The research paper ""Extinction Risk from Climate Change"" published in the journal Nature in January 2004 created front-page headlines around the world. The notion that climate change could drive more than a million species to extinction captured both the popular imagination and the attention of policy-makers, and provoked an unprecedented round of scientific critique.
Saving a Million Species reconsiders the central question of that paper: How many species may perish as a result of climate change and associated threats? Leaders from a range of disciplines synthesize the literature, refine the original estimates, and elaborate the conservation and policy implications. The book:
examines the initial extinction risk estimates of the original paper, subsequent critiques, and the media and policy impact of this unique studypresents evidence of extinctions from climate change from different time frames in the pastexplores extinctions documented in the contemporary recordsets forth new risk estimates for future climate changeconsiders the conservation and policy implications of the estimates.
Saving a Million Species offers a clear explanation of the science behind the headline-grabbing estimates for conservationists, researchers, teachers, students, and policy-makers. It is a critical resource for helping those working to conserve biodiversity take on the rapidly advancing and evolving global stressor of climate change-the most important issue in conservation biology today, and the one for which we are least prepared.
Foreword \ Thomas E. Lovejoy
PART I. Introduction Chapter 1. Are a Million Species at Risk? \ Lee Hannah Chapter 2. First Estimates of Extinction Risk from Climate Change \ Chris D. Thomas Chapter 3. Climate Change, Extinction Risk, and Public Policy \ Jonathan Mawdsley, Guy Midgley and Lee Hannah
PART II. Refining First Estimates Chapter 4. Refining Risk Estimates Using Models \ Alison Cameron Chapter 5. The Use and Misuse of Species-Area Relationships in Predicting Climate-Driven Extinction \ John Harte and Justin Kitzes
PART III. Current Extinctions Chapter 6. First Extinctions on Land \ Sarah K. McMenamin and Lee Hannah Chapter 7. Global Warming and Widespread Coral Mortality: Evidence of First Coral Reef Extinctions \ Peter W. Glynn Chapter 8. Extinction Risk at High Latitudes \ Eric Post and Jedediah Brodie
PART IV. Evidence from the Past Chapter 9. Extinctions in Deep Time \ Peter J. Mayhew Chapter 10. Terrestrial Ecosystem Response to Climate Change during the Paleogene \ William C. Clyde and Rebecca LeCain Chapter 11. Quaternary Extinctions and Their Link to Climate Change \ Barry W. Brook and Anthony D. Barnosky Chapter 12. Quaternary Tropical Plant Extinction: A Paleoecological Perspective from the Neotropics \ Mark B. Bush and Nicole A. S. Mosblech
PART V. Predicting Future Extinctions Chapter 13. Every Species Is an Insect (or Nearly So): On Insects, Climate Change, Extinction, and the Biological Unknown \ Robert R. Dunn and Matthew C. Fitzpatrick Chapter 14. Extinction Risk from Climate Change in Tropical Forests \ Yadvinder Malhi Chapter 15. Coral Reefs, Climate Change, and Mass Extinction \ Ove Hoegh-Guldberg Chapter 16. Extinction Risk in a Changing Ocean \ Benjamin S. Halpern and Carrie V. Kappel Chapter 17. Climate Change and Freshwater Fauna Extinction Risk \ N. LeRoy Poff, Julian D. Olden, and David L. Strayer Chapter 18. Climate Change Impacts on Species Interactions: Assessing the Threat of Cascading Extinctions \ Lesley Hughes
PART VI. Conservation Implications Chapter 19. Strategies for Reducing Extinction Risk under a Changing Climate \ Jessica J. Hellmann, Vicky J. Meretsky, and Jason S. McLachlan Chapter 20. Saving a Million Species \ Lee Hannah
Contributors Index
"Saving a Million Species provides a much-needed review of extinction risk from climate change, penned by the best experts in the field. The early extinction-risk numbers associated with climate change were big and worrisome but didn't include marine or freshwater environments. This book addresses those neglected systems and argues that action is needed now to prevent further losses. Extinction risk is the most critical area of research in climate change biology."
