Modules

• Energy and Our World (Word Document)
• Restless Earth: Natural Hazards (Word Document)

Meets

• Ness; 1/3/05
• Gladwin; 1/11/05
• Ford; 1/18/05
• Allan; 1/25/05
• Killeen; 2/14/05
• Kling; 2/17/05
• Abreu; 3/25/05

Structure

• modular design, allowing for relevant overlap and/or duplication
• broadly defined modules
• complete tables as web appendix; annually updated
• colorful art program that attracts reader ("eye candy")
• flowing text with comparable organization as style for each module
• boxes used for extra information, as opposed to topical or case studies (impedes reading flow)
• Activities based on GC labs and discussions.  Use systems thinking exercise and interpersonal activity for each module
• List thinking/summary points

Outline

1. Intro: principles (2) and systems (3-11)
2. Life system (building blocks/soils, complex life, speciation, evolution, ecosystem); biological principles-DA
3. Biodiversity (trophic systems, biological productivity, global inventory, biodiversity)-DA
4. Human evolution and environment (origins, agricultural practices)-RF
5. Human population (demographic transition, economic drivers, trends)-GN
6. Restless Earth: natural hazards-BP
7. Energy and our World -BP (radiative equilibrium,Energy)
8. Climate: Atmosphere and Ocean (climate zones, greenhouse gases, predictions)-TK
9. Biogeochemistry and elemental cycles (elemental cycles of ecosystems)-GK
10. Development and Pollution (air pollution, fresh water, urbanization)-VA(+BP)
11. Environmental economics and justice-TG(+RF)
12. Coda

 Earlier structure

1. Intro: Earth system and systems thinking (vdP and Gladwin)
2. Matter, solar system (energy balance), early Earth, early life, oxygenation (vdP)
3. Modern life, Evolution and Ecosystem (Allan)
4. Cycles and Feedbacks (Kling)
5. Atmospheric evolution, climate change and scenarios (Killeen)
6. Pollution, Development and Policies (Abreu)
7. Human evolution and environment, human-environmental justice (Ford)
8. Human population and trends (Ness)
9. State of the Planet: water, food, life, energy (Allan, vdP)
10. Socio-economics and sustainability scenarios (Gladwin)
11. Coda (vdP)

 

Email to Authors:

Dear Friends:



Except for Vince Abreu later this month, Lesley and I have met/talked with all of you and we believe that we've gotten a good sense about your interests and a common framework for the various contributions. This is a long email, because I do not expect that a face meeting with all contributors will be possible, so please read on and interpret the comments in the constructive spirit of commonality.



Whereas the topics cover a wide range, they all seem to fit a driver-response feedback system that we propose as a guide for each module (or chapter block):

Driver (principles)---Status (state of the world)--->Response. The loop is complete with response to driver arrow, which is the policy/sustainability link: Response---Choices--->Driver. The latter is variable relevant, given the nature of topics.



For the text we offer the following tentative outline:

Title: Global Change, Global Challenges

Publishing details

ToC (condensed)

ToC (detailed)
* Introduction (approach, goals and systems thinking) - BP/DA/TG
* Life system (time, building blocks/soils, complex life, speciation, evolution, ecosystem) - DA
* Biodiversity (trophic systems, biological productivity, global inventory, biodiversity) - DA
* Human evolution and environment (origins, agricultural practices) - RF
* Human population (demographic transition, economic drivers) - GN
* Restless planet (earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, landslides, mitigation) - BP
* Energy and our world (fusion, electromagnetic radiation, radiative equilibrium, fuel sources) - BP
* Climate: Atmosphere and Ocean (circulation, climate zones, greenhouse effect, future scenarios) - TK
* Ecosystems and elemental cycles - GK
* Development and pollution (air pollution, fresh water, urbanization) - VA
* Environmental economics (broadly defined) and environmental justice - TG(+RF)
* Closing chapter (sustainability scenarios; to be decided)

Index

Credits

You'll see your initials with the relevant module(s). Except for Dave Allan and me, there is one (multi-chapter) module per person. You will find write-ups from our meets and author summaries on our website at http://www.globalchange.umich.edu/gctext/index.html.



Following our posted meeting notes, most of you have given us your outlines, which seem readily adaptable to a structure that follows the sequence:
* Introduction to topic
* Principles that are needed to understand the material (governing laws, human principles, etc.)
* Today's state of our planet (inventory of change up to now, global focus with perhaps some regional examples)
* Trends, scenarios and/or implications for the (near) future (implications based on "business as usual" scenario and modifications based on new choices)
* References (Material linking to general readings that offer further information; not an encyclopedic listing of publications)
* Related activities: modeling, data analysis and reading/discussion (see below)



While we have been discussing content and outline with you, Lesley and I have given activities a great deal of thought. As a consequence, this component has grown from a brief suggestions for activities to fully developed units that are similar in approach for each module. We will have a systems modeling activity using Stella, a spatial data analysis activity using ArcView and a discussion activity based on selected readings and stimulating questions. We plan to include links to articles from the WWI, which cover a broad range of topics with an agenda for change. The connection with WWI will be formalized (via the publisher), allowing text users access to the readings (perhaps included with text or downloaded from publisher's website) and offering yearly-updated data sets from WWI. The latter actualizes the text, limiting the dated nature of print that concern many of us. You'll find descriptions of the activities, many based on past GC labs, on our website, at http://www.globalchange.umich.edu/gctext/Module%20Activities/module_activities.htm .



What's next? Give the broad outline some thought and share (or revise) your 2-page outlines. Then start putting material together in a more complete form that includes text and data. I expect that the heading hierarchy of each module will remain uncertain until more written material is in hand, but should generally follow the structure above. If you need any material from the GC pages in text form, then ask Lesley to email you a convenient version (ltsefcik@umich.edu).



Let me know if you have questions and please feel free to share your comments with the group by using "reply-all" function.



Ben