‼️ Energy and Civilisation: A History by Václav Smil ‼️

19/∞

Rating: ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️

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“After reading this book, a piece of fucking coal won’t be a piece of fucking coal anymore. You are going to see it as stored energy and you are going to start to wonder how to release it and harness it.”

Me

Why did I read this book on the first place? The answer is simple:  Bill Gates read it. As the matter of fact, Bill Gates has read all Smil’s books.

If Bill Gates is reading Smil’s books it means that there is a reason, why he reads them. Similarly, if Warren Buffet or Steve Jobs read some book, it means I want to read it, too. I want to see what they saw and I want to think like them to unleash my full potential.

The first time I have heard about Smil was actually through Gates. He mentioned Smil’s name in his Netflix documentary called: “Inside Bill's Brain: Decoding Bill Gates.”

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See the trailer here:

As Gates mentioned Smil’s name, my brain went. Wait a second, this guy’s name sounds Czech! So I looked up Smil on Wikipedia. The big surprise was that he was actually Czech. If somebody is Czech, he writes in English and his books are being read by Bill Gates, it is good enough reason for me to read it, too.

To my big surprise, Smil emigrated in 1969 to North America. Firstly in the USA and eventually moved to Canada. Later he went on to teach at University of Manitoba and started to publish books in English, of course. Smil is no newbie as his other book: Made in the USA was mentioned in Jeff Bezos’s biografy written by Brad Stone.

In the documentary, Bill Gates mentioned that he wants to improve the world we live in. Bill is actually concerned about three majors issues: climate change, energy and disease eradication.

Smil is covering up the part about energy. So why this book lapsed up Bill’s attention?

I can only guess but I think it was Smil’s profound narrative. He cuts deep in the tissue. If I compare this book with the latest book I have read (Shoe Dog by Phil Knight - founder of Nike), then there is a massive difference. Shoe Dog is manily another marketing tool. It is positive, filled up with beautiful motivational quotes, but it is not that rich in substance. Vice versa, Smil’s book could be seen by many readers as boring and profoundly academic. Smil is using more information in one sentence that would be necessary. He is also not avoiding to use scientific terms. Somebody not familiar with all of those terms can get lost very easily in the book.

So there was some criticism. Now, let’s carry on to what makes this book great. I would like to sum it up in one sentence:

⚡️⚡️⚡️THINK ENERGY⚡️⚡️⚡️

To think energy means that Smil’s narrative revolves around energy and how we use it. He also puts it into historical context.

“To put this simply, Smil analyses energy use from head to toe.“

I’m going to use a few examples to give you a taste of how Smil writes:

He made bold estimation how much energy was required by foraging societies by hunting and gathering. How much energy was required to build roman roads and viaducts. How much energy (in terms of quarrying the stones and sand) was required to build pyramids and later on French fortresses in 1800’. Smil counts everything in joules. He estimates much energy takes for us to lift up our arms etc.

He analyses energy in terms of food we eat, because food is nothing more than stored energy. Here I see some similarities with Darin Olinen’s Superlife. Smil says for example that when you do eat 200g of salmon, the energy value is not the same as in 200g of cod. Samlon is energy richer, because it contains more fat and consequently lipids. In the past, many societies flourished and went bust because of energy recourses they had at their hand. 

But Smil goes further. He says that drugs have nothing in common with evolution, they are part of culture. When some hunters and gatherers were done hunting, some just smoked weed and did drugs regardless the fact that women were upset.

I personally think that any kind of drugs are slowing people down and it is always preferable to go on without them.

He also mentioned that the first farmers were migrants replacing or blending together with aboriginal foraging societies. (Well Anglo-Saxons know something about that. They got colonised by some white people from the North. Is that a reason why they are so scarred of foreigners? Because foreigners will eventually outperform them? That is something to thing about)

It is amazing to see on his book how we were developing as humanity based on inventions we made. Every improvement led to better and easier life.

As Smil mentions that “we humans” are highly unstable for hard physical labor. Therefore we were harnessing animal power for centuries. Amazingly, Smil analysed how a pair of oxen and horses do in comparison to one another. Horses are the best, they live longer and the major body weight is on the from legs - it makes horses very powerful. Oxen have shorter live span and are not as powerful as horses.

Smil also mentioned that “we humans” were harnessing “renewable energy”  (wind, thermal etc.) for centuries. He shows that on comparison of wind and water mills. In 15th century the both had about the same efficiency. In 1800’ water mill’s efficiency surpassed the wind mills severalfold. 

He is an advocate for nuclear energy. He considered it to be one of the cleanest source of electric energy every made. The problem he mentions is that the design of nuclear power plants has not changed for 50 years. We now have means and plans to build very clean and safe nuclear power plants, but we are not doing it. He makes me think that nuclear energy is not perhaps dead as it might seem now. And what about generation of electricity through nuclear fusion?

He also analyses the crisis in the middle Easy, the crisis caused by uneven allocation of energy resources.

Smil even analysed bombs and their energy output including bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

“In the other words, Smil goes deep into substance and has ambition to analyse everything involving energy…”

When white people in England are going to call you trash Eastern European, remind them that Bill Gates reads Smil’s books and would like to improve the world based on Smil’s findings. After that ask them, how did they themselves lately contributed to development of humanity. 😏😏😏

Conclusion:

“Every book related to an area of knowledge I do not know nothing about helps me to grow intellectually and spiritually.”

Me

The book reminds me a little bit of Czech educational system and universities consequently. It means a loads of information and very little time to let it sink in. Which makes Czechs extremely successful outside of their own country, but not so successful in their own country.

I think that especially engineers are going to enjoy this book. History fans should also find it interesting. Yet, to read this book you have to expend quite a lot of energy. I do not think it is for just anybody, simply because it is a quite complicated read. But hey! Who the fuck am I to say something like that? 😏 Do whatever you think is right.

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👉 Buy this book! 👈 through my link and help me build this website! 😊

Feel free to like, share and comment or recommend books you find inspirational yourself. I’m keen to hear about them.

Coming Up Next:

MasterClass: Chris Voss The Art of Negotiation

Peace 🧘‍♂️✌️🌱