Research Catalog

Title

Nature's operating instructions : the true biotechnologies / edited by Kenny Ausubel with J.P. Harpignies ; foreword by Paul Hawken.

Publication

San Francisco : Sierra Club Books, [2004], ©2004.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

• Ausubel, Ken.
• Harpignies, J. P.

Description

xx, 236 pages; 23 cm

Summary

"For this second volume in Sierra Club Books' Bioneers Series, Bioneers founder Kenny Ausubel has gathered reports from scientific innovators on such diverse topics as biomimicry (mimicking nature to restore environments and transform production processes); "living technologies" that break down toxics biologically; and ecologically sound design for industries and buildings. These are set alongside essays by visionaries such as Paul Hawken, Terry Tempest Williams, and Michael Pollan that underscore the urgent need for working in harmony with nature's intelligent design. Unlike the corporatized genetics that claims the name "biotechnology," the true biotechnologies surveyed here illuminate a future of hope by "wedding human ingenuity with the wisdom of the wild," in the words of contributor John Todd. Sector by sector - from energy and agriculture to transportation and land management - this book shows how we humans can emulate and adapt nature's operating instructions to the benefit of all life on Earth."--BOOK JACKET.

Subject

• Applied ecology
• Nature conservation
• Sustainable development
• Human ecology

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 227-233).

Contents

Foreward / Paul Hawken -- Introduction / Kenny Ausubel -- Biomimicry : what would nature do here? / Janine Benyus -- Living technologies : wedding human ingenuity to the wisdom of the wild / John Todd -- Magic mushrooms : planetary healing with deep biology / Paul Stamets -- Bioremediation : waste equals food / Randall von Wedel -- Heavy metal blues : botanical detox centers / Rufus L. Chaney -- Nature's filters : from cattails to bureaucrats / Doug Kepler -- The human-nature dance : people as a keystone species / Malcolm Margolin -- Indigenous science : the cultivated landscape of Native America / Dennis Martinez -- The green-fire wolf : saving wildlands with a wild heart / Dave Foreman -- Have a cow : the paradox of rangeland restoration / Dan Dagget -- Think like a prairie : solving the 10,000-year-old problem of agriculture / Wes Jackson -- Noah's new ark : conserving seed diversity in the garden / Kent Whealy -- Weaving community : restoring the ecology of Los Angeles / Andy Lipkis -- Ignorance is not bliss : the perils of genetic engineering / David Suzuki -- Unnatural selection : the bacterium that (almost) ate the world / Elaine Ingham -- Genetic pollution : a life of its own / Michael Pollan -- Natural capitalism : brother, can you spare a paradigm? / Paul Hawken -- Natural capitalism : where the rubber meets the road / Amory Lovins and Hunter Lovins -- Reinventing the wheel : transportation down the road / Jim Motavalli -- Ecological design : the architecture of democracy / David Orr -- Whaaa!? : how the dragonfly turned my head / Steven Foster -- From miracle to magic : spirituality as political consciousness / John Mohawk -- The phosphorescent soul : swimming with mystery / Terry Tempest Williams -- The eye of the world : sex, beauty, fraud, and kinship / Peter Warshall -- Planet 'hood : making the world our home / Luisah Teish -- A world made of stories : saving the web of cultural life / Wade Davis.

ISBN

1578050995 (pbk. : alk. paper)

LCCN

2004045343

OCLC

• ocm54758811
• SCSB-5084852

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries