Science Nature Books

I bought my son several of the Let's Read and Find Out books for Christmas. He's a first grader going on 7 years. These are just absolutely fantastic books for introducing varoius difficult concepts. I like that they contain alot of information, but are still easy to understand. Hard to find something "not too young, not too old" for this age. We love them. This particular one was a favorite.

One of my older children brought this book home from a school book sale many years ago. It was a hit with both of my children for several years. Then, as they grew up, the book was put away in a box for another time.

When I had another child, I got out that "box for another time" and stacked the books on a shelf. This one was amongst them, and onto a shelf it went, though I did't expect it to be of interest to him for several years yet.

But lately, at 21 months, Jack has been asking for this book frequently -- and listening with interest to reading after reading! I doubt that the concept of "how much you weigh on Mars" makes much sense to him yet -- but the idea of gravity is one that he is working out, and Branley's explanations of the Earth pulling everything to its center is simple and seems to satisfy even at this age!

Even better, the science is simple, but accurate so it's a good start on his physics education!

Although this book will painlessly teach your four year old what science is and what that abstract concept, gravity, is, it is also excellent for a teenager who is struggling through a physics course. As Einstein said, you don't really understand a concept until you can explain it to your grandmother. Well, this is a book for Grandmother.

This book is as important as it is wonderful. It brings home the Big Secret about science that escapes most people: Science is about the unknown, not the known. There are lots of mysteries out there; the business of science is to change the unknown into the known, which is the lesson, I think, of Franklyn Branley's masterpiece.

In 1990, my husband went to the library and brought home " gravity is a mystery" for our son to read. He loved it! It was his favorite book for weeks! Every night one of us would have to read it to him. This is a fun book that everyone should get a chance to read.

This textbook is excellent for life science students who want to approach ecology from the point of view of ecosystem functioning. A precise and clear systematic description of ecosystems organisazion is given, from physiology to complex communities organization. It also focuses on the emrgence of new functions and features every time the complexity level increases, which is essential to have a full systematic comprehension of ecosystems. Underlying physical-chemical processes are always taken into considaration, which contributes to easily understand all the general aspects of ecosystem functions. A must read.

a technical book written for ecosystem ecologists but easy to read. I had to get it for a class, but it was well put-together and organized.

My research is on integration of terrestrial carbon modelling with remote sensing and I was looking for a book which explains different aspects of the terrestrial ecosystem along with latest research results. This book by some of the famous researchers on the subject explains in a very lucid way every aspects of the terrestrial ecosystem while not failing to include the minute yet important details of the same. I found the chapters on carbon input to terrestrial ecosystems, terrestrial production processes and global biogeochemical cycle very stimulating. The book starts with the basic concepts and then go on to dig deeper to help nourish the curiosity with latest findings and reports. Best for begineers in ecosystem ecology or related field to get a crisp and clear idea on complex interlinking of different processes of the earth's terrestrial ecosystem. Additional readings at the end of each chapter would cater the need for the more hungry ones to go deeper. very nicely sequenced and fun to read with excellent drawings/diagrams.

This is one heck of a book! I'm very, very impressed. I'm certainly going to use for my courses, and I think it will be used by many others teachers and professor. I think it will find itself along side Schlesinger's Biogeochemistry as a standard textbook for ecologists and global change scientists.

The text is written by some of the best ecologists on the planet, and is very complete and up-to-date. Amazingly, it is also very well written and completely understandable to the average biology student.

I especially like the organization of the book into four major sections: context, mechanisms, patterns, and integration. This works very, very well.

Each chapter is about the right length, with the right level of detail. I also like the use of highlighting, and the list of suggested readings. They work very well.

Overall, this is a fantastic book -- destined to become a classic in the field.

The book was given as a gift to my son, who found it rather boring, quickly discarding it in favor of books about soccer and American football. This allowed a careful perusal of the book and its content, which, truth be told, I found lacking as well.

