The Once and Future World: Book Review and Synopsis

The Once and Future World, by J.B. MacKinnon is best described as an intensely personal ode to nature. Calling it a ‘natural history’ book doesn’t seem appropriate, especially since the author disputes the use of this term for his work in the first chapter. The author J.B. MacKinnon is a Canadian author and journalist, well-known for his book The 100 Mile Diet and the subsequent television series The 100 Mile Challenge. 

The Once and Future World is divided into 3 main parts for a total of 12 chapters and approximately 230 pages. These 3 parts are: The Nature of the Problem; the Nature of Nature; and Human Nature. As a side note, the font they used in this book was very pleasant.

We open The Nature of the Problem by asking the reader to remember what their first idea of ‘nature’ was, and then quickly break down that illusion since most of our childhood “natural areas” had already been severely altered by human presence. MacKinnon then presents us with some sobering statistics, including the estimated 97% loss of biomass in the Atlantic fishery. He suggests that we have  a sort of ecological amnesia, similar to the frog in a slowly boiling pot of water. We don’t notice the environmental degradation because the change is so slow. An interesting hypothesis is also presented that the harvesting of sea life tends to stop being economically viable when a population has been reduced to 10% of its original numbers. The concept of ‘rewilding’ is explained to us, as well as the debate around what actually counts as ‘wild’. Are we to go back to when Europeans first colonized the globe? Or when humans first arrived at a particular landscape? Is it ethical to bring extinct species back to life in our efforts to rewild the landscape?

The Nature of Nature discusses the importance of perception of nature. Even though modern society is more focused on technology and politics, everything occurs in the backdrop of the environment. Even in the most urban parks, there are small-scale dramas occurring that we often overlook. We are also introduced to “ecological ghosts”, plants and animals which have adapted to predators which no longer exist today. An example is the pronghorn antelope which can run at highway speeds since it used to be hunted by the American cheetah. The ‘cascade effect’ in nature is presented to us, in which a novel species is introduced to an environment which causes ripples all throughout the food web by upsetting the balance. An example is honeybees (native to Europe), which begin pollenizing certain plants to the disadvantage of others. 

Finally, we reach Human Nature. MacKinnon discusses how we are more likely to care for things we are familiar with, hence why our disconnection from nature leads to apathy. This book was published in 2013, before rewilding was part of the larger ecological discussion, but the topic merits an entire chapter. In particular, the patchwork nature of our current parks system is slowly being replaced by the concept of ‘wildlife corridors’, connected stretches of natural landscapes for plants and animals to thrive in. The idea of ‘double disappearance’ is brought up. In short, when a species is lost, any aspects of our culture directly related to that species is lost, such as a festival which used to celebrate the emergence of bears from hibernation. To finish off this part, we are introduced to the fictional “Lost Island”, a perfectly untouched wilderness. How would we humans interact with such a landscape? Would we be able to control our urge to modify it? At a larger scale, can human society accept a wilder world? Would we be able to limit our growth?

I read the book over 2 days. Even though it is non-fiction, MacKinnon has a smoothness to his writing style which makes an easy read of a complex topic. Part philosophical treatise, part ecological call-to-arms, I found myself postponing my other plans so I could keep reading.

5 global extinction events out of 5