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A terrestrial ecoregion map of the Earth is available from the National Geographic Society and WWF - United States as their "terrestrial ecoregion map" showing the 8 terrestrial ecozones. According to WWF-US this is "a project which involves describing, mapping and photographically representing 867 Terrestrial Ecoregions of the World. These ecoregions are divided based upon geography, climate, soils, and vegetation... technical descriptions, species lists, educational excerpts, and photographic depictions of each ecoregion... for educational purposes only."

Understanding most environmental security problems requires some base map. Unfortunately these maps are not available generally in digital map form, which is one reason a digital ecoregion map standard is required.

There is a digital map petition urging the publishers to make the material available electronically under Creative-Commons by-nc-sa. This helps those interested in helping preserve the 238 Global 200 priority ecoregions and complements WWF's own plans: "Every school in the United States will be sent 10 ecoregion maps and teachers guides to get students interested in visiting the web page. Each ecoregion page will include educational descriptions highlighting important biodiversity features of the ecoregion and a summary of the conservation situation. The technical descriptions detail the biology and status of each ecoregion. There also will be one or more photographs depicting the natural habitat of each ecoregion. It has been a Herculean task to gather photographs of natural habitats of the world. We could not have accomplished as much as we have without your willingness to contribute your images." - David M. Olson, Ph.D., Director, Conservation Science Program, World Wildlife Fund US, email: david.olson wwfus org.

Current the WWF-US seeks only "a) the right to publish the photographs on the World Wide Web as part of the Wild World educational web site created by WWF in association with National Geographic Society, underwritten by Ford Motor Company; b) The right to crop and otherwise alter and edit the photographs, as WWF deems appropriate, to fit space or to enhance the function or effectiveness of use of the photographs."

This comment is licensed under CC-by-nc-sa 2.0 - see http://www.livingplatform.ca/tiki-index.php?page=e coregion+map.

Just to add, theres a further article on the same site.

here :)

Both of these are full articles with no crap about buy it now.

National Geographic from a while ago.

was also mentioned on slashdot at the time.

"Do not believe in evolution and don't believe there is enough evidence for it, if there proof comes out then I will accept it :)"

Evolution: The process of change in the traits of organisms or populations over time. (source).

If you truly believe that no species has ever changed, then you are a moron.

A simple example of evolution: Dog breeders. They attempt to breed the best dogs together to create better dogs. Over time this brings out certain traits in the species. The species has changed. That's evolution.

ND

So you're sitting in the couch waiting for major distaster to happen? When the polar ice melt, costal cities getting flooded, fire and drought ravage farm land. By then perhaps you might say, "Damn! These environmentalists are for real, we got to find some way to refreeze the polar ice, move our cities to highland, bring extincted species back to life, save our argiculture industry and bail out the bankrupting insurance sector?"

You want to see change? Check out National Geographics's September issue. It half of that issue is filled with stories like glacier and artic ice thawing, wildlife and plants' life cycle changing all around the globe and so on. They don't just sit in the couch and proclaim "life is good, nothing to worry".

Well the problem seems to be that nobody can really provide any good evidence that a disaster is coming. Global warming, for instance, is hard to confirm. Antarctica is inconclusive, and one could find tons of places that have warmed or that have cooled. I suggest reading Michael Crichton's State of Fear if you haven't. One comparison in the book is between global warming and eugenics. Both were supported by most respectable scientists at the time, but were founded on inconclusive data.

clickey

You picked up on Dawkins and dropped everything else.

PS, since you disparage him so much, perhaps you'll prefer this link.

"Despite the threat of war in Iraq and the daily reports of suicide bombers in Israel, less than 15 percent of the young U.S. citizens could locate either country." link

The National Geographic channel last night aired an hour-long investigation into the mystery of the shroud of turin. NG was made the argument that Leonardo Da Vinci created the shroud. Anyone who's interested should check it out.

