What indicators are suitable for monitoring the required actions and monitoring
success?
How much influence do economic systems and cash flows have?
How important for flora and fauna are power relationships and economic liberalism?
What are the most effective and targeted means of tackling the particularly dubious
legal and illegal evils of the traditional and the modern?
What impact does the sale of exotic and rare plants or animals have on the remaining
wild populations in their native habitats?
How do the specific problems and management measures taken to deal with ecosystems and biodiversity differ in the various regions of the world?
Why is environmental education so important?
How can we avoid any further loss of a species?
The book is divided into four sections: past, present, future, and synthesis.
The first section discusses historical aspects and focuses on the natural and
cultural connections between humans and nature in the past. The past includes the
history of our abiotic environment, the evolution of the biota, and the history of
human influences on ecosystems, but the constraints of the evolution of our psychological constitution and development of our cultures depending on natural resources
as well.
Which events and case studies of the past can serve as positive or negative
examples? The knowledge of the history of ecosystems and biodiversity under
human’s influence can help to understand recent challenges and planning of the
future.
The second section deals with current processes and tendencies. The descriptions
and explanations given there provide a basis for distinguishing between what is
inevitable and what is optional. We highlight recent problems of influences on
ecosystems and species conservation caused by human behavior, wishes, and
money.
The third section is, by its very nature, speculative and thus entails uncertainty.
Looking to the future we attempt to show, based on the current state of scientific
knowledge, the optimal ecosystem conditions for the survival and evolution of biota
despite anthropogenic influence or, rather, with human support. We aim to describe
realistic options under worst-case scenarios—further growth of the world population, increasing demand on resources, and changing climate. We also describe what
would have to be done to prevent species extinction and further damage to
ecosystems.
The fourth and final synthesis section includes a meta-analysis from all the
contributors to this book. The goal of this meta-analysis is, with a strong focus on
human impacts on the environment and a work order, to analyze, enable, and
manage the protection, survival, and evolution of all species on Earth.
We venture prognoses in this book and we will fail. However, we hope that we
will be wrong on the right side.
Flensburg, Germany
Carsten Hobohm
Preface
vii
success?
How much influence do economic systems and cash flows have?
How important for flora and fauna are power relationships and economic liberalism?
What are the most effective and targeted means of tackling the particularly dubious
legal and illegal evils of the traditional and the modern?
What impact does the sale of exotic and rare plants or animals have on the remaining
wild populations in their native habitats?
How do the specific problems and management measures taken to deal with ecosystems and biodiversity differ in the various regions of the world?
Why is environmental education so important?
How can we avoid any further loss of a species?
The book is divided into four sections: past, present, future, and synthesis.
The first section discusses historical aspects and focuses on the natural and
cultural connections between humans and nature in the past. The past includes the
history of our abiotic environment, the evolution of the biota, and the history of
human influences on ecosystems, but the constraints of the evolution of our psychological constitution and development of our cultures depending on natural resources
as well.
Which events and case studies of the past can serve as positive or negative
examples? The knowledge of the history of ecosystems and biodiversity under
human’s influence can help to understand recent challenges and planning of the
future.
The second section deals with current processes and tendencies. The descriptions
and explanations given there provide a basis for distinguishing between what is
inevitable and what is optional. We highlight recent problems of influences on
ecosystems and species conservation caused by human behavior, wishes, and
money.
The third section is, by its very nature, speculative and thus entails uncertainty.
Looking to the future we attempt to show, based on the current state of scientific
knowledge, the optimal ecosystem conditions for the survival and evolution of biota
despite anthropogenic influence or, rather, with human support. We aim to describe
realistic options under worst-case scenarios—further growth of the world population, increasing demand on resources, and changing climate. We also describe what
would have to be done to prevent species extinction and further damage to
ecosystems.
The fourth and final synthesis section includes a meta-analysis from all the
contributors to this book. The goal of this meta-analysis is, with a strong focus on
human impacts on the environment and a work order, to analyze, enable, and
manage the protection, survival, and evolution of all species on Earth.
We venture prognoses in this book and we will fail. However, we hope that we
will be wrong on the right side.
Flensburg, Germany
Carsten Hobohm
Preface
vii