A Review of Limits to Growth by S. Rodriguez
Rating: 3 Stars (OK)
Limits To Growth The 30 Year Update Review:

I would recommend this book to other readers. It opened my eyes to many issues that I'd like to change in my life. It also illistrated some good and bad scenarios that we are facing now and will continue to face in the future if we dont make changes or continure to make changes. On the negative side; I thought the book was somewhat hard to read. And I thought that the world3 model was a touch unrealistic, mostly because it lacked important elements to the "real world." But the book did acknowledge that it lacked the elements that I am talking about. Elements such as; war, corruption, government ect.

S. Rodriguez

Submitted on 11:36 AM on 3/22/08

A Review of Limits to Growth by Steven Drevecky
Rating: 4 Stars (Good)
Limits to Growth: The 30-year Update definitely did have a more pessimistic view of population growth. I was extremely surprised to find that this book is nothing more than a long description of the authors' computer model. This book looks at a few basic trends and asks what they mean on a world scale in the long term. The main trend is the exponential increase in the human population and the finite size of the earth, and resources of the earth. Clearly these trends are real and cannot be discounted, the question the book asks is when and how will the finite size of the earth pose a problem to exponentially increasing population.

Overall, I feel as though this book was quite a good read. In that Limits to Growth goes into a lot of detail about problems that we are currently facing, but not only that but do expanding on them with the computer models to see if this problem were still occurring how it would be projected in the future. The authors' do go over solutions that we could look at to be able to avoid a societal collapse.

Submitted on 3:41 PM on 3/19/08

A Review of Limits to Growth by Brita Norvold
Rating: 3 Stars (OK)
Limits to Growth brings in an interesting perspective to the world's natural resources. I would recommend this book to anyone who is desiring to explore the various scenarios in which the globe will reach the limits to resources through the use of computer models. In the examination of each scenario, the determination of each factor is based upon the interconnected web of dependency of natural resources and it shows just how effortlessly our current system is drawing towards an overshoot. The overall trends in the scenarios tell of the the future of business as usual.

While I very much enjoyed the use of the computer models and exploration in the scenarios that they allowed for, I was disappointed to read of the authors lack of confidence in the accuracy of the information that was being input into the models. It left the legitimacy of the models in question, which in turn, took away from the entire book. However, the points that they authors were making were not lost, only slightly lessen.

Towards the close of the book, in the ending chapters, the authors do a fine job in addressing what can be done to avoid the futures that are predicted in the models and stating their overall message. It was in this section of the book that I found the most useful of information and positive outlook to the future.

Submitted on 3:39 PM on 3/19/08

A Review of Limits to Growth by Scott s
Rating: 3 Stars (OK)
By and large, Limits to Growth – The 30-Year Update was a worthwhile read. The original book published in 1972 was a book that I had heard much talk about from my father who was in college at the time. I remember hearing stories about this book and how pessimistic it was in regards to the outcome of the planet if we did not begin to move towards better sustainability and reduce our overall growth. The original version of Limits to Growth turned out to be a little dooms-day and, according to the original text, we should be worse off then we are now.
The 30-Year update, which is the book in review, seems to be less pessimistic than the original and explains some of the reasons behind the initial pessimism. The introduction of the book was very interesting and has good explanations of exponential growth and how the earth’s population is rapidly approaching the carrying capacity.
The bulk of the book deals with the various models that were used to predict outcomes for the future. Much of this middle part could have been trimmed down a bit and better edited for concision. On an interesting note, the section explaining the limitations of the model, dubbed World3, was found near the end of the bulky section regarding the model. I would have preferred this section explaining the limitations of the model upfront so that I could interpret about the models in different context.
The final two chapters of the book were the most important to me. These were used to describe some of the possible solutions we need to look into to avert a collapse; although, the tone of these chapters differs greatly from the rest of the book tending to be less science orientated and more on the philosophical.

Submitted on 9:53 PM on 3/18/08

A Review of Limits to Growth by Sarah S
Rating: 3 Stars (OK)
Limits to Growth – Review

In the beginning of the book it started out with much pessimism explaining that the world is “reaching its limits to growth.” Its goes onto talk about the fact that we are using much of our natural resources up and our population is growing exponentially; we are going to have problems to support the growing population. Over consumption is another issue that is underlined through out the book.

Then the book changes gears and pretty much rebuffs the World3 model in chapter seven and eight which was the basis for the book to begin with. These two chapters have a complete different tone and agenda than the rest of the book. They bring in a few brief ideas that our world can do to change the growing problems, some of them unrealistic) as well as provide optimism.

I really was disappointed with the book. I read Limits to Growth expecting a scientific accurate account of the data from the model. I was hoping that it was based off facts, but in the end the model can not possibly account for many outside factors that intervene. Instead, I got a few mushy ending chapters, which was not what I signed up for with this science class.

There was one good thing I got from the book, though, which was learning about many problems which plague the world right now from consumption, poor farming methods, to learning about companies and their expected growth. The book was informative on these matters even if it does not predict the immediate consequences from them.

Submitted on 4:47 AM on 3/16/08

A Review of Limits to Growth by Jessica DaBell
Rating: 3 Stars (OK)
Limits to Growth, a great book for anyone that thinks growth can be unlimited on our finite planet. I myself knew from signs such as the decline in biodiversity, global warming and other environmental problems that we are currently bumping into limits. But this book widened my perspective by showing different models of population growth, resource decline, pollution, and more variables. How the variables interact with each other is of great value. Although the authors seem wary of confidently putting forth the results of their computer model. This contrasts with the qualitative aspects of the book,where the authors seem very confident. For example they suggest using "soft tools" such as love, or truth-telling to bring the human ecological footprint down below global limits.

Overall, this book reads just a smidge better than the IPCC reports. But it has good aspects that shouldn't be brushed aside. The ecological alarm is going off and we can't continue to hit the snooze button.
Submitted on 4:25 PM on 3/11/08