NG claimed that Da Vinci had family ties to the church that housed the shroud, thus creating a link between how the shroud could have been obtained by the church.

NG made other intereresting links and arguments.

I found it particuarly amusing that the image on the shroud is extremely similar to Da Vinci's own self portrait. It seems well within Leonardo's personality to pull such a prank that has lasted for centuries.

As for the actual age of the shroud, as long as it was *before* Leonardo's time, he could have obtained the material. If his goal was to trick the people of his time with the shroud he probably would have sought an older-looking one anyway.

From nationalgeographic.com: Behind the Mysteries Week: "Da Vinci and the Mystery of the Shroud" at 8P et/pt Jesus's image, believers say, was burned into the Shroud of Turin by the intense heat of resurrection. But is it genuine? Or was it created by someone with extraordinary skills, like the great Leonardo Da Vinci?

I couldn't help but look at that advertisement banner and go... AoooO!!!!!

http://abyss.nationalgeographic.com/ads/images/200 4/wolves_ng2_728x90_20k.gif/
http://abyss.nationalgeographic.com/ads/images/200 4/wolves_ng2_300x250_20k.gif/

I couldn't help but look at that advertisement banner and go... AoooO!!!!!

http://abyss.nationalgeographic.com/ads/images/200 4/wolves_ng2_728x90_20k.gif/
http://abyss.nationalgeographic.com/ads/images/200 4/wolves_ng2_300x250_20k.gif/

Either it was simply a bad article, or you misunderstood something. Citing the downfall of an empire due local climate as an example for "everyday" global climate change is quite weak.

The page titled Global Warming @ National Geographic doesn't seem to suggest such a causal view of climate change.

With our current technology, the largest extra-solar planets are the only ones we can reliably detect, let alone photograph.

It helped significantly in this case that the planet was so far away from a dim star, because most of the difficulty comes when searching for a dim speck in the glare of a bright star. The December National Geographic had a great article on the search for extra-solar planets and compared it to finding a firefly in the glare of a lighthouse from several miles away.

Thus, astronomers have not ruled out the possibility of planets in nearby systems. In fact there are already a few hundred that have been found, but only by detecting the "wobble" of the sun as others here have pointed out. This is the first to be directly imaged.

As technology and methods continue to improve we will be able to detect smaller and smaller planets, closer and closer to their suns. The smallest currently detected is around 14 times the size of Earth (roughly the size of Neptune, I believe).

Once we can regularly detect Earth-sized planets in life-sustaining orbits, astronomers hope to be able to detect hints of the planets' compositions using the spectrums of light emitted (can't remember the exact terminology off-hand).

Anyway, for those of us familiar with astronomy and astrobiology, this is very exciting. And to put it into perspective, this image is of even better resolution than we had of Pluto until just a few years ago.

Yes, IAAAA (I am an amateur astronomer).

Absolutely Fucking Nothing!

Let's "look at the numbers", as you advise.

With 1,755,637 sq km ice-covered, it's a lot of ice. Melt that into water and it's a more than a few meters of sea level rise... National Geographic says 7 meters.

Your so-called "institutional racism" is a smoke-screen, it isn't how big Greenland is or isn't compared to somewhere else that matters. What matters is how much ice might melt and the damage that produces in Hong Kong, Singapore, Bangladesh, London, Pacific Islands, and countless other places.

What if all the ice on Greenland melts? It doesn't float, so it will make the sea level rise. By seven meters, according to current estimates

To make matters worse, greenland is on the far end of the
North American plate.

If the downforce of all that ice disappears into the oceans, the tectonic plate might start to balance itself, causing giant earthquakes while lowering the US and Canada.

The same thing happened to Scandinavia after the last ice age.

It's difficult to predict exactly what will happen and how strongly, but it's a dangerous possibility you don't hear much about.

Well, we are. I can prove that. Did anybody see the article in National Geographic about global warming? After seeing those charts, I don't know how anyone, anyone, could deny that global warming is happening. Anyone care to tell how people can stand up there and deny up?

