About the Book
The author of The Long Descent examines a solution for the troubles of our modern age: technical regression.
To most people paying attention to the collision between industrial society and the hard limits of a finite planet, it's clear that things are going very, very wrong. We no longer have unlimited time and resources to deal with the crises that define our future, and the options are limited to the tools we have on hand right now.
This book is about one very powerful option: deliberate technological regression.
Technological regression isn't about "going back"--it's about using the past as a resource to meet the needs of the present. It starts from the recognition that older technologies generally use fewer resources and cost less than modern equivalents, and it embraces the heresy of technological choice--our ability to choose or refuse the technologies pushed by corporate interests.
People are already ditching smartphones and going back to "dumb phones" and land lines and e-book sales are declining while printed books rebound. Clear signs among many that blind faith in progress is faltering and opening up the possibility that the best way forward may well involve going back.
A must-read for anyone willing to think the unthinkable and embrace the possibilities of a retro future.
Praise for The Retro Future
"Whether or not you accept John Michael Greer's argument that a deindustrialized future is inevitable, you'll appreciate his call for the freedom to select the best technologies of the past--worthy and sustainable tools, not pernicious prosthetics. Greer's vision of a "post-progress" world is clear, smart, and ultimately hopeful." --Richard Polt, professor of philosophy, Xavier University; author, The Typewriter Revolution: A Typist's Companion for the 21st Century
"What might your life be like without an automobile, TV, or a mobile phone? Ask John Michael Greer, who lives that way and recommends it as practice for the soon-to-be-normal. Greer says we are embarked upon the post-progress era. Climate change, loose nukes, and resource exhaustion are among its many challenges. In The Retro Future, Greer looks backward to mark the way forward." --Albert Bates, author, The Post-Petroleum Survival Guide, The Biochar Solution, and The Paris Agreement
About the Author :
John Michael Greer is a scholar of ecological history, an award-winning author and an internationally renowned Peak Oil theorist whose blog, The Archdruid Report, has become one of the most widely cited online resources dealing with the future of industrial society. He is a certified Master Conserver, an organic gardener, and has been active in the alternative spirituality movement for more than 25 years. John lives in Cumberland, MD.
Review :
As John Michael Greer writes in The Retro Future: Looking to the Past to Reinvent the Future, when you've driven down a blind alley and are sitting there with your bumper pressed against a brick wall, the only way forward is by backing up. . . staying stuck against the brick wall leads nowhere useful. His call is not to a tribal or Stone Age existence, but rather, a return to things that actually work. Greer calls for "retrovation" -- that is "retro plus innovation" rather than forsaking the old because we assume that all things new are superior. It's time to redefine "progress" in this way rather than using the latest technology to dig our heels into the illusion that "nothing is wrong at all." Engaging, witty, and exemplary of the Greer style we've come to love and rely on, The Retro Future will not disappoint. In fact, it may reassure you that in many instances, your ancestors got it right.-- Carolyn Baker, Ph.D., author, Love In The Age of Ecological Apocalypse and Dark Gold: The Human Shadow And The Global Crisis.
Whether or not you accept John Michael Greer's argument that a deindustrialized future is inevitable, you'll appreciate his call for the freedom to select the best technologies of the past -- worthy and sustainable tools, not pernicious prosthetics. Greer's vision of a "post-progress" world is clear, smart, and ultimately hopeful.-- Richard Polt, professor of philosophy, Xavier University; author, The Typewriter Revolution: A Typist's Companion for the 21st Century
What might your life be like without an automobile, TV, or a mobile phone? Ask John Michael Greer, who lives that way and recommends it as practice for the soon-to-be-normal. Greer says we are embarked upon the post-progress era. Climate change, loose nukes, and resource exhaustion are among its many challenges. In The Retro Future, Greer looks backward to mark the way forward.-- Albert Bates, author, The Post-Petroleum Survival Guide, The Biochar Solution, and The Paris Agreement.
The prevailing assumption is that you will accept every bit of new technology, whether enthusiastically or grudgingly, or you won't be able to spend your life in a box, tethered to a gadget, looking at colored pixels. Greer's book discards this assumption: it is up to you to order your technology à la carte, plus the box and the gadget are soon going away in any case. And the stunning bit of news is, most of the recent technological progress has been in the direction of shoddy, inconvenient, short-lived, buggy time-wasters, so there is a lot for you to reject.--Dmitry Orlov, author, Reinventing Collapse and Five Stages of Collapse
