With a foreword by the preeminent zoologist Gerard Durrell, you know that The Gaia Atlas of Planetary Management is a serious text.
It was originally published in 1984, but Norman Myers’ classic work has been brought, somewhat, up to date in subsequent reprints.
Why We Love The Gaia Atlas of Planetary Management
Norman Myers was the first person to work out how much damage clearing forests for cattle raising was doing to the planet.
In The Gaia Atlas of Planetary Management he explores, using hard data, the way that humanity is having an impact on the environment around them and how we might, perhaps, reverse this impact.
“Humankind can be seen as either the climax of evolution’s course, or as its greatest error. No other creature is a fraction so precocious. No other can think about the world, plan to make it better, and dream of the best possible. Yet no other reveals such capacity for perverse behavior — for gross misuse of its habitat …In certain senses, humanity is becoming a super-malignancy on the face of the planet…fomenting ultimate crisis…unlike the cancer cell, we are coming to realize the nature of what we are doing. Can we learn fast enough, act soon enough.”
Norman Myers
Final Notes
Norman Myers was one of the first people to take a hard look at what mankind has done to the planet and how to fix it.
The Gaia Atlas of Planetary Management is an absolutely essential piece of reading for anyone interested in Gaia Theory or how to make the world a better place.
If you’re looking for more ideas regarding Gaia Theory, we can recommend Gaia in Action, Gaia In Turmoil and Homage to Gaia too.