The asteroids that are large enough to do damage can be seen far away enough that the cosmic blind spot is irrelevant. The article mentions a 2.9 mile wide asteroid (which would quickly wipe out all life on the planet if it hit) which scientists have known about for years. It won't come anywhere close.

At the moment, we have no defense against a planet-killing asteroid, but the European Space Agency is studying the issue, and NASA's Deep Impact project is also working on it.

"In 1991, hikers found the preserved body of a man trapped in an Alpine glacier and freed as it retreated."

Ol' Oetzi sure was a spry character!

I Googled on Lonnie Thompson's name, and came across some National Geographic articles. One notes,

"When Thompson's reports of glacial recession on Kilimanjaro first emerged in 2002, the story was quickly picked up and trumpeted as another example of man destroying nature. It's easy to see why: Ice fields in the tropics--Kilimanjaro lies about 220 miles south of the Equator--are particularly susceptible to climate change, and even the slightest temperature fluctuation can have devastating effects. 'There's a tendency for people to take this temperature increase and draw quick conclusions, which is a mistake,' says Douglas R. Hardy, a University of Massachusetts climatologist, who has been monitoring Kilimanjaro's glaciers from mountaintop weather stations since 2000. 'The real explanations are much more complex. Global warming plays a part, but a variety of factors are really involved.'

"According to Hardy, forest reduction in the areas surrounding Kilimanjaro, and not global warming, might be the strongest human influence on glacial recession. 'Clearing for agriculture and forest fires--often caused by honey collectors trying to smoke bees out of their hives--have greatly reduced the surrounding forests,' he says. The loss of foliage causes less moisture to be pumped into the atmosphere, leading to reduced cloud cover and precipitation and increased solar radiation and glacial evaporation."

National Geographic Adventure: Kili is Crumbling

The quoted text is linked to another article:

National Geographic Adventure: The Ice Man

"In 1991, hikers found the preserved body of a man trapped in an Alpine glacier and freed as it retreated."

Ol' Oetzi sure was a spry character!

I Googled on Lonnie Thompson's name, and came across some National Geographic articles. One notes,

"When Thompson's reports of glacial recession on Kilimanjaro first emerged in 2002, the story was quickly picked up and trumpeted as another example of man destroying nature. It's easy to see why: Ice fields in the tropics--Kilimanjaro lies about 220 miles south of the Equator--are particularly susceptible to climate change, and even the slightest temperature fluctuation can have devastating effects. 'There's a tendency for people to take this temperature increase and draw quick conclusions, which is a mistake,' says Douglas R. Hardy, a University of Massachusetts climatologist, who has been monitoring Kilimanjaro's glaciers from mountaintop weather stations since 2000. 'The real explanations are much more complex. Global warming plays a part, but a variety of factors are really involved.'

"According to Hardy, forest reduction in the areas surrounding Kilimanjaro, and not global warming, might be the strongest human influence on glacial recession. 'Clearing for agriculture and forest fires--often caused by honey collectors trying to smoke bees out of their hives--have greatly reduced the surrounding forests,' he says. The loss of foliage causes less moisture to be pumped into the atmosphere, leading to reduced cloud cover and precipitation and increased solar radiation and glacial evaporation."

National Geographic Adventure: Kili is Crumbling

The quoted text is linked to another article:

National Geographic Adventure: The Ice Man

Do yourself a favor and buy National Geographic Magazine from Semptember with the main story:
Global Warming.

The evidence for rapid climate change is here and its very real.

The "biblical" flood is actually just a retelling of a story from the epic of Gilgamesh; as such, it likely refers to the flooding of the Persian gulf.

the water hit the Black Sea with 200 times the force of Niagara Falls. Each day the Black Sea rose about six inches (15 centimeters)

I read the article, too, and not only is there no evidence, but the one thing I do know a little about (the alpine mummy, "Ötzi" the Iceman) is plain wrong.

