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Anthropogenic climate change is becoming a reality, and in Australia this means longer , more intense wildfire seasons over a wider area. The GunaiKurnai people saw much of their Country decimated during ‘Black Summer’ (2019/2020), prompting questions about both the management of Country and its heritage resources moving forward.
This novel text assembles some of the most intriguing voices in modern conservation biology. Collectively they highlight many of the most challenging questions being asked in conservation science today, each of which will benefit from new experiments, new data, and new analyses. The book's principal aim is to inspire readers to tackle these uncomfortable issues head-on. A second goal is to be reflective and consider how the field has reacted to challenges to orthodoxy, and to what extent have or can these challenges advance conservation science. Furthermore, several chapters discuss how to guard against confirmation bias. The overall goal is that this book will lead to greater conservation of ecosystems and biodiversity by harnessing the engine of constructive scientific scepticism in service of better results.
The long-term productivity of forest ecosystems depends on the cycling of nutrients. The effect of carbon dioxide fertilization on forest productivity may ultimately be limited by the rate of nutrient cycling. Contemporary and future disturbances such as climatic warming, N-deposition, deforestation, short rotation sylviculture, fire (both wild and controlled), and the invasion of exotic species all place strains on the integrity of ecosystem nutrient cycling. Global differences in climate, soils, and species make it difficult to extrapolate even a single important study worldwide. Despite advances in the understanding of nutrient cycling and carbon production in forests, many questions rema...
The contemporary crisis of emerging disease has been a century and a half in the making. Human, veterinary, and crop health practitioners convinced themselves that disease could be controlled by medicating the sick, vaccinating those at risk, and eradicating the parts of the biosphere responsible for disease transmission. Evolutionary biologists assured themselves that coevolution between pathogens and hosts provided a firewall against disease emergence in new hosts. Most climate scientists made no connection between climate changes and disease. None of these traditional perspectives anticipated the onslaught of emerging infectious diseases confronting humanity today. As this book reveals, a...
Rapid economic development has been a boon to human well-being. It has lifted millions out of poverty, raised standards of living, and increased life expectancies. But economic development comes at a significant cost to natural capital—the fertile soils, forests, coastal marshes, farmland—that support all life on earth, including our own. The dilemma of our times is to figure out how to improve the human condition without destroying nature’s. If ecosystems collapse, so eventually will human civilization. One answer is inclusive green growth—the efficient use of natural resources. Inclusive green growth minimizes pollution and strengthens communities against natural disasters while re...
Is climate catastrophe inevitable? In a world of extreme inequality, rising nationalism and mounting carbon emissions, the future looks gloomy. Yet one group of environmentalists, the ‘ecomodernists’, are optimistic. They argue that technological innovation and universal human development hold the keys to an ecologically vibrant future. However, this perspective, which advocates fighting climate change with all available technologies – including nuclear power, synthetic biology and others not yet invented – is deeply controversial because it rejects the Green movement’s calls for greater harmony with nature. In this book, Jonathan Symons offers a qualified defence of the ecomoderni...
This book critically explores the legal tools, concepts, principles and instruments, as well as cross-cutting issues, that comprise the field of international environmental law. Commencing with foundational elements, progressing on to discrete sub-fields, then exploring regional cooperative approaches, cross-cutting issues and finally emerging challenges for international environmental law, it features chapters by leading experts in the field of international environmental law, drawn from a range of countries in order to put forward a truly global approach to the subject. The book is split into five parts: • The foundations of international environmental law covering the principles of inte...
A scientific excursion into folklore, zoology, and cryptozoology, this text highlights a field, often called a pseudoscience, which seriously considers the possible existence of hidden or unknown animals not recognised in conventional zoology. Folklore and Zoology accessibly reviews the science of DNA samples; film and photograph analysis; hair and footprint examination; and the statistics behind such alleged animals as Sasquatch and the Yeti, Nessie and Champ, the Griffin and the Thunderbirds, and the possible survival of the thylacine, ivory-billed woodpecker, eastern cougar, and others. With over 400 references, Folklore and Zoology is among the most complete scientific review of cryptozoology to date, with discussion of the history and future, and successes and failures of this controversial and fascinating field, offering a fresh synthesis of a highly interdisciplinary literature. This book is ideal reading for students and academics interested in and studying zoology, palaeontology, and folklore courses.
Als der Atmosphärenchemiker Paul Crutzen und der Limnologe Eugene F. Stoermer im Jahr 2000 den Begriff des Anthropozäns einführten, traten sie eine wissenschaftliche Debatte los, die rasch an Dynamik gewann und mittlerweile in großer disziplinärer Breite verhandelt wird. Dabei verwischen etablierte Grenzziehungen zwischen tradierten disziplinären Kulturen der Wissensproduktion, was die beteiligten AkteurInnen dazu zwingt, aus ihren Arenen herauszutreten und mit den jeweils anderen Akteursgruppen einen Aushandlungsprozess über die Evidenzsicherung zu führen. Die jeweiligen Evidenzpraktiken geraten unter Legitimierungsdruck und werden im inter- und transdisziplinären Raum neu verhandelt. Fabienne Will beleuchtet die Anthropozändebatte als trading zone, in der nicht nur zentrale Fragen zur Gegenwart und Zukunft der Menschheit auf der Erde, sondern darauf bezogen auch grundlegende Verständnisse von Evidenzproduktion und -sicherung verhandelt werden.