Global catastrophic risks
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Global catastrophic risks
Oxford University Press, 2008
- : hbk
- : pbk
Available at 13 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Includes bibliographical references and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
A global catastrophic risk is one with the potential to wreak death and destruction on a global scale. In human history, wars and plagues have done so on more than one occasion, and misguided ideologies and totalitarian regimes have darkened an entire era or a region. Advances in technology are adding dangers of a new kind. It could happen again. In Global Catastrophic Risks 25 leading experts look at the gravest risks facing humanity in the 21st century, including natural catastrophes, nuclear war, terrorism, global warming, biological weapons, totalitarianism, advanced nanotechnology, general artificial intelligence, and social collapse. The book also addresses over-arching issues - policy responses and methods for predicting and managing catastrophes. This is invaluable reading for anyone interested in the big issues of our time; for students focusing on science, society, technology, and public policy; and for academics, policy-makers, and professionals working in these acutely important fields.
Table of Contents
- Foreword
- Introduction
- BACKGROUND
- Long-term astrophysical processes
- Evolution theory and the future of humanity
- Millenial tendencies in responses to apocalyptic threats
- Cognitive biases potentially affecting judgememnt of global risks
- Observation selection effects: the Fermi paradox, the Doomsday argument and the simulation argument
- Systems-based risk analysis
- Catastrophes and insurance
- Public policy toward catastrophe
- RISKS FROM NATURE
- Supervolcanism and other geophysical processes of catastrophic import
- Hazards from comets and asteroids
- Influence of supernovae, gamma-ray bursts, solar flares, and cosmic rays on the terrestrial environment
- RISKS FROM UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES
- Climate change and global risk
- Plagues and pandemics: past, present, and future
- Artificial Intelligence as a positive and negative factor in global risk
- Big troubles, imagined and