The article implies that his body being found in a receding glacier is proof that he was flash frozen, however, it is widely understood that he died of wounds after a skirmish (see, for example, National Geographical).

How about a Corpse Flower instead?

Jaysyn

They just need this on either end controlling the network. It would then be a sentinent species as well.

$1000.. that even's less than the $2000 figure for a trained rat that sniffs out landmines...

From the summary: "We're also looking into including more advanced cameras and other types of sensors .."

Rats.. sniffing.. any electronic smell sensors included on the vehicle?

For those looking for more on Spencer Wells' work:
Map of Homo Sapien's spreading
The info about the Nat Geo. documentary
The book at amazon.com.

For those looking for more on Spencer Wells' work:
Map of Homo Sapien's spreading
The info about the Nat Geo. documentary
The book at amazon.com.

Let's turn this on its head.

Combine the Internet hunting stand idea with National Geographic's "CritterCam": Allow only live hunters into the area. Trap deer, fit them with something like a steadicam rig that includes a camera and a wifi-controlled gun, release them into the hunting area, and let them shoot back.

Now that would be sporting!

Actually there are archaeological ruins that point to the Great Flood.

Some deposits in the bottom of the black sea discover fossils of animals that only lived in non-sea water. This points to a huge lake existing many meters below sea-level, in a time where water was very scarse. At a point, the water level increased, and the sea flooded this zone. (Human bones which confirm this have been found)

Later, the tale of the great flood was written in an ancient babylonian text called the Epic of Gilgamesh. When the jews were captured by Babylon, they learned this account, and incorporated it into the book of Genesis.

Here's a National Geographic article about it. There's a Discovery channel brief, too.

Frankly, both tales, Atlantis and the Great Flood, look very interesting to me, from an archaeological point of view.

Search for Noah's Flood

Really big floods aren't an outrageous mythical proposition. Neither is an anti-religion bias.

how can you make that difference?

...I do strongly suspect that we have more in common with chimps, anatomicly and socially, than little 'rat'-dogs with wolves.

Buesseler said it is possible to enrich larger areas of the oceans around Antarctica with iron, but that the net result would likely be the removal of only a few percent of the extra carbon in the atmosphere.

The solution is obvious: 1+ 1+ 1= 3

I'm in favor of nuclear power, but then I'm in favor of most technologies. But what we might want to consider, invest more in, etc., is the process of turning organic waste into oil: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/11/11 25_031125_turkeyoil.html#main And as for the nukes, I thought I read somewhere recently that someone's invented a method for taking the hazard out of nuclear plant waste.

For all of those "they are both theories, why can't we all get along" types that have posted today :Check this out

and a repost in case of /. ing ;-)

"As of right now, neither creation nor evolution is provable. Period. I personally believe that neither will ever be provable."

This is incorrect. Evolution has been proven over and over again. The National Geographic has an excellent synopsis of Evolution by Natrual Selection in this month's issue. You should really read it. It lays out in plain language the evidence for evolution and how the theory gets confirmed over and over again by various branches of science (not just biology).

You do not take an unproven (or unprovable) hypothosis and then go looking for evidence to prove it (and ignoring evidence that does not prove it). This is not the scientific method. By this standard, Creationism is not science.

You examine the evidence, and develop a hypothosis that explains your observations. You use your hypothosis to make predictions. You let others test and examine your hypothosis. When you have a great deal of evidence, both observed and experimental, your hypothosis can then become a "theory" - a theory in scientific terms is just about equivilent to "fact" in laymans terms.

Gravity is a theory, Elctricity is a theory, Relativity is a theory. That I am sitting here typing this on the Internet proves all three.

You let the evidence take you to a conclusion, not the other way round.

