this metropolis. Underground water veins would quickly make their way to the surface – as nobody would be there to maintain the machines that pump millions of gallons of water out of the subway system on a daily basis. This would create a new environment, one that could take over the cement structures that comprise New York City. In a matter of months, all semblance of human life would quickly go the way of the Dodo. It would begin to crumble, break and plant life would take back what was rightfully theirs.

“Amid the rubble of Manhattan financial institutions that literally collapsed for good, a few bank vaults stand; the money within, however worthless, is mildewed but safe. Not so for the artwork stored in museum vaults, built more for climate control than strength. Without electricity, “ he writes, “protection ceases; eventually museum roofs spring leaks, usually starting with their skylights, and their basements fill with standing water.”

This all takes place within a matter of days, years, or even a few decades. At least the Statue of Liberty will remain for time immemorial, a sign that at least for some far off archaeologist, the legacy of humanity will remain. It is almost a slap in the face by Weisman, who points out so poignantly that at least we will have our freedom, even if we are gone and the statue illuminating this point lies at the bottom of ocean just off the coast from what once stood our greatest city.

Just imagine all that we hold dear, think so permanent, gone in only a few years. While Weisman may not have realized it, the image of the Statue of Liberty – the symbol of freedom – at the bottom of the ocean shows how close we are to the brink. Without humans, the world would quickly, and without end, retake the lands that we humans have endeavored to control.

So when Weisman paints a beautiful picture of the tragedy that looms on the very real horizon, it is time for all of us to wake up and smell what could be the dwindling coffee of the fields across our globe.

If we do not, he reminds us, we will all quickly not see how fast the world is able to recover when we are gone.

Remember, the planet persisted even as we were not even thought of, so to believe, as many of our great leaders have done in the not so distant past, that the world will endure and we are its immaculate keepers, is fallacy; gross misunderstanding of the reality that scientists have called out over and over again. Will we come to grasp Weisman’s fears before it is too late? Let us hope there are still some good people out there ready to make the sacrifice that will see our species survive.

BM

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