November 19, 2015 - 16:49
Environment change is the definitely the hotspot of the world today. In recent years, major countries hold a lot of conferences discussing the environment and climate issues. More and more people are paying attention to environmental issues. Elizabeth Kolbert, Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway show their concerns about climate changes and the environment problems human are facing in their books “The Sixth Extinction” and “The Collapse of Western Civilization”. Although Kolbert, Oreskes, and Conway are trying to convey the same idea that human does harm to the climate and environment, they use totally different methods to show their perspectives. The difference lead to a question that which writing is more effective in persuading readers. I think although Oreskes and Conway seem bolder and they have stronger statements, both of these two books have more space to improve and become more effective.
Kolbert writes a non-fiction book which tells readers facts and some research experiences in a present perspective. She uses the example of the extinction of frogs to induce her concerns of the sixth extinction, which is that human, unnoticeably, have a large impact on the creations in the world. The experiences and researches take place in the present, which is a contradictory to what’s in Oreskes’ and Conway’s book. Oreskes and Conway create a science fiction by looking from the future, viewing the present as a history, and uses both history facts and made-up facts. Kolberts’ method to tell the stories, which is a formal one, provides some crucial facts that human does harm to the environment. This method reveals some issues happening right now that humans need to recognize to prevent things going worse, especially in the environmental protection; the method of Oreskes and Conway is more like using future perspective to give a warning ahead of bad results come out. Comparing these two manners, because of the perspective of the timeline, Kolbert’s writing give people a sense of hope. Because those problems are happening right now and scientists as her are trying to solve the problems, people may think that they do not need to worry about the environmental changes. However, Oreskes and Conway alarm people the crisis in future and using the future perspective to make their purpose seems like really going on, which makes readers feel tense that they really have to do something to stop those things happen. Thus, it seems that the writing of latter has more power in convincing people that the environment and climate changes are really crucial.
Another reason “The Collapse of Western Civilization” is more effective is that its topic is more related to people’s daily life. Oreskes and Conway focus more on the overall aspects of human actions—not only the actions directly to nature but also people’s actions on politics, economics, and climate. They talk about different politics impact to the climate change and how does the policy of economics influence a country’s policy to climate. In contrast, the topic of “The Sixth Extinction” seems not that approachable. Kolbert writes about the environmental issues by looking at specific species and organisms, such as frogs, rats, and plants. The author focuses more on the effects of species of animals and humans’ action directly to nature. However, not all the people are scientists, so they may not interest in the science world and the issues that are kind of professional.
For the last reason, in terms of the view of these authors, Kolbert’s writing seems a little more objective than the other’s, which makes it not powerful and impressive enough. It includes different views from different people so that weaken the author’s statement. For example, in her book, some people insist that humanity will always be a harm while others think people can do efforts to prevent the extinction. Compared with the diversity of opinions in Kolbert’s writing, Oreskes and Conway seem bias but more powerful. They insist that people are the most influencing creatures that change the climate, and people are doing worse when trying to prevent the global warming. One can feel more tense in protecting our planet when reading “The Collapse of Western Civilization” because the authors statement is clear. There is no wrong for authors to just state one perspective that they support and ignore other opinions though sometimes showing a different perspective and argue with it makes the thesis stronger.
Although Oreskes and Conway seem to have successful influencing statements, they can still make their books more attractive in order to impress more readers. Their book looks like a history textbook which is not an advantage in persuading people who don’t like academic articles. If Oreskes and Conway create a science-fiction novel with vivid characters would be a better choice because many people prefer to read a novel than a textbook.
In conclusion, Kolbert, Oreskes, and Conway have their own focus in writing the same topic that people are the main reason that cause the environmental crisis and climate changes but Oreskes and Conway are bolder to state their argument, which makes their writings more effective. After reading those two books, we should really think about how to stop or reduce human’s damage to the earth.