In order for its suggestions to be relevant, in order for its impact to be felt, the science behind Ms. David's book has to be correct. As has already been mentioned, this book has a major flaw, which it has carried over from the related movie An Inconvenient Truth - e.g. the data sets for temperature and CO2 are reversed. When one learns that simple fact one discovers that temperature leads CO2 concentrations - not the other way around - which makes sense when one considers that CO2 is less soluble in water at higher temperatures. And the lag is fairly consistent and predictable between the two.

That Ms. David, a non-scientist, has opted to perpetuate this rather glaring error suggests one of two things - either that she really is a vapid celebrity of little brain or that she perhaps has some other reason for inducing nightmares in children than the good of Planet Earth. It could be, perhaps, that she would like for us to forget about her jet-setting narcissistic lifestyle and her own huge carbon footprint - and also her opposition to renewable energy projects when they impede her view from Martha's Vineyard.

Ms. David has stated many times that "the debate is over" - and for her it probably is, but our children will have to live with the results of the smothering policy initiatives she proposes as the solution to this non-existent problem. They will be affected by the inevitable reductions in standards of living in David's new era, where every Carbon atom is counted.

The debate for the rest of us is NOT over - not by a long shot. Some of us remember what we learned about geology - that the carbon got underneath the ground somehow or other, and that it was floating around in the Earth's atmosphere at far higher levels than we see now (as evidenced by ice core data David does not mention).

One star because zero was impossible to give.

Potential of unlimited methane gas can release from the ocean in a couple yrs. 2/3 of the population might be gone if we don't go veg or at least cut down on meat info. Don't believe me. Check this out.
youtube. com/user/StopClimateCrisis

I bought this book for my 9 and 10 year old boys. Both are above average students and were vaguely familiar with the concept of global warming. This book was PERFECT for them. It was easy to read, held their attention and was about as clear and consice as it gets. As my 9 year old told me after reading it: this books tells you (1) what is causing global warming (2) what we can do to stop it (3) and what is going to happen because of global warming. Our kids are going to have to deal with this issue. As parents it is up to us to help them begin to understand it. This book is AN EXCELLENT place to start.

This is a wonderful book, chock full of information about what we are doing to our Earth, as well as great tips for making a difference, all in a very USER FRIENDLY FORMAT. Forget the doom and gloom, just do something! I bought several to give out as gifts (I usually only borrow books from the library, but this is printed on recycled paper...).

As the title summarizes, this book discusses the topic of global warming. The book is split up into chapters that describe what global warming is, how it can effect our planet and everything living on it, and what we can do to stop this problem. A glossary and an index are included. To fit with the earth-friendly subject material, the book is even printed with soy inks on recycled paper.

This book is a great introduction to the topic of global warming. Since this topic is something that people sometimes disagree on, readers can use the information in the book to form their own opinions. I think that the authors do a very good job of not only discussing their opinions, but also using facts to back them up. I think the best chapter in this book is the one discussing what we can do to help the earth. The ideas in this chapter are ones that young people can do on their own, like not leaving the chargers for their cell phone or mp3 player plugged in when the device is not connected to it. The bright bold pictures are what drew me in to this book and they would definitely keep readers interested.

Kinship with Animals: Updated Edition
In the Shadow Of Man is the story of Jane Goodall's first foray into the African jungle in search of the elusive Chimpanzee. It had been her lifelong dream to go to Africa and live like Tarzan, learning to understand the behavior of the animals there. She fearlessly set out to Africa as a very young woman, then just as fearlessly headed into the jungle by herself. This was unheard of and would still require a huge amount of courage. Her mother joined her there and Jane began tirelessly searching for the chimps. Finally she found them and won their confidence. Her observations and hard work led to some of the greatest discoveries ever made about animals, including the discovery that they made and used tools. Before that, man was considered to be the only tooluser. Jane Goodall set the scientific world on its ear. She is an amazing role model to all people, but especially to young girls who have a dream that seems beyond accomplishment. She was my role model as a child and has served me well in that capacity! I recommend this book to people of all ages. It has continued to inspire me throughout my life, since childhood. I read it every couple of years. The stories are just breathtaking and the book is impossible to put down.

