Customer Reviews

Sustaining Life: How Human Health Depends on Biodiversity

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Wow! What a comprehensive piece of work. I believe "Sustaining Life" will prove to be one of the most important books of the 21st century.

I lead a small, volunteer-run conservation organization. Our objective is to educate the public about our local fauna and flora, to get them outdoors and to inspire an appreciation for wildlife and an understanding of their habitat needs. We emphasize tolerance for wild animals which increasingly come into conflict with us, as our own population expands and development marches onward.

Early on in this work, however, it became evident to me that the average person does not see much intrinsic value to wildlife, nor believes that other species have any inherent right to occupy space on this planet. Instead, people want to know how they themselves might benefit, (beyond aesthetics and recreational opportunities), from protecting wildlife and their habitats. Why limit our own expansion for the benefit of wildlife? Why not shoot the coyote who took a lamb, the fisher that snatched a cat, the fox who snuck off with a chicken, or the groundhog who eats in a vegetable garden? Why spend money on protective fencing, guard animals, or land conservation? "What's in it for me?" they want to know.

So, I decided I needed to learn the answers to these questions: to learn more about how biodiversity benefits people. I found this book and read it cover to cover. It is full of detailed examples of what Nature does for us, why all species, from fungi to polar bears, are important for our own survival, how healthy ecosystems ensure clean water and clean air, how countless individual species provide for our food production and medical treatments, and how a loss of biodiversity has, time and again, resulted in outbreaks of human infectious disease. There are many concrete examples in this book that I can use in my own work with the public, to help them understand why tolerating wildlife and protecting habitat are important for their own existence, and that of their children and grand children to come. Exactly what I needed.

This book is well organized and beautifully put together with stunning photos. It is written well enough to be read cover to cover, and valuable as a resource to which I will frequently refer. It assumes no detailed scientific knowledge on the part of the reader, as many technical terms are defined. However, it is densely packed with information and would probably be a very challenging read for someone who lacks a strong science background.

I do have one criticism. The editors occasionally make reference to the destructive effects of human overpopulation, but seem satisfied to give the subject only brief mention and then to quickly turn away from it. Well, it is certainly safer to tiptoe around this extremely important taboo of a topic, but it felt to me to be a cop out. After all, they argue that we need to preserve the world's flora and fauna so that we can develop more and better treatments for human illnesses. But what is the result of all that resource intensive medical research and treatment if not reduced human mortality and increased human population?

Even with the current human population, it may not be possible for us to live sustainably enough to halt the current extinction crisis, while at the same time provide people with better medical care. The editors present a graph on p. 408 which shows that in order for people to live sustainably, based on the 2001 human population, each person's ecological footprint would have to be, on average, only slightly higher than that of the average African, tens of thousands of whom receive no medical care at all. In light of this, I was disappointed that the editors avoided direct discussion of the need to maintain our own population at a lower level, and neglected to include, in their otherwise very helpful chapter entitled "What Individuals Can Do to Help Conserve Biodiversity", a suggestion that couples consider having only one or two children.

Nonetheless, I still think this book is outstanding. No other book that I could find addresses so comprehensively how important other species are for our own continued existence. I am deeply grateful to Drs. Chivian and Bernstein for taking on the enormous task of putting together this magnificent volume.

First the more practical stuff. I think the book is very cheap, because I found for a much higher price somewhere else, but also because of its size and print quality (I expected something smaller). And it arrived very fast (I got super-fast shipping for free).
Now the book. I like that it has a lot of figures. I'm a scientist and usually have to read long, black and white papers, with only formal figures. Adding figures to text books is not cheap, but is makes is much more reader-friendly. Also, it is written in a non-scientific language so that anybody can read it, and it explains all necessary scientific terms. This might be a bit boring for those familiar with terminology, but I think its better that way, because this is NOT a scientific text book, it aims to reach wider audiences. thus, it has ''basic'' chapters on what biodiversity is and why is it threatened. Still, the book is essential for conservationists. It contains many hard data on why biological conservation is not just something we should promote because of aesthetic or recreational purposes but because of live and dead issues such as medical research and disease spreading. I would have liked though more than the seven groups of living organism that were reviewed in this book, for example fungi.
This book is somehow a mixture of scientific data with general environmental education. Something I will use for my work and also to share with my friends and (future) children.

Educational and intesting. Includes excellent discussion on biodiversity and ecosystems, and ties these into topics from medicines and human health to food and farming. Finally it closes with a discussion on what people can do. Clear explanations, good list of references and further reading.

The recent publication of Sustaining Life, edited by Eric Chivian and Aaron Bernstein, is an immensely valuable and timely addition to the growing body of literature in support of a One Health approach. This volume should stand as key testimony to the core value of biodiversity in maintaining the health of the planet and all life that depends on it, including humans, and should supersede political agendas that depend only on aesthetics as an argument for conservation. Best of all, this highly readable and beautifully illustrated text appeals to both science and non-science educated people and should be recommended reading for all who care about the future of our earth.

This book is a must for anyone who cares about our world and what we as a collective people are doing to it. When one looks around and sees what devastations there are due to such things as global warming, deforestation, destruction of ecosytems and many other changes, it is easy to see why we MUST preserve and revere what remains of all forms of life on our planet.

Editor Dr. Eric Chivian lays out for us the myriad ways in which we should revere our planet. For instance, polar bears do not go into hybernation when in captivity yet they do in the wild. Humans could never go as long as bears do without the simple process of releaving our bladders, or we'd die! As an amateur zoologist -- it all goes back to my undergrad days of studying Field and Systematic Vertebrate Zoolong in college -- I have always been interested in what goes on this planet, and am an avid fan of not only Dr. Chivian but the other writers and editors of this book.

I would also like to give a quick shout out to the PBS NewsHour, for if it wasn't for an interview with Dr. Chivian, I would never have known about this book.

A way to persuade care in the biodiversity of the planet.
The book relates the countless ways chemicals in certain species can help in man's diseases and infections.

Wonderful, wonderful book. Can get pretty technical.

Coffee table sized.