Chapter 17

This chapter takes the time to talk about the science of geology, which is a much less exact form of science then many of the others. There are many different viewpoints in geology, or at least there have been in the past, especially between the gradualists and the catastrophists. I think the author made a good point that using geology and the uniformitarianism scale it could be possible to predict some of the geographical events that will happen in the future. It was interesting to also read about how societies can cause their own downfalls, and how there are so many different aspects to it. He also talks about how we a following down the same path as many of these other failed nations and while some nations are able to turn themselves around it is very infrequent that nations can do this,and even more unlikely in our case. We neither want or feel the need to try to change our ways. I also like how the author ended this chapter with an upbeat proclamation, because after reading the last few chapters I was feeling very down about the whole end of society thing and I am generally very optimistic about everything.