Jane Goodall's first popular book, and worth every penny. It does not become outdated with time -- it becomes more interesting. Follow this work with her "Reason for Hope" and you will be blown away by the spiritual journey Goodall has taken over the decades.

Like another reviewer, I'm an anthropology student and I had to read this book for a class I'm taking. Never has a book, meant for education, made me both laugh and cry out loud. It was simply wonderful. You will learn a lot about chimpanzees, and I promiss you will never watch them in the zoo, in the same way, again. Even if you are not looking to learn about chimpanzee developement and behavior, the book is excellent on a purely entertainment level. Even though this book is was a required reading, I was so impressed that I'm going out to buy her other books... just out of interest.

I had to read this book for school, and I loved it! It really made the chimpanzees feel like human characters. I wish I could go live at the research center!

"In the shadow of man" reads like a recently published book, not published in 1971. The argumnets are strong that it is hard for dispute theory of evolution and our intimate relation to other animals. This book, and others, made me quit my religious beliefs that my parents instilled in me long time ago. I hope other people whill enjoy the book the same way I did.

If you are like my family and want to step away from the agri-business model of farming then this book is a great resource. Some parts are a little complicated as far as his method for tracking yields, but once you get the hang of it, it is quite an effective tracking method. Keep in mind...he won't tell you what kind of grasses to grow. Which I think is great, because you need to grow what is native to your area, not his.

These books are not just a great resource for raising salad bar beef, but also for marketing this unique product. That alone makes these books well worth the money.

If it wasn't for bureaucrats farming with this method would be absolute heaven! This is an absolute essential read for anyone wanting to raise beef cattle. If your interested in creating a grass based business I would recommend reading "You can Farm" First!

This book starts with the framework for grass finished cattle production, then looks at day to day operation, followed by some more detailed points and problem shooting, before closing with marketing. This is a great guide and an enjoyable read. I liked it better than Pastured Poultry, but both are great books for those interested in the future of the farm buisness.

Ryan

I recommend Salad Bar Beef to anyone in the country that wants to produce beef worth eating. Salatin is extremely open and honest about everything he does on his farm, and is very passionate about green farming.

This book does not contain simple homesteading information; it is a manual on how to maximize profits, production, and soil fertility, while decreasing disease and stress(both cattle stress and farmer stress). When I said it does not contain "simple homesteading information", I did not mean that this book is complicated. Salad Bar Beef is actually one of the easiest agricultural books to comprehend.

Although easy to comprehend, you can not by any means read this book with a conventional mind. Pretend you do not know anything, and carefully consider Salatin's points.

If you begin reading this book and get the feeling that Salatin is strong in the way he presents his points, that's because he is. Many do not like being convicted, but the truth is, if you're never convicted, you never learn. Salatin makes his views clearly seen in his books, and every one of them are good and practical. Personally, I do not like reading a book in which the author is weak in his presentation of views.

I have never read agricultural books as good as the ones that Salatin has written, and I recommend them to anyone interested in farming naturally. The books are high-priced, but worth double that. Before long I will raise poultry and cattle using Salatin's methods, using Salad Bar Beef as a manual. Too bad I can't give Salad Bar Beef six or seven stars.

This is a great book with a lot of ideas. He is a little extreme for me, but all of his points are quite valid. I love his experience and his families experience and how he gives such great advice based on experience.

Getting to the moon required a lot of knowledge. The astronauts, especially Neil Armstrong, often distance themselves from the heroism of the Apollo 11 project.

Apollo took hundreds of thousands of people and lots of teamwork to develop. It is therefore a treat to see Thimmesh's vivdly illustrated and inspiring book.

