You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
"What in the ever-loving blue-eyed world do these [U1ano wicz's] innocuous comments on thermodynamics have to do with ecology!" Anonymous manuscript reviewer The American Naturalist, 1979 "The germ of the idea grows very slowly into something recognizable. It may all start with the mere desire to have an idea in the first place. " Walt Kelly Ten Ever-Lovin' Blue-Eyed Years with Pogo, 1959 "It all seems extremely interesting, but for the life of me it sounds as if you pulled it out of the air," my good friend Ray Lassiter exclaimed to me after enduring about 20 minutes of my enthusiasm for the newly formu lated concept of "ascendency" in ecosystems. "It wasn't," I replied, "but it would take ...
A challenge to existing Newtonian and Darwinian paradigms, Ecology, the Ascendent Perspective demonstrates that a theoretically reshaped science of ecology, better suited to portraying the dynamics of the natural world, can be a more effective means of ensuring its health.
A collegiate course in philosophy emphasizing material and mechanical foundations for the creation of the world shook Robert E. Ulanowicz's youthful faith to its core. Having difficulty accepting a purely secular and meaningless worldview, Ulanowicz persisted in searching for clues to give meaning to the nature of the cosmos and the evolution of life as we know it. Reaching adulthood in the midst of his career in ecology, his work with networks of connected living processes convinced him that the importance of processes eclipses the subsidiary role that classical thermodynamics had assigned to them. Rather, Ulanowicz discovered what he considers the origins of phenomena that had been conside...
A New Ecology presents an ecosystem theory based on the following ecosystem properties: physical openness, ontic openness, directionality, connectivity, a complex dynamic for growth and development, and a complex dynamic response to disturbances. Each of these properties is developed in detail to show that these basic and characteristic properties can be applied to explain a wide spectrum of ecological obsevations and convections. It is also shown that the properties have application for environmental management and for assessment of ecosystem health.* Demonstrates an ecosystem theory that can be applied to explain ecological observations and rules* Presents an ecosystem theory based upon a systems approach* Discusses an ecosystem theory that is based on a few basic properties that are characteristic for ecosystmes
Written by a highly accredited scientist, this book offers a compelling and original alternative to outdated approaches to the life sciences. It presents a metaphysical basis for living systems that significantly mitigates several purported conflicts between science and religion.
'Aquatic Food Webs' provides a current synthesis of theoretical and empirical food web research. The textbook is suitable for graduate level students as well as professional researchers in community, ecosystem, and theoretical ecology, in aquatic ecology, and in conservation biology.
This book arises from a workshop on the application of network analysis to ecological flow networks. The purpose is to develop a new tool for comparison of ecosystems, paying particular attention to marine ecosystems. After a review of the methods and theory, data from a variety of marine habitats are analyzed and compared. Readers are shown how to calculate such properties as cycling index, average path length, flow diversity, indices of ecosystem growth and development and the origins and fates of particular flows. This is a highly original contribution to the growing field of ecosystem theory, in which attention is paid to the properties of the total, functioning ecosystem, rather than to the properties of individual organisms. New insights are provided into the workings of marine systems.
Landscape Ecology - a rapidly growing science - quantifies the ways ecosystems interact. It establishes links between activities in one region and repercussions in another. Landscape Ecology: A Top-Down Approach serves as a general introduction to this emerging area of study. In this book the authors take a "top down" approach. They believe that
This book examines from a multidisciplinary viewpoint the question of what we mean - what we should mean - by setting sustainability as a goal for environmental management. The author, trained as a philosopher of science and language, explores ways to break down the disciplinary barriers to communication and deliberation about environment policy, and to integrate science and evaluations into a more comprehensive environmental policy. Choosing sustainability as the keystone concept of environmental policy, the author explores what we can learn about sustainable living from the philosophy of pragmatism, from ecology, from economics, from planning, from conservation biology and from related disciplines. The idea of adaptive, or experimental, management provides the context, while insights from various disciplines are integrated into a comprehensive philosophy of environmental management. The book will appeal to students and professionals in the fields of environmental policy and ethics, conservation biology, and philosophy of science.
This volume comprises the proceedings of the International Workshop on Eco logical Goal Functions, held at the Schleswig-Holstein Cultural Center of Salzau, August 30 -September 4, 1996. The conference - first in a series - intended to be convened at Salzau at 1 -2 year intervals to address various aspects of theo retical and application-oriented ecology, was initiated, organized and carried out under the auspices of the Ecology Center of the Kiel University. It featured key note addresses, invited lectures, submitted papers, and posters. 32 contributions written by authors from eight countries, were selected to be presented in this book. From the very rich discussions of the workshop, some ...