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<\/a><\/p>\nThere is a new (Dec 2011) book out by William deBuys: A Great Aridness: Climate Change and the Future of the American Southwest<\/span>. deBuys posts about his book here<\/a>. An excerpt:<\/p>\n “The news for the Southwest is not good: the droughts, fires, social strains and other stresses that lie ahead will challenge the region to the utmost. But the stories about how people came to understand those problems are endlessly fascinating, at least for me. In A Great Aridness<\/em> I have tried to capture the \u201ceureka moments\u201d when the researchers I talked with glimpsed new and resonant insights \u2013 like when Tom Swetnam, who heads the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona, and Julio Betancourt of the USGS made the link between forest fire frequency and the El Nino\/La Nina cycle. Or when Mark Varien of the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center found a great kiva at Sand Canyon Pueblo and was able to visualize in a completely new way the pueblo\u2019s final days. Or when Chris Milly or Richard Seager, separately, realized that their climate models were telling them something big.<\/p>\n The surprise for me in writing the book was to come full circle back to issues I had been working on for many years. Yes, we urgently need to cut back on greenhouse gas emissions, which for virtually all of us means a radical change in the way we live. But we also need to take care of business that has long been unfinished, like living within a sustainable water budget and restoring fire resilience to our forests. Climate change only makes more urgent the big task that has always <\/em>been before us: to learn how to live in the marvelous arid lands of this continent without further spoiling them. It is an old challenge. We have already had a lot of practice, and we should be better at it. We can be.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n In Dec 2011, The New York Times<\/a> reviewed deBuys’ book and another book by Andrew Ross, Bird on Fire.<\/span><\/p>\n An excerpt:<\/p>\n “Dr. deBuys puts it somewhat differently. History teaches that people have difficulty adapting to prolonged, extreme drought, he writes. Faced with it, they typically abandon efforts to cope and simply abandon their homes. That is why we call dry places deserts \u2014 they are deserted.<\/p>\n Is that tactic likely for today\u2019s Southwest? No. But, he writes, any answers to the water challenge will require \u201cstrong social will and collective commitment.\u201d<\/p>\n At the moment, though, the region\u2019s politics tend to embrace the idea that collective action of any kind is inherently suspicious or even evil; government is the problem, never the solution; and regulation is the bane of economic growth.<\/p>\n These ideas are not in accord with Dr. deBuys\u2019s prescription, which is to \u201cget on with what we should have been doing all along, including limiting greenhouse gases.\u201d<\/p>\n There is no silver bullet, he writes. \u201cThere is only the age-old duty to extend kindness to other beings, to work together and with discipline on common challenges.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Dot Earth<\/a> post about the book<\/p>\n NY Times post<\/a> about the book.<\/p>\n Follow up:<\/p>\n