-Tahir Rahman, author of We Came in Peace for all Mankind: the untold story of the Apollo 11 silicon disc

I will use this book in my middle school curriculum when I teach about space. When I showed it to students, they pretty much just looked at the pictures. After they watched "Apollo 13" it made a lot more sense to them. Then they wanted to understand more about the technology available at the time. This book makes a great companion piece to "The Right Stuff" and "The Dish" as well. If you are trying to get a historical perspective on that time period and didn't live through it as some of us did, please do yourself a favor and read it. The current textbooks cannot portray the taste of adventure we felt each time the astronauts voyaged out into dangerous places,as students back home gathered around black and white TV's brought into the classrooms to watch splashdowns. Knowing that the support structures have to be so huge may help people both understand why it costs so much to run a space program as well as perhaps pursue careers in the aerospace industry that are not just in the small astronaut corps.

Definitely a juvenile-oriented work, but nonetheless very interesting and full of information not generally provided in accounts of the first manned moon landing.

i thought this book was great. i added it to my classroom library and the students love it too.

Though I typically lean towards fantasy and adventure-themed novels, this was one of the few science fiction books I was able to appreciate, not only for its interesting word choice, but also for its unexpected suspense. The author of this book really paints an image in your mind. The beginning, for me, was something I had to somewhat struggle through, but once I got past it, I was able to dive into the past, understanding the fears of the unknown that the people of that time must have faced. What was it like to go to the moon, to step onto that land that no man can describe? And 400,000...that's no small number, just as it was no small feat to land Apollo 11 on the moon.

~From the reader

This book is invaluable. It is perfect for leisurely identification as well as research. Amazing descriptions and photographs, sturdy compostion, and great information.

Forest Plants of the Southeast is good book for just about anyone who is interested in what is out in the woods. I am a professional forester and the book is useful to me to know what the ground cover is. Also the book explains the forage value of specific plants and then you can figure out what wildlife will be present.

This book should be in the collection of anyone interested in wildlife, plant ID, botany or gardening. Quality pictures make identification easy. The information is concise and helpful.

This is an excellent plant guide with great photo illustrations. The use of as many as four images to illustrate a plant makes this book one of my favorite plant guides.

This book is a wonderfully organized reference for anyone. It contains all important details while still remaining concise and efficient.

the book that i received was the exact book that i ordered. it was in perfect condition and nothing was wrong with it.

I found this book very informative. Although it is not extremely detailed, I thought that the author provided sufficient detail to make it worth the time to read, especially as a reference book.

I chose this book for an introduction to equine science class I teach at the university level. I think that it is an excellent book for those students with little background with horses; however, I hear from more advanced horse-people that they enjoy the book, READ IT (!), and they are glad to have it as a reference book on their bookshelves. In my opinion, any college text that isn't destined to be sold back to the bookstore is a good choice.

I had this book for a college class and it is terrible. I found it to be very, very vague on it's topics and just barely skims the surface. The diagrams are drawings, and they are not very good for the representation. If you want to learn about equine science, this is not the book.

Reading this book gave me a great peace of mind. I'm an environmental scientist, but I wanted to inspire people to reconnect with the world around them before focusing on objective science (which Orr claims, and I agree, is not really objective, but an objective method to verify and support subjective perspectives and passions).

He lists everything that is wrong and what needs to be corrected. A good follow-up book or study would be if someone took his advice to a school or set of schools and set up a curriculuum after his suggestions and measured how students responded.

David Orr exquisitely puts into words a need for an environmental ethos in the classroom. As a high school teacher, I have long-intuited his insights about how to bring daily connections to students about the natural world that we inhabit. He is deeply passionate, articulate and practical. I'd love to see school boards, administrations, faculty and students alike be exposed to his clear thinking and real suggestions. He brings urgency without bringing despair.

