What is Digg?193 Comments
- mixmasteraaron, on 01/20/2008, -6/+143Cannibalism is a terrible thing.
- rjmoriarty, on 01/20/2008, -14/+143I'm probably looking too much into it, but something about this image is very inspiring; like there's some kind of hope in this world...
- abtarhar, on 01/25/2008, -2/+96how do we know its not a pop-up book?
- JLecker, on 01/20/2008, -3/+97A Tree Grows in... Detroit?
- inactive, on 01/20/2008, -2/+91I'm not sure if it's just incredibly sad that building has something to do with our public school systems or if it's just beautiful and ironic that a tree found a new home to grow. See, if the world collapses, nature will prevail. :P
- weiwuwei, on 01/20/2008, -2/+90Fresh green leaves of a tree, growing out of the chaos of rotting books, inside of a man-made structure. Nature wins for now?
- inactive, on 01/20/2008, -0/+80Books are seeds for intelligence.
And trees. - desistere, on 01/20/2008, -1/+43Detroit is the epicenter of one of the largest mass exoduses in the country. There are thousands of vacant homes and buildings and this type of image is very typical. The buildings, no longer in use, slowly deteriorate and are reclaimed by the earth. Detroit growth and shrinkage numbers from Wikipedia:
Year Population Increase/Decrease
1920 993,678 113.3%
1930 1,568,662 57.9%
1940 1,623,452 3.5%
1950 1,849,568 13.9%
1960 1,670,144 -9.7%
1970 1,514,063 -9.3%
1980 1,203,368 -20.5%
1990 1,027,974 -14.6%
2000 951,270 -7.5% - DearSergio, on 01/20/2008, -4/+44Sorry I'm late. [insert crypto-racist comment about Detroit here]
Won't happen again, I promise. - Locke2053, on 01/20/2008, -1/+35Really? That was your first thought? My first thought was: "Isn't a tree growing in paper cannibalism?"
- HiKevinRose, on 01/20/2008, -3/+36What an almost surreal image, the tree is like a phoenix, literally rising from the ashes of other trees. Awesome. Just Awesome.
- nspireing, on 01/20/2008, -0/+32ive been inside this building here are a few more links to look at if your interested, also check the first one to really see trees growing in this building.
http://nspireing.deviantart.com/art/Hidden-Forest- ...
http://nspireing.deviantart.com/art/Broken-Dreams- ...
http://nspireing.deviantart.com/art/Hope-lies-6966 ...
I cant even describe the feeling the first time i was in the book depot, ive been in several other ex-landmarks in detroit and this was the only one ive seen more than one person fall to tears over the scope of this building. - WestDC, on 01/20/2008, -4/+30Books in... Detroit?
- BeefBaron, on 01/20/2008, -5/+26If all those pesky ***** Sapiens are removed!
- inactive, on 01/20/2008, -4/+25Hmmm.. 11 hours and no crypto-racist comments about Detroit yet; will check back later.
- Aroundtown27, on 01/20/2008, -0/+19in the end nature always wins...
- banmaster, on 01/20/2008, -2/+20I find it very depressing. The ignorant destruction of books (either directly or indirectly) is always a shame.
- lordmike, on 01/20/2008, -0/+16Yet, with the thousands upon thousands of other buildings vacant, the government is still obsessed with tearing down Tiger Stadium... a national landmark... but, that huge burnt out building you can see from I-75? That festering eyesore can stick around...
- ArikSantiago, on 01/20/2008, -1/+16Captain Planet would cry with joy if he saw this.
- TheSkunkMonkey, on 01/20/2008, -4/+15Nah, that's just someones failed biology experiment.
- warlokaz2004, on 01/20/2008, -0/+11Makes you wonder why waste millions using cgi to erase people filming I am legend in New York when you have 'vacant' urban areas like Detroit and Gary, Ind. out there.
- Hellothere123, on 01/20/2008, -1/+12Almost looks like a scene in the video game Bioshock.
- Checkerd, on 01/20/2008, -0/+11Nope.
- tricks574, on 01/20/2008, -0/+11Have you seen d-towns mayor? Or the city council lately? Didn't they vote to change the tourism slogan from "Motorcity Motown" something that actually meant something to "The D". Seriously, Kwame pulled the race card, RUNNING AGAINST A BLACK MAN, AND IT F*CKING WORKED!!!!!!!!! This all works around to the educational system being defunct and generations going without proper teaching, but yeah, the city's leaders are not exactly moral beacons
- kyouteki, on 01/20/2008, -0/+10Detroit needs a company like Omni Consumer Products to clean it up.
- snotrokit, on 01/20/2008, -0/+8The failure of Man. Fantastic photo, means so many different things to each person that sees it.
- akatherder, on 01/20/2008, -1/+9Detroit was simply too reliant on the auto industry. As the Japanese manufacturers took market share, they grasped onto winning it back for too long. In recent years, new industries have come to Detroit and it's changing things around.
Some areas are burnt out ghettos and other areas are safe, clean, and new. The amount of contrast is scary and re-assuring.
