Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

This open access book features essays written by philosophers, biologists, ecologists and conservation scientists facing the current biodiversity crisis. Despite increasing communication, accelerating policy and management responses, and notwithstanding improving ecosystem assessment and endangered species knowledge, conserving biodiversity continues to be more a concern than an accomplished task. Why is it so? The overexploitation of natural resources by our species is a frequently recognised factor, while the short-term economic interests of governments and stakeholders typically clash with the burdens that implementing conservation actions imply. But this is not the whole story. This book develops a different perspective on the problem by exploring the conceptual challenges and practical defiance posed by conserving biodiversity, namely: on the one hand, the difficulties in defining what biodiversity is and characterizing that “thing” to which the word ‘biodiversity’ refers to; on the other hand, the reasons why assessing biodiversity and putting in place effective conservation actions is arduous.

Biology-Philosophy. --- Biodiversity. --- Ecology. --- Endangered ecosystems. --- Philosophy of Biology. --- Geoecology/Natural Processes. --- Ecosystems. --- Threatened ecosystems --- Biotic communities --- Nature conservation --- Balance of nature --- Biology --- Bionomics --- Ecological processes --- Ecological science --- Ecological sciences --- Environment --- Environmental biology --- Oecology --- Environmental sciences --- Population biology --- Biological diversification --- Biological diversity --- Biotic diversity --- Diversification, Biological --- Diversity, Biological --- Biocomplexity --- Ecological heterogeneity --- Numbers of species --- Ecology --- Philosophy. --- Vitalism --- Biology—Philosophy. --- Geoecology. --- Environmental geology. --- Biocenoses --- Biocoenoses --- Biogeoecology --- Biological communities --- Biomes --- Biotic community ecology --- Communities, Biotic --- Community ecology, Biotic --- Ecological communities --- Ecosystems --- Natural communities --- Geoecology --- Environmental protection --- Physical geology --- Philosophy --- Biology—Philosophy --- Biodiversity --- Environmental geology --- Physical geography. --- Biotic communities. --- Earth System Sciences. --- Geography