Earth System Analysis: Integrating Science for Sustainability - Softcover

Inhaltsangabe

1. Earth System Analysis - The Concept.- Discourse: Earth System Analysis - The Scope of the Challenge.- 1 Prologue.- 2 Global Change: Quantity Turns into Quality.- 3 Global Environmental Management: The Physics and the Metaphysics.- 4 Sustainable Development: One + Four Paradigms.- 4.1 Standardization.- 4.2 Optimization.- 4.3 Pessimization.- 4.4 Equitization.- 4.5 Stabilization.- 4.5.1 Generalized Equilibria.- 4.5.2 Passage to Equilibrium.- 4.5.3 Quality of Passage.- 4.6 Complex Paradigms.- 5 Integrated Modelling: Exploring Virtual Planetary Futures.- 5.1 Integration and Integrity.- 5.2 Playing the Game.- 5.3 Orientators and Indicators: From Virtual to Real Reality.- 6 Fuzzy Control: Soft Decision Making under Uncertainty or A Tale of Two Demons.- 6.1 The Teleological Dream: Laplace's Demon and Contemporary Company.- 6.2 Newton's Root-Finding Method - a Paradigm for Fuzzy Control.- 6.3 Coping with Uncertainty: Grand Entrance of Maxwell's Demon.- 6.4 Fuzzy Control and Geo-Cybernetics.- 7 Epilogue.- Commentary: Earth System Analysis - Explorations in a Research Frontier.- 1 Orientation.- 2 Substance.- 2.1 The human factor.- 2.2 The social dilemma.- 2.3 Contingency strategies.- 3 Concluding remarks.- Commentary: Surprises in the Climate Change Course.- 1 Introduction.- 2 The Caspian Sea case.- 3 Modelling activities.- 4 Conclusions.- Commentary: Sustainable Development - Teleology and Ambiguity.- 1 Introductory remarks.- 2 Semantic consideration.- 3 The role of values.- 4 Incompleteness.- 5 Standardization paradigm.- 6 Concluding remarks.- 2. Natural Dimensions.- 1: Ecology and the Earth System.- 1 Introduction.- 2 Why global models?.- 3 Can ecology meet the challenge?.- 4 The tools of global ecological modelling.- 5 Patterns in the biosphere.- 6 Primary production and optimality.- 7 Equilibrium and transient responses.- 8 The validation problem.- 9 The uses of palaeodata.- 10 Conclusions.- 11 Acknowledgments.- Commentary on "Ecology and the Earth System".- 1 Introduction.- 2 Boundary conditions for modelling the biosphere and the global carbon cycle.- 3 Feedbacks and time delays in dynamic systems.- 4 Vegetation models and climate.- 5 Dynamic vegetation models.- 6 Outlook.- Commentary: Eco-System Modelling and the Social Sciences.- 1 Introductory remarks.- 2 Global Change: an age old process.- 3 Origins of agriculture and links between climate change and human activities.- 4 Interdependencies between forms of social organization and the environment.- 5 Common vs. private property rights.- 6 The resulting research agenda.- 2: Climate Change and Land Use: Global and Regional Analyses.- 1 Introduction.- 2 Effects on regional competitiveness and global prices.- 2.1 Modelling effects on crop yields.- 2.2 Modelling effects on food supply and prices, worldwide.- 2.3 Assumptions about the future.- 2.4 Altered potential cereal production and food prices.- 2.5 Effects on regional - level land use.- 2.6 The Land Use Classification System (Lcs).- 2.7 The Climate Land Use Allocation Model.- 2.8 Effects of climate change on agricultural potential in England and Wales.- 2.9 Land use in England and Wales in a future without climate change.- 2.10 Effects of climate changes on land use in England and Wales.- 3 Conclusion.- Commentary: On the Inconsistency at the Interface of Climate Impact Studies and Global Climate Simulations.- 1 Introductory remarks.- 2 The problem of spatial scales.- 3 The problem of climate variability.- 4 Summary.- 3: Sustainable Development in Agricultural Landscapes.- 1 Introduction.- 2 The principle of sustainability in a cultural landscape.- 3 The role of agricultural landscapes within cultural landscapes.- 4 The application of mathematical models in research of agroecosystems.- Commentary on "Sustainable Development in Agricultural Landscapes".- 1 Introductory remarks on sustainable development.- 2 Profit oriented versus ecological oriented behaviour.- 3 Main environmental problems in agriculture and their causes.-

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