There's the new football stadium (hosted the Super Bowl 2 years ago), new baseball stadium (just hosted the all star game), soon to be new hockey arena, refurnished Renaissance Center, Compuware building, Grand Circus park, Campus Martius, two new casinos, Heidleberg Project, and Greektown among other things. - ampersand2001, on 01/20/2008, -0/+7I love being from detroit.
if you ever want to see what the rest of the place looks like, check out http://detroityes.com/0tourdetroit.htm#The_Fabulou ... - sulayman, on 01/20/2008, -1/+8I can see that for direct destruction (book burning, for example), because it's the worst form of censorship -- it's an attempt to silence voices completely. To write them off, as it were.
But indirect destruction of books? Eh. I mean, so long as they're not irreplaceable, where's the harm? Ultimately the paper decomposes and returns to the earth to begin the cycle anew (as seen above). - Locke2053, on 01/20/2008, -1/+8If you studied entropy, you would know that in the end, only cold wins.
- BossKey, on 01/20/2008, -0/+7You are trying to be politically correct, but you're using a backwards argument.
When it's the ecosystem vs. humans, the ecosystem ALWAYS wins. Think about it. The ecosystem can continue without humans, but humans cannot continue without the ecosystem. If humans are environmentally irresponsible, we will destroy the parts of the ecosystem that keep us alive (supplies of clean air, water, and food). The ecosystem as a whole can hold out longer than we can. If both humans and ecosystem are destroyed, the first to recover will be the ecosystem, not the humans.
This is why humans must be envorinmentally responsible. Not just to save the ecosystem...but to save the humans. - banmaster, on 01/20/2008, -0/+7Nature always wins (at least these small battles).
You should google chernobyl pics where ts only been 15 years or so cince it blew up but already trees are well on their way to reclaiming abandoned towns and buildings. - submariner, on 01/20/2008, -0/+6Been there a few times, as well as Michigan Central and the Packard plant. Always a fun adventure
- inactive, on 01/20/2008, -1/+7This looks so post-apocalyptic to me, it is just beautiful. No subtitles are needed here. Just peaceful.
- polarpaw, on 01/20/2008, -1/+7As Malcolm said, "Life will find a way."
- themastersb, on 01/20/2008, -0/+6This looks like it would be a picture for an inspirational poster "Overcoming Adversity"
- benroy, on 01/20/2008, -1/+7I had to think about that for a second. Good one.
- DeFex, on 01/20/2008, -0/+6too bad some people have to complain about everything and pretend to be superior.
- fartbuttes, on 01/20/2008, -6/+11Well there is hope for the world, but it depends on your perspective. From the earth's perspective, there is still hope that the humans will kill themselves off before completely destroying the ecosystem!
- philrenaud, on 01/20/2008, -0/+5You know, I love being from Detroit, too.
The thing is, Detroit's a really great place to be _from_. Not such a great place to end up. - DeFex, on 01/20/2008, -0/+5ants 60,438,252,775,345,637,4567,3221,456,332,566,232,744,314,153,
- leahcim, on 01/20/2008, -0/+5For most of the same reasons, The Colosseum in Rome can be considered the same thing, what's wrong with it?
- ihatepaulspam, on 01/20/2008, -1/+6Check the other dozen pics by the same author on flickr, then Google "Detroit textbook repository fire," then come back to Digg and apologize for being one of those morons who posts "photoshoped" on every image post on Digg.
- ZMerlin, on 01/20/2008, -0/+5It's just the tree of knowledge.
- gfair, on 01/20/2008, -2/+7Life is the most powerful force on this planet, it will erase anything we build in only a few hundred years where it is abundant.
- pipdip, on 01/20/2008, -0/+5The Irony of trees growing over books is amazing
- DephexTwin, on 01/20/2008, -0/+4If the human race dies on a planet, and no sentient beings are around to hear it, does it make a sound?
- sporg, on 01/20/2008, -0/+4 I have always been fond of urban exploration. Once the climate control of a building is removed its amazing how fast decay sets in. Of course human vandalism is also a key ingredient to natures reclamation. Its interesting that as soon as the restraints of civilization are loosed human beings destroy everything they can with relish.
- darkheartlor, on 01/20/2008, -0/+4I think this is just amazing. It shows that nature will take over after we've left. When we eventually kill ourselves off, nature will just come in and clean up our mess. After a few hundred years, you'd barely be able to tell that humans were even around without doing some digging. Mother nature is good to us and we need to treat her a bit better if we want to survive.
- AngryIrishMan12, on 01/20/2008, -0/+4The picture almost looks fake but i'm going to abide by good faith and assume it is real. Coming from Toledo i can relate with our ***** hole to the north and only take this as a sign of good things to come. As much as we may ***** this world up, nature will prevail and make things right, with or without humans(whichever may be necessary). Either way, don't hate on Detroit, their part in the industrial revolution of the U.S. made America what it is today. And without Detroit, i doubt i would be able to enjoy the little charms of the *****-up little city I call Toledo
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