{"product_id":"the-long-descent-a-users-guide-to-the-end-of-the-world-9781915952219","title":"The Long Descent: A User's Guide to the End of the World","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe visionary classic that traces out the twilight of the petroleum age\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn 2008, as the price of crude oil spiked to record levels, John Michael Greer's \u003cem\u003eThe Long Descent\u003c\/em\u003e pushed past the stereotyped debates of the time to offer a harrowing but hopeful vision of the future of industrial society.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAs believers in perpetual progress insisted that something would turn up to replace depleting petroleum reserves, and believers in apocalypse insisted just as fervently that the spike in oil prices would send industrial society crashing down in ruin overnight, Greer's epochal book reframed the entire debate in terms of the great rhythm of rise and fall the marks the history of civilizations.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Long Descent\u003c\/em\u003e follows the ragged course of decline that has brought every previous civilization to its end, and is doing the same with ours.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIt takes the average civilization one to three hundred years to descend from its peak into a dark age out of which new civilizations will be born, and that same process is visibly under way in our own lives.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe global challenges facing industrial civilization are not problems that we can solve, but predicaments that all of us must live with, as our societies stumble down the long slope to the deindustrial future.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eMuch can still be done as the petroleum age winds down, and the interval between one spike in oil prices and the next offers opportunities that will no longer be available when the price of everything made from petroleum starts soaring again -- as it will.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Long Descent\u003c\/em\u003e offers crucial insights into what individuals, families, small groups, and local communities can do to brace themselves for the changes to come.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eJohn Michael Greer\u003c\/strong\u003e is the award-winning author of more than fifty books, including T\u003cem\u003ehe New Encyclopedia of the Occult, The Druidry Handbook, The Celtic Golden Dawn\u003c\/em\u003e and C\u003cem\u003eircles of Power: An Introduction to Hermetic Magic.\u003c\/em\u003e An initiate in Freemasonry, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, the Martinist Order, and three Druid traditions, Greer served as the Grand Archdruid of the Ancient Order of Druids in America (AODA) for twelve years. He is also the author of seventeen fantasy and science fiction novels and ten nonfiction books on peak oil and the future of industrial society. He lives in Rhode Island and blogs weekly on politics, magic, and the future at www.ecosophia.net.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Sphinx Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50919550353682,"sku":"9781915952219","price":27.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_a51e17b5-f877-4034-a946-312b05d7e07c.jpg?v=1738898340","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/the-long-descent-a-users-guide-to-the-end-of-the-world-9781915952219","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}