Does that mean there's not God? No, not nescesarily, but it does show that the God that is portrayed in the Bible (and most other theistic religious books) does not exist. Darwin himself was studying to be an Anglican minister when he took his famous voyage on the Beagle. He followed the evidence and that evidence helped him build the theory of Evolution by Natural Selection (in secret, over 15 years of gathering and examining the evidence). After that, he quietly renounced his faith. Although he was no longer a Christian, he was an agnostic, leaning toward theism - he believed that an impersonal God existed, but that once it created the universe it simply "moved on" leaving the mechanism of evolution to run.

And that is what really scares Creationists and why they cling to their beliefs so rabidly, despite the overwhelming LACK of evidence for their hypothosis - they are afraid to become Darwin. They WANT there to be a personal God of the Bible, that can interceed in our world. The idea that God doesn't exist or is impersonal takes away the psychological crutch that theistic religions give to those that need it. They WANT there to be a God so badly they will use any amount of sophistry and even violence to keep their world from being shattered. The possibility that God does not exist as they believe he should (or even exist at all) is too terrifying to even consider for them. They may have to take responsibility for themselves.

Think of the pat answer's of Creationists and Fundementalists less as arguments to people that support evloution than as mantra's sung to themselves to keep them convinced of that which the want to believe.

Of course all this simply proves that no matter how many well-supported arguments and reasons are presented, Creationists will ignore them and continue to drag out the same old arguements, no matter howmany times they are refuted.

And they dare to call themselves "scientists"..

Even better, it is not only part of the title of the ABC News article, but it also appears in the titles of the BBC and National Geographic articles also.

"As of right now, neither creation nor evolution is provable. Period. I personally believe that neither will ever be provable."

This is incorrect. Evolution has been proven over and over again. The National Geographic has an excellent synopsis of Evolution by Natrual Selection in this month's issue. You should really read it. It lays out in plain language the evidence for evolution and how the theory gets confirmed over and over again by various branches of science (not just biology).

You do not take an unproven (or unprovable) hypothosis and then go looking for evidence to prove it (and ignoring evidence that does not prove it). This is not the scientific method. By this standard, Creationism is not science.

You examine the evidence, and develop a hypothosis that explains your observations. You use your hypothosis to make predictions. You let others test and examine your hypothosis. When you have a great deal of evidence, both observed and experimental, your hypothosis can then become a "theory" - a theory in scientific terms is just about equivilent to "fact" in laymans terms.

Gravity is a theory, Elctricity is a theory, Relativity is a theory. That I am sitting here typing this on the Internet proves all three.

You let the evidence take you to a conclusion, not the other way round.

Does that mean there's not God? No, not nescesarily, but it does show that the God that is portrayed in the Bible (and most other theistic religious books) does not exist. Darwin himself was studying to be an Anglican minister when he took his famous voyage on the Beagle. He followed the evidence and that evidence helped him build the theory of Evolution by Natural Selection (in secret, over 15 years of gathering and examining the evidence). After that, he quietly renounced his faith. Although he was no longer a Christian, he was an agnostic, leaning toward theism - he believed that an impersonal God existed, but that once it created the universe it simply "moved on" leaving the mechanism of evolution to run.

And that is what really scares Creationists and why they cling to their beliefs so rabidly, despite the overwhelming LACK of evidence for their hypothosis - they are afraid to become Darwin. They WANT there to be a personal God of the Bible, that can interceed in our world. The idea that God doesn't exist or is impersonal takes away the psychological crutch that theistic religionsgive to those that need it. They WANT there to be a God so badly they will use any amount of sophistry and even violence to keep their world from being shattered. The possibility that God does not exist as they believe he should (or even exist at all) is too terrifying to even consider for them.

Think of the pat answer's of Creationists and Fundementalists less as arguments to people that support evloution than as mantra's sung to themselves to keep them convinced of that which the want to believe.

Here's the article you mentioned:

Ask Adventure

I've heard that polar explorers can condition themselves to freezing temperatures before an expedition. If I'm desert bound, should I prepare for thirst by drinking less water? --Nicholas, St. Paul, Minnesota

The odds of getting struck by lightning in your lifetime are 1 in 3,000 (the 1 in 700,000 figure is for each year). I'm going to live in my basement from now on too. (source)

National Geographic had an article recently about pollution in China and it was just down-right frightening.

