Brendan’s Review Blog

Now the review summary reads like spam, so I apologise for that. I’m just really enthusiastic that the internet in general, and ebay in particular, was able to solve my plumbing problem (insert Carry On innuendo here).

My gas boiler has been giving trouble for many months now, and I was fearing that the whole bloody thing would have to be replaces (little change from 2k). I eventually found (from Google) that the problem was probably related to the Potterton’s infamous PCB (Printed Circuit Board) - the brain of the boiler, so to speak. If I wanted to get an Irish plumber to replace this faulty item, it’d cost me somewhere between 300 and 500 euro (and might not even solve the problem) so it was with great happiness that I found a vendor (sarumlady) on ebay who sells reconditioned PCBs for about 45 euro. The item description included instructions for how to replace the PCB (very <i>very</i> easy, though not strictly permitted) and I now have a house whose temperature actually corresponds to what’s on the thermostat.

Considering that to get over the problem, we had to jam up the thermostats to full, and regulate the temperature by switching the boiler on and off manually, I also expect to see savings on my gas bill.

I know a lot of people with the same boiler problem. If you are one, check out sarumlady.

One of the really refreshing things about this book and this author is that he is playing to nobody’s tune but his own. He acknowledges from the outset that what he has to say will please neither those who assume that modern technological society is inherently wicked, nor those who feel it is blameless for our current state of affairs, ecologically speaking.

The book charts the success or failure of various human societies in the past and the modern age, compares them, and asks the question “What makes the difference between sociatal life and death?”. The author extrapolates 6 variables from past societies that, he argues, can be used to predict our own fortunes.

Most of the content is, it has to be said, disturbing. But Diamond insists that the jury is still out in our own case. He offers, as an appendix, a common sense list of things that every single one of us can do to play our part in addressing current problems that could lead, if unchecked, to the demise of our society as we know it.

I’m really glad that I read this book, and it’s one of the few books that I will undoubtedly re-read.