Unwinding the Spool of Civilization in Ponting's The Green History of the World and Quinn's Ishmael Clive Ponting's The Green History of the World and Daniel Quinn's Ishmael both criticize dominant paradigms of modern human civilization, especially regarding its relationship with the environment. They both feel strongly that we are in trouble. Neither is willing to make definitive connections and present us with a systematic way out of our impending ecological crisis, but both clearly explain what was wrong, what is wrong now, and what will happen if we choose not to take evasive action. In the absence of similar works "in the canon" it is difficult not to feel as if, (as the character Ishmael promised), if you accept their premises you are condemned to isolation, for those who see the future most clearly are usually marginalized, lost about the power they can have to change minds and directions. Lighting almost always has a price, often a high one. In the interest of exploring the need for dissent, let's follow that line of environmentalist thinking a little further. Ponting presents us with the scientific/cultural evidence that supports what Quinn is saying: that we as a species are destroying our foundations even as we proclaim our creation, Civilization, a success. If this massive collapse and ominous future are certainties, then we must ask, as Quinn does, who or what is telling us lies to make us believe otherwise? His character, Ishmael, calls her “Mother Culture” and insists that her pervasive voice works to keep us on course even when large portions of the population have every reason to lose hope in Her principles. This all-powerful entity would presumably include most educational institutions and the media, and thus information to the contrary would rarely be funded or reported, and probably never directly emphasized. Which leaves us with a challenge: using Thomas Kuhn's model for change in social science, we must strive to see whether the civilization-wide Ponting/Quinn paradigm is simply a change in attitude or – as it would be difficult for Kuhn to imagine – a completely new realization that brings with it remedies to the sanctions it warns against. . If this is a paradigm shift, towards hunter-gatherer or Noble Savage imagery, then the potential for civil unrest is great. With the stakes of annihilation as high as they are presented, such a change could justify a radical political-economic reform that, in the absence of believed reality, would only place a greater portion of the Earth's population in positions of subsistence and subjugation...