Abstract: .This was proposed as an ongoing project of the Union of Concerned Elders to come up with 20 books posterity should read, with the number one book offering a foundation for understanding the others.
And the 19 Books to Inform Posterity (chronological order)
Tao Te Ching, Laozi 400 BCE
Walden: or, Life in the Woods, H.D. Thoreau 1854
The Shape of Things to Come, H.G. Wells 1933
The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge, Berger & Luckmann 1966
Environment, Power, and Society, H.T. Odum 1971
Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome’s Project on the Predicament of Mankind, D. Meadows, et al. 1972
Steps to an Ecology of Mind, G. Bateson 1972
Human Understanding: The Collective Use and Evolution of Concepts, Vol 1, S. Toulmin 1972
Exploring New Ethics for Survival: The Voyage of the Spaceship Beagle, G. Hardin 1972
Mind & Nature: A Necessary Unity (Advances in Systems Theory, Complexity, and the Human Sciences), G. Bateson 1979
Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change, W.R. Catton 1980
Towards a World Theology: Faith and the Comparative History of Religion, W.C. Smith 1981
The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener, M. Gardner 1983
The Collapse of Complex Societies, J. Tainter 1988
Steady State Economics: A New Paradigm, H.E. Daly 1993
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, C. Sagan 1995
Deep Ecology for the 21st Century: Readings on the Philosophy and Practice of the New Environmentalism, ed. G. Sessions 1995
The Revenge of Gaia: Why the Earth is Fighting Back — and How we Can Still Save Humanity, J. Lovelock 2006
Half Earth: Our Planet’s Fight for Life, E.O. Wilson 2016
Elders can suggest other books for anyone younger than themselves to read. The Union of Concerned Elders will consider suggestions. But read the One Book first.