"An extensively-researched novel about the role of science in modern life, set against the backdrop of the 1925 Scopes Trial"--

Science fiction-roman.

The world is currently experiencing a sixth period of mass species extinction, and extinction of flora and fauna is caused by a variety of factors arising from industrial activity and increasing human population, such as global warming, climate change, habitat loss, pollution and use of pesticides. Most causes of extinction are linked to corporate activity, either directly or indirectly. Around the World in 80 Species: Exploring the Business of Extinction responds to the ongoing mass extinction crisis engulfing our planet by exploring the ways in which accounting, business and finance can be used to prevent species extinctions. From Africa to the Far East and from Europe to the Americas, the authors explore species loss and how businesses can stop mass extinctions through greater transparency, and through closer engagement with their investors and wildlife organisations. The book concludes that global capitalism has led us to this extinction crisis and that therefore the mechanisms of capitalism – namely accounting, finance, investment – can help to pull us out. Businesses must urgently address extinction before it is too late for all species, including ourselves. As the first book to explore corporate accounting and accountability in relation to species on the brink of extinction, this book will be of great interest to both professionals and a wider audience interested in the causes and prevention of extinction.

This biography of the eminent naturalist explores his life and pioneering work through the rapidly changing world of 19th and 20th century science. For centuries naturalists have endeavored to name, order, and explain biological diversity. Born in 1861, Karl Jordan dedicated his long life to this project, describing thousands of new species in the process. Ordering Life celebrates Jordan’s distinguished career as an entomologist and chronicles his efforts to secure a place for natural history museums and the field of taxonomy. In the face of a changing scientific landscape, Jordan was determined to practice good taxonomy while also pursuing status and patronage—an effort that included close collaboration with the Rothschilds. Biographer Kristin Johnson traces the evolution of Jordan’s work through wars, economic fluctuation, and political upheaval, demonstrating that the broader social context is an essential aspect of naming, describing, classifying, and, ultimately, explaining life.

Winner of the Nicholas Bessaraboff Prize Musical repertory of great importance and quality was performed on viols in sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century England. This is reported by Thomas Mace (1676) who says that ’Your Best Provision’ for playing such music is a chest of old English viols, and he names five early English viol makers than which ’there are no Better in the World’. Enlightened scholars and performers (both professional and amateur) who aim to understand and play this music require reliable historical information and need suitable viols, but so little is known about the instruments and their makers that we cannot specify appropriate instruments with much precision. Our ignorance cannot be remedied exclusively by the scrutiny or use of surviving antique viols because they are extremely rare, they are not accessible to performers and the information they embody is crucially compromised by degradation and alteration. Drawing on a wide variety of evidence including the surviving instruments, music composed for those instruments, and the documentary evidence surrounding the trade of instrument making, Fleming and Bryan draw significant conclusions about the changing nature and varieties of viol in early modern England.