John Spicer - Biodiversity

Biodiversity

A Beginners Guide

ONEWORLD BEGINNERS GUIDES combine an original, inventive, and engaging approach with expert analysis on subjects ranging from art and history to religion and politics, and everything in-between. Innovative and affordable, books in the series are perfect for anyone curious about the way the world works and the big ideas of our time.

aesthetics

africa

american politics

anarchism

ancient philosophy

animal behaviour

anthropology

anti-capitalism

aquinas

archaeology

art

artificial intelligence

the bahai faith

the beat generation

the bible

biodiversity

bioterror & biowarfare

the brain

british politics

the Buddha

cancer

censorship

christianity

civil liberties

classical music

climate change

cloning

the cold war

conservation

crimes against humanity

criminal psychology

critical thinking

the crusades

daoism

democracy

descartes

dewey

dyslexia

economics

energy

engineering

the english civil wars

the enlightenment

epistemology

ethics

the european union

evolution

evolutionary psychology

existentialism

fair trade

feminism

forensic science

french literature

the french revolution

genetics

global terrorism

hinduism

history

the history of medicine

history of science

homer

humanism

huxley

international relations

iran

islamic philosophy

the islamic veil

jazz

journalism

judaism

justice

lacan

life in the universe

literary theory

machiavelli

mafia & organized crime

magic

marx

medieval philosophy

the middle east

modern slavery

NATO

the new testament

nietzsche

nineteenth-century art

the northern ireland conflict

nutrition

oil

opera

the palestineisraeli conflict

parapsychology

particle physics

paul

philosophy

philosophy of mind

philosophy of religion

philosophy of science

planet earth

postmodernism

psychology

quantum physics

the quran

racism

rawls

reductionism

religion

renaissance art

the roman empire

the russian revolution

shakespeare

shii islam

the small arms trade

stalin

sufism

the torah

the united nations

the victorians

volcanoes

war

the world trade organization

world war II

A Beginners Guide

John Spicer

For Fiona, my fair one

Through history, the most important changes in society have come from the bottom up, from grassroots.

Greta Thunberg

It is now fifteen years since Biodiversity: A Beginners Guide was published. In the intervening period, in one sense so much has changed and at the same time little has changed. We are still losing and damaging biodiversity, but now faster than ever before the pace of change has accelerated. Previously, to the nearest approximation every species was an insect. Now it is becoming clear that to the nearest approximation every species is a microbe. The importance of viruses to biodiversity is clearer than it ever was in the past what they are, how they work, and how they originate and evolve and not just because of SARS-CoV-2 (the name of the virus, not a bacterium, whereas COVID-19 is the disease), although admittedly thats been difficult to miss. And while the general format of the book is roughly the same, it has had to change to accommodate not just new and updated material but new ways of thinking about that material and what it means.

And while the purpose of the book is essentially the same, to act as a beginners guide to biodiversity, the way that aim is now approached is slightly different more than ever I see this as a book hopefully to astound, but also to shock the senses, challenge thinking, and to whet the appetite for greater and deeper knowledge and understanding. That is why the reading list has been greatly expanded, to act as a gateway to the academic or further study of biodiversity, at school, university or at home, and as an introduction to the wealth of books that are already out there and to bridge the academicpopular divide.

My thanks to Mark Lord-Lear for reading and commenting on early versions of Chapter 6, and to Jon Bentley-Smith, of Oneworld, for his excellent editorial assistance, and for that greatest of editor-virtues, patience tinged with empathy. Thanks also to all who wrote to me suggesting changes, additions and corrections to the first edition I have tried to make sure Ive incorporated or addressed them in this new edition. As with the first edition, this new text will not always satisfy everyone, particularly those whose research speciality is an area of biodiversity that I barely touch on, dont include or, even worse, that they dont feel I do justice to. I dont believe any one person could produce a comprehensive book on all of biodiversity, even if we could agree on what biodiversity is in the first place. Instead I have tried to tell not the, but a story of biodiversity what it is, where it is, how it got here, how we value it, how its threatened, how it can be maintained to tell it as a story that interests me, in the hope that it may interest others too.

It is said that books are best written in community. Over the past fifteen years I have been extraordinarily fortunate in the scientists I have worked with or for. They have made a lasting impression on what I know and believe about biodiversity, and this book would not have been written without their input in so many ways. Thanks to Lorraine Maltby, Phil Warren, Dave Morritt and Kevin Gaston for providing such a stimulating environment in which to work and think when I was at the University of Sheffield, and Kevin in particular as he opened my eyes to the notion that biodiversity is a serious science. I feel privileged to have spent so much of my time at Sheffield discussing, investigating and writing with Kevin, and I thank him for allowing me to use the same broad outline for introducing novices to biodiversity that we came up with in the Rising Sun so many years ago.

I also thank my present colleagues, the members of the Marine Biology and Ecology Research Centre here at Plymouth Rikka, Simon, Dave, the Bish, Kath, Mark, Martin, Pete, Andy, Paul, Miguel, Mal, Kerry, Jason and Steve for their friendship and for making going into work on a Monday morning something to look forward to; all of the postgraduate students, postdoctoral fellows and academic staff with whom I have had the honour of adding just a little to our knowledge of what biodiversity is and how it works Sally Marsh, Kirsten Richardson, Jeanette Sanders, David Johns, Tony Hawkins, Steve Widdicombe, Nick Hardman-Mountford, Mike Kendall, Nikki Dawdry, Jenny Smirthwaite, Kate Arnold, Lucy Dando, Emily Hodgson, Anne Masson, Sanna Eriksson, Susie Pihl Baden, Jalle Strmberg, Peter Tiselius, Jenny Cowling, Jason Weeks, Andy Rees, Mona Mabrouk El-Gamal, the inimitable Dave Morritt, Alan Taylor, Andy Hill, Stuart Anderson, Warren Burggren, Roy Weber, Brian McMahon, Peter Duncan, Katherine Turner, Alistair Edwards, Peter Spencer Davies, Maria Thomasson, Bengt Liljebladh, Paul Bradley, Angela Raffo, Hayley Miles, Ula Janas, Hugh Tabel, Tim Blackburn and the inspirational Geoff Moore who, as well as co-supervising my doctorate, first opened up to me the wonder and science which characterises the best of biodiversity as an academic subject. I am grateful to Roger Byrne and Mick Uttley, two of the sharpest minds Ive ever encountered, for their detailed feedback on the manuscript and Marsha Filion of Oneworld who also made helpful comments on the manuscript. Suffice to say none of the above are responsible for any errors, omissions, transgression or biases that remain. Although too numerous to mention by name, I certainly owe a large debt to all my undergraduate students who have taught me so much as they caught on to how exciting and threatened our biodiversity is.