Excerpts from the March 2004 issue are available here: http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0403/featu re4/index.html

See what you run into if you trek 2000 miles through Africa's forests. Remote is an understatement...

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/data/2001/ 08/01/html/ft_20010801.5.html

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/data/2001/ 08/01/sights_n_sounds/media.5.2.html

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/03/03 23_megatransect2.htmlventure/0107/fay/

See what you run into if you trek 2000 miles through Africa's forests. Remote is an understatement...

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/data/2001/ 08/01/html/ft_20010801.5.html

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/data/2001/ 08/01/sights_n_sounds/media.5.2.html

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/03/03 23_megatransect2.htmlventure/0107/fay/

See what you run into if you trek 2000 miles through Africa's forests. Remote is an understatement...

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/data/2001/ 08/01/html/ft_20010801.5.html

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/data/2001/ 08/01/sights_n_sounds/media.5.2.html

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/03/03 23_megatransect2.htmlventure/0107/fay/

In a recent National Geographic they say that the CO2 is rising, but the temperature changes through history (from ice cores and other things studied) show that temp changes over time are also tied to changes in the way the earth orbits and we are in one of those changes in orbit right now...

Just makes it a little more

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0409/index .html

Some one needs to do a sensitivity analysis on all these two.

I am just curios. What is your "huge disadvantage in software"? Because I am a switcher, and so far I have found 2 things that OSX is lacking in, and only 2.

1. Children's games. We all know that OSX has fewer games than Windows, but Childrens games are much fewer - and most of them that are out barely work at all.

GPS and Mapping. OSX only really has one street mapping software - Route66. Which is merely OK. It is not the most stable, and it doesn't do a whole lot. It won't track GPS histories and such.... There is MacGPSPro, which works good. I have used it for Marine charts, I have yet to import regular maps in, but you can... And there are a few others now as well, and I think Topo! is now out... But Definately OSX, even though it might have GPS/Mapping software - they are less mature than Windows counterparts.

Now having said that, the article missed a couple. Fire is a great IM client, I like it better than Adium. And OSX has CuteFTP and Adobe Acrobat as well...

I have been working full time in OSX for about 2 months now, on a PowerBook 15.GhzG4 with 1GB memory. I am a Java developer, and I use eclipse and other tools. So far I am much happier working in OSX than in Windows. I have been using OSX at home since OSX 10.0.4, and I like it much more than Windows....

How much sea levels have risen in the *last* half a century isn't really the issue here. The issue is the massive predicted rise by 2050. If temperatures continue to rise, chances of large sheets of ice in Antarctica breaking away and melting increase. Keep in mind, a rise of only 1 meter would be enough to flood many coastal cities in the continental US. Maldives (the country) may be submerged in 100 years. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/393076 5.stm Floriday could suffer the same fate. Can you really take the risk of that happening? It would certainly cost less than invading another country. Not a bad trade. Ensure your own country will still be above water, rather than screwing up another :) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/04/04 20_040420_earthday.html

Along with all of those links, the National Geographic Web Site has this cool picture of people looking at the before and after of the eruption.

I remember hearing about dozens of whales and porpoises beaching themselves mysteriously. I figured back then the Navy was involved somehow... I did a quick bit of googling and found tons of news articles all within the last 4 or 5 years about mysterious beachings... Here's a couple links, the first from CNN way back in 2000 and the other from National Geographic from earlier this year... http://www.cnn.com/2000/NATURE/07/28/beached.whale s/ http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/03/03 31_040331_whalesincrisis.html#main

The news outlets at the time passed it off as a new type of sonar, but it seems to be a bit different... It makes me sad that we humans are using the Oceans as our toilets without thinking of the consequenses...