David W. Orr is chair of the environmental studies program at Oberlin College in Ohio and is most often credited with coining the word "ecoliteracy" (similar to the renown biologist Garrett Hardin's "ecolacy") to describe the very important study and understanding of ecology and natural resource processes. He is also credited with the simple, but profound statement, "When we heal the Earth, we heal ourselves."

No wonder then that Prof. Orr is well suited to write on the importance of ecoliteracy being incorporated into all educational systems for a more balanced perspective of reality.
Contemporary education, Orr says "...emphasizes theories, not values; abstraction rather than consciousness; neat answers instead of questions; and technical efficiency over conscience." (p 8) and, "As a result, after 12 or 16 or 20 years of education, most students graduate without any broad, integrated sense of the unity of things." (p 11)

"This is not an argument against education but rather an argument for the type of education that prepares people for lives and livelihoods suited to a planet with a biosphere that operates by the laws of ecology and thermodynamics." (p 27)

"Intelligence would lead us...to protect biological diversity, but for reasons that go beyond the calculation of self-interest. The surest sign of maturity of intelligence is the evolution of biocentric wisdom, by which I mean the capacity to nurture and shelter life-a fitting standard for a species calling itself homo sapiens." (p52)

"...I propose a different ranking system for colleges based on whether or not the institution and it's graduates move the world in more sustainable directions. Does four years at a particular institution instill knowledge, love, and competence toward the natural world or indifference and ignorance? Are the graduates of this or that college suited for a responsible life on a planet with a biosphere? This is an admittedly difficult, but not impossible, task."

A sense of "biophilia", as the renown sociobiologist, E.O. Wilson has described as that innate feeling of connectedness to a biological world where our roots and sustenance lie, is critical for developing a deep sense of respect and care of our world. Biophilia and it's antithesis, biophobia are well covered in chapter 20.

"We need an ecological concept of citizenship roots in the understanding that activities that erode soils, waste resources, pollute, destroy biological diversity, and degrade the beauty of landscapes are forms of theft from the commonwealth as surely as bank robbery. Ecological vandalism undermines future prosperity and democracy alike." (p 168)
"The first bit of conventional wisdom denies the importance of place and environment in favor of global vandalism masquerading as progress." (p 160)

Indeed, and a deep understanding of natural life-support systems would help mend that twisted perception of reality. David Orr has very well delineated the educational path here to creating graduates with a sense of awe and respect for the fragile, but life-supporting planet they live on.

This is a very important book that should be read by all politicians, educators, and citizens of Earth. David Orr gives clear examples and ideas for making the radical changes we need to undo some of the damage that we have done to the planet. You will be inspired and moved if you read this book.

first off, as promised by the reseller, the book was in great condition.

as for the contents of the book, it's a fantastic read if you are interested in the root of the sustainability movement. that is to say the foundations and meaning of our educational system which as critical public good, is in dire need of a re-examination.

The book arrived quickly and in the condition that was specified. No issues, would use this seller again.

Particularly for a budding Optometrist, this book allows the Optometrist to be acquainted with all the fine arts of optics and the like.

Book arrived in great shape. Like new!!

One of the best science textbooks I've ever read. Clearly written and interesting to read. Heavy on concepts, light on math. Diagrams are simple but effective. It's rare to see a physics book as approachable as this one. As an amateur photographer and research microscopist, I love this book. Some parts of the text are a bit outdated (remember it was published in 1986), but the vast majority is valuable information. This is a great tool for physics students and teachers.

This is the best textbook I ever had, and I sold it for some ($$$) at the end of a semester to buy a bus ticket. Very mad; I miss the book, but it's so expensive. It's amazing the way the author incorporates all sorts of literary allusions in this physics book, such as offering an interesting hypothesis on the optical illusion of the egyptians getting swallowed by the red sea while chasing the jews. Every chapter, light becomes a metaphor for so many things, the way we see, the obstacles, etc.