| Description |
xiii, 311 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages [289]-298) and index. |
| Summary |
From where--and what--does water come? How did it become the key to life? This book presents a state-of-the-art portrait of the science of water, recounting how the oxygen needed to form H2O originated in the interiors of stars, asking whether microcomets may be replenishing our oceans, and explaining how the Moon and planets set ice-age rhythms. The book then takes the measure of water today in all its states, solid and gaseous as well as liquid. How do El Niño and La Niña events affect our weather? What clues can water provide to climate changes of the past, and how does it complicate predictions of future global warming? Finally, the book deals with the role of water in the rise and fall of civilizations. As nations grapple over watershed rights and pollution controls, water is poised to supplant oil as the most contested natural resource of the new century.--From publisher description. |
| Contents |
Prologue -- Priming the pump -- The states of water -- Some remarkable properties -- Water's many cycles -- pt. I. Water in the universe from the big bang to the appearance of man -- 1. Beginnings -- From hydrogen to oxygen, and all the rest -- Water in the interstellar medium -- 2. The churning of the earth -- Saving the water at the birth of the planets -- Primordial waters, from inside the earth or from outside? -- Outgassing and deluge -- A living solid earth : oceans, sea-floor spreading, continental drift, earthquakes, and volcanoes -- 3. Origin and evolution of life -- An extraterrestrial origin? -- Matter living and inert -- Where and when did life appear? -- Life without the sun at the bottom of the sea -- The invention of photosynthesis and the conquest of dry land -- 4. Catastrophes -- Climbing up an evolutionary ladder? -- Mass extinctions -- The demise of the dinosaurs -- Deadly impact -- Man the exterminator -- 5. Ice, moon, and planets -- The moon, time, and tide -- The precession of the equinoxes -- The moon and Milankovitch -- Ice on the move -- Ice in the tropics. |
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pt. II. Water in today's world -- 6. Water and energy cycles -- Ice budgets -- Water budgets : clouds, rain, and snow -- Water budgets : evaporation, condensation, and latent heat -- Energy budgets and the greenhouse effect -- Latitudes and seasons -- Land and sea -- 7. Winds, waves, and currents -- The tropical furnace and the Hadley circulation -- East winds, west winds, and the gyrations of the oceans -- Land and sea : monsoons -- East-west : El Niño, La Niña, and the Pacific basin -- North-south : the Atlantic -- 8. Water's deep memories -- The salt of the sea -- The great conveyor belt -- Foreseeable accidents, or surprises? -- 9. Clouds, rain, and angry skies -- Making rain -- Stability or instability? -- From fair-weather cumulus to cumulonimbus : convection and precipitation -- Cyclones and convective cloud systems -- Tornadoes -- Tropical cyclones : hurricanes and typhoons -- Gently falling snow and rain -- Acid rain -- 10. Earth's water, between sky and sea -- Watersheds and water flows -- Vegetation, evapotranspiration, and the soil -- Infiltration and underground water -- Runoff : from rills to rivers -- Along the great rivers -- Water on the continental scale. |
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pt. III. Water in human history, past and future -- 11. Water and man's rise to civilization -- Out of the Ice Age -- The Nile -- Water's revenge -- Drinking water for the cities -- Clean but toxic water -- Water down the drain -- Water for food -- Land for food? -- Mosquitoes and disease -- Water for industry -- Water business -- Nuclear power and water -- 12. Problems for the 21st century -- A new millennium? -- The water resource -- Satisfaction of water needs -- Water management : cooperation or conflict? -- Water between Israel and the Arabs -- 13. Butterflies and humans in a warming greenhouse -- The butterfly effect -- The greenhouse effect -- Global warming? -- The real risks -- A new deal in water -- 14. Back to the Ice Age -- The end of the Pleistocene? -- From the twentieth to the 21st century -- Finite and infinite resources -- Avoidable catastrophe -- 15. Conclusion, the end of the story? -- Back to the beginning? |
| Subject |
Water.
|
| Added Title |
Eaux du ciel. English
|
| ISBN |
0231122446 cloth alkaline paper |
|
9780231122443 cloth alkaline paper |
|
0231122454 paperback |
|
9780231122450 paperback |
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