The Sixth Extinction: Patterns of Life and the Future of Humankind - Softcover

Leakey, Richard E.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0385468091 ISBN 13: 9780385468091

Verlag: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 1996

Inhaltsangabe

Book by Leakey Richard E

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Reseña del editor

Chronicling five times in the history of the earth in which more than half of all living species disappeared in a geological instant, a geological study states that we are on the brink of a sixth mass extinction and presents supporting evidence. Reprint.

Nota de la solapa

Richard Leakey, One Of The World's  Foremost Experts On Man's Evolutionary Past, Now Turns  His Eye To The Future And Doesn't Like What He  Sees.

To the philosophical the  earth is eternal, while the human race -- presumptive  keeper of the world's history -- is a mere speck  in the rich stream of life. It is known that  nothing upon Earth is forever; geography, climate, and  plant and animal life are all subject to radical  change. On five occasions in the past, catastrophic  natural events have caused mass extinctions on  Earth. But today humans stand alone, in dubious  distinction, among Earth's species: Homo  Sapiens possesses the ability to destroy  entire species at will, to trigger the sixth  extinction in the history of life. In The Sixth  Extinction, Richard Leakey and Roger Lewin  consider how the grand sprawl of human life is  inexorably wreaking havoc around the world. The  authors of Origins and  Origins Reconsidered, unimpeachable  authorities on the human fossil record, turn their  attention to the most uncharted anthropological territory  of all: the future, and man's role in defining it.  According to Leakey and Lewin, man and his  surrounding species are end products of history and  chance. Now, however, humans have the unique  opportunity to recognize their influence on the global  ecosystem, and consciously steer the outcome in order  to avoid triggering an unimaginable upheaval.
From the Hardcover edition.

Über diese Auflage

• Verlag: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0385468091
• ISBN 13: 9780385468091
• Einband: Tapa blanda
• Anzahl der Seiten: 288