Description |
xviii, 201 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm |
Series |
Complexity in ecological systems series |
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Complexity in ecological systems series.
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Contents |
Foreword / T. F. H. Allen and David W. Roberts -- 1. Ecology: The Exceptional Science -- 2. Causality in the Age of Science -- 3. The Emergence of Order -- 4. Quantifying Growth and Development -- 5. Extending Ascendency -- 6. Other Members of the Elephant -- 7. Practical Applications -- 8. The Ascendent Worldview |
Summary |
A challenge to existing Newtonian and Darwinian paradigms, Ecology, the Ascendent Perspective demonstrates that a theoretically reshaped science of ecology, better suited to portraying the dynamics of the natural world, can be a more effective means of ensuring its health |
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Ecology, the Ascendent Perspective provides an entirely fresh view of the origins of organization in living systems. Writing for theoretical ecologists, biologists, and philosophers of science, Robert Ulanowicz mounts a powerful challenge to prevailing mechanistic paradigms of ecology. Ecology, Ulanowicz argues, needs a more robust central paradigm, and this book presents one derived from current work in information theory, ecosystem energetics, and complexity theory; the result is a theoretical and empirical tool kit better able to measure the developmental status of any living community. Ranging widely to explore critical issues in the history of science - order, causality, progress, laws - the book sets forth a coherent theoretical framework for ecology |
Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages [167]-178) and indexes |
Subject |
Biotic communities.
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Causation.
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Ecology -- Philosophy.
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LC no. |
96037899 |
ISBN |
0231108281 |
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023110829X |
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