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The present volume studies the application of concepts from non-equilibrium thermodynamics to a variety of research topics. Emphasis is on the Maximum Entropy Production (MEP) principle and applications to Geosphere-Biosphere couplings. Written by leading researchers from a wide range of backgrounds, the book presents a first coherent account of an emerging field at the interface of thermodynamics, geophysics and life sciences.
An accessible book for graduate students and researchers that describes how the laws of thermodynamics apply to Earth system processes.
Can we discover morality in nature? Flowers and Honeybees extends the considerable scientific knowledge of flowers and honeybees through a philosophical discussion of the origins of morality in nature. Flowering plants and honeybees form a social group where each requires the other. They do not intentionally harm each other, both reason, and they do not compete for commonly required resources. They also could not be more different. Flowering plants are rooted in the ground and have no brains. Mobile honeybees can communicate the location of flower resources to other workers. We can learn from a million-year-old social relationship how morality can be constructed and maintained over time.
This volume builds on an international workshop held in 2019, inspired by James Lovelock's "The Revenge of Gaia - Why the Earth Is Fighting Back, and How We Can Still Save Humanity". It, therefore, understands the Gaia concept as an umbrella term for the living world that planet Earth is hosting for nearly 4 billion years. Humankind has intervened in this ecosystem since its emergence on the planet about 2.5 million years ago, often with painful consequences for itself. In its reactions, the Earth system follows only the laws of nature. Consequently, humanity needs to develop strategies for a sustainable Earth system. This volume presents a unique trans- and interdisciplinary variety of approaches to this challenge, offering philosophical considerations as well as practical medical research. It addresses a broad knowledgeable and general audience in environmental management, public administration, and higher education alike.
An accessible account of the ways in which the world's plant life affects the climate. It covers everything from tiny local microclimates created by plants to their effect on a global scale. If you’ve ever wondered how vegetation can create clouds, haze and rain, or how plants have an impact on the composition of greenhouse gases, then this book is required reading.
Overviews and fundamentals -- Case studies and applications -- Advances in modeling, mapping, and coupling.
Leading scientists bring the controversy over Gaia up to date by exploring a broad range of recent thinking on Gaia theory.
How the specter of climate has been used to explain history since antiquity Scientists, journalists, and politicians increasingly tell us that human impacts on climate constitute the single greatest threat facing our planet and may even bring about the extinction of our species. Yet behind these anxieties lies an older, much deeper fear about the power that climate exerts over us. The Empire of Climate traces the history of this idea and its pervasive influence over how we interpret world events and make sense of the human condition, from the rise and fall of ancient civilizations to the afflictions of the modern psyche. Taking readers from the time of Hippocrates to the unfolding crisis of ...
The book is conceived at two levels. An introductory one intended for undergraduate and/or environmental studies students and the other (in the appendix) for advanced students (graduate). The book is different from others on the same subject which are either too descriptive or too much specialized. Beside there are large sections on biogeochemistry not usually found in other textbooks. Whenever possible an approach based on entropy considerations is introduced. The book includes a quite classical introduction to the thermodynamics of ocean and atmosphere, then the circulation of the ocean and atmosphere, the connection climate-chemistry with main emphasis on the carbon dioxide problem. The chemistry is also considered in connection with the polluted atmosphere and ocean and particulate in the atmosphere . A chapter is dedicated to the biogeochemical cycles which are solved both with the integration of a system of equations or matrix algebra. An original chapter is dedicated to sea-atmosphere interactions which includes the monsoons meteorology, hurricanes and the ENSO phenomena. Finally a concise description of the fluid environments in the Solar System is given.