Product Description
Harvard Professor and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Edward Wilson takes readers through time--tracing the processes that create new species, the five cataclysmic events that have disrupted evolution over the past 600 million years, and how humans are destroying diversity at a projected rate of 20 percent over the next 30 years. "In the Amazon Basin the greatest violence sometimes begins as a flicker of light beyond the horizon. There in the perfect bowl of the night sky, untouched by light from any human source, a thunderstorm sends its premonitory signal and begins a slow journey to the observer, who thinks: the world is about to change." Watching from the edge of the Brazilian rain forest, witness to the sort of violence nature visits upon its creatures, Edward O. Wilson reflects on the crucible of evolution, and so begins his remarkable account of how the living world became diverse and how humans are destroying that diversity. Wilson, internationally regarded as the dean of biodiversity studies, conducts us on a tour through time, traces the processes that create new species in bursts of adaptive radiation, and points out the cataclysmic events that have disrupted evolution and diminished global diversity over the past 600 million years. The five enormous natural blows to the planet (such as meteorite strikes and climatic changes) required 10 to 100 million years of evolutionary repair. The sixth great spasm of extinction on earth--caused this time entirely by humans--may be the one that breaks the crucible of life. Wilson identifies this crisis in countless ecosystems around the globe: coral reefs, grasslands, rain forests, and other natural habitats. Drawing on a variety of examples such as the decline of bird populations in the United States, the extinction of many species of freshwater fish in Africa and Asia, and the rapid disappearance of flora and fauna as the rain forests are cut down, he poignantly describes the death throes of the living worlds diversity--projected to decline as much as 20 percent by the year 2020. All evidence marshaled here resonates through Wilson's tightly reasoned call for a spirit of stewardship over the worlds biological wealth. He makes a plea for specific actions that will enhance rather than diminish not just diversity but the quality of life on earth. Cutting through the tangle of environmental issues that often obscure the real concern, Wilson maintains that the era of confrontation between forces for the preservation of nature and those for economic development is over; he convincingly drives home the point that both aims can, and must, be integrated. Unparalleled in its range and depth, Wilson's masterwork is essential reading for those who care about preserving the worlds biological variety and ensuring our planets health.

Amazon.com Review
Humans, the Harvard University entomologist Edward O. Wilson has observed, have an innate--or at least extremely ancient--connection to the natural world, and our continued divorce from it has led to the loss of not only "a vast intellectual legacy born of intimacy" with nature, but also our very sanity. In The Diversity of Life, Wilson takes a sweeping view of our planet's natural richness, remarking on what on the surface seems a paradox: "almost all the species that ever lived are extinct, and yet more are alive today than at any time in the past." (Wilson's elegant explanation is a scientific education in itself.) This great variety of species is, of course, threatened by habitat destruction, global climate change, and a host of other forces, and Wilson revisits his oft-stated call for the protection of wilderness and undeveloped land, noting that "wilderness has virtue unto itself and needs no extraneous justification." We should, he continues, regard every species, "every scrap of biodiversity," as precious and irreplaceable, without attempting to quantify that regard with utilitarian measures such as "bio-economics." In short, Wilson offers with this book a simple, workable environmental ethic that extends the work of Aldo Leopold and other conservationists. A remarkably productive and influential scientist, Wilson is also a fine writer, and his survey of biodiversity makes for welcome and instructive reading. --Gregory McNamee

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.5 based on 36 reviews)

Great Book

If you love the planet and want to understand your small place in the grand scheme of things this book is not for you. If you want to understand how we are all interdependent on the life around us, and how evolution has shaped the face of the earth, buy this book. Mr Wilson's writing is welcoming and the information is great.
September 07, 2008

The Diversity of Life

This is an outstanding book. If you read this before you read Darwin's Origin of Species you'll get soooo much more from reading the latter. Anyway, the book encapsulates in easy to read prose much information that your mind can easily wrap itself around.
January 10, 2007

Second time round

When I received the book, it appeared that I had already an earlier edition in my bookcase. I did not regret my purchase, because the new version is updated/upgraded and E.O. Wilson is an excellent author and scientist on the subject of evolution.
January 04, 2007

The Diversity of Life

To begin with, I would like to say that this book was fairly good. The book started talking about early life on this planet, the various pioneering species of early Earth, etc. The book then goes into detail about the eolutionary paths of some of these pioneer species and of evolution in general, and of how the biodiversity on Earth has grown both in size and complexity. Towards the end, the book goes into the human influence on the environment; mostly the negative effects of human activity on theenvironment. I read this book for an AP Environmental Science class, and although this book is not the best, it had many colorful graphics and was fairly interesting and not dull like many of the books you are forced to read in school.
January 03, 2007

A Good Introduction to the Tapestry Of Life

This is a very eye-opening book which shows how important the diversity of life forms is to all of us. It demonstrates how even when we think we are conserving nature by setting aside
small areas to remain undeveloped, we are still dooming many species of life to extinction. With the loss of some species, others are threated and in the end, all of us are threatened.

I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a large view picture of nature in this world and how it is all interelated.
August 27, 2006

SIMILAR PRODUCTS

The Future of Life
by Edward O. Wilson

The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth
by Edward O. Wilson

On Human Nature
by Edward O. Wilson

Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge
by Edward O. Wilson, Edward Osborne Wilson

Biophilia
by Edward O. Wilson