Global survival : the challenge and its implications for thinking and acting / Ervin Laszlo and Peter Seidel, editors.

Includes bibliographical references and index

Foreword / Ervin Laszlo -- Introduction : a sensible way to think and act / Peter Seidel -- Survival research : a new discipline needed now / Peter Seidel -- On human survival : reflections on survival research and survival policies / John H. Herz -- World population, food, natural resources, and survival / David Pimentel & Marcia Pimentel -- Survival from the brain's perspective / Walter Lowen -- Biology is destiny only if we ignore it / Jerome H. Barkow -- Belief and survival / James E. Alcock -- The social psychology of sustainability / David G. Myers -- The need for a planetary ethic / Ervin Laszlo -- Rational sustainability / Joseph A. Tainter -- Seeing the whole picture / Richard B. Norgaard & Paul Baer -- What can the systems community contribute to ensure the survival of civilization? / Kenneth E. F. Watt -- Economics weak and strong : ecological economics and human survival / Andy Bahn & John Gowdy -- Historical perspectives on global ecology / J.R. McNeill -- Governance barriers to sustainability / Richard D. Lamm -- Sustainability and governmental foresight / Lindsey Grant -- Educating world leaders / Christopher Williams -- A primer of civilization / James Lovelock with Peter Seidel

Our planet is undergoing extreme and shocking changes due to humankind's footprint upon it. And, while most involved focus on one or several specific aspects of the problem (pollution, groundwater depletion, species diversity), many are so encased in their own specialties or interests that they fail to see the greater problem--that our fragmented ways of thinking and acting are failing to resolve the environmental and related political situations threatening the viability of life on this planet. We must, and can, do better. However, this will require a new way of thinking. It is in light of this that the editors of this book propose a new discipline, first suggested by the eminent political scientist John H. Herz, combining all relevant scientific disciplines with an overarching, unified, humanistic philosophy that will directly and positively influence the sustainability of life on Earth: survival research.--From publisher description