The second edition of this acclaimed text has been fully updated and substantially expanded to include the considerable developments (since publication of the first edition) in our understanding of the science of climate change, its impacts on biological and human systems, and developments in climate policy. Written in an accessible style, it provides a broad review of past, present and likely future climate change from the viewpoints of biology, ecology, human ecology and Earth system science. It will again prove to be invaluable to a wide range of readers, from students in the life sciences who need a brief overview of the basics of climate science, to atmospheric science, geography, geoscience and environmental science students who need to understand the biological and human ecological implications of climate change. It is also a valuable reference text for those involved in environmental monitoring, conservation and policy-making.Read more
- Accessible to students from multiple disciplinary backgrounds
- Updated version of successful first edition
- Emphasis on climate change and biology and human ecology
Reviews & endorsements
"A comprehensive review of the science of climate change, the impacts of climate change on biological and human systems, and their interrelatedness. An excellent contribution to the growing recognition that knowledge of biological and human systems is needed to understand climate change."
Gordon Bonan, National Center for Atmospheric ResearchSee more reviews
"… readers gain an appreciation of the wide-ranging consequences of climate change with many examples and analogies … it is a book a climate scientist, or any concerned citizen of the world, should read."
Paul A. Dirmeyer, George Mason University
"Chapter 1 is an excellent primer on the causes of climate change … the core of the volume is three chapters that ambitiously summarize climate changes from 4.6 billion years ago to the present … Highly recommended."
D. Goldblum, Choice
"Read this book and gain a new perspective on climate change. This is above all an interdisciplinary topic, and hard to grasp in all its essentials by those of us brought up in the old-fashioned 'single discipline' mode of instruction. Few people have put together in such a compelling and reader-friendly way the full extent of information about climate change and its effects, ranging all the way from changes with geological time to real or potential impacts on human health and welfare and on plant and animal life … This is an invaluable, readable and well-referenced guide to where we are now, how we got here, what is happening now, what may happen next, and what we can do about it."
Colin Summerhayes, Geoscientist
"… a useful synthesis of recent literature for undergraduates."
A. M. Mannion, The Biologist
"This book provides a reasonable synopsis of the material available on climatic change and is thus a useful addition to the literature … a reasonable price for a good-sized text."
Antoinette Mannion, BES Bulletin
"This book presents, in reader-friendly language, an immense amount of information taken from primary literature from a great variety of disciplines connected with the study of climate change and its impacts. It is thus an invaluable reference not only for undergraduate students, but also for scientists."
Simone Fattorini, Biological Conservation
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- Edition: 2nd Edition
- Date Published: November 2012
- format: Paperback
- isbn: 9781107603561
- length: 582 pages
- dimensions: 254 x 178 x 30 mm
- weight: 1kg
- contains: 85 b/w illus. 14 tables
- availability: Available
Table of Contents
1. An introduction to climate change
2. Principal indicators of past climates
3. Past climate change
4. The Oligocene to the Quaternary: climate and biology
5. Present climate and biological change
6. Current warming and likely future impacts
7. The human ecology of climate change
8. Sustainability and policy
Appendix 1. Glossary and abbreviations
Appendix 2. Bio-geological chronology
Appendix 3. Calculations of energy demand/supply and orders of magnitude
Appendix 4. Further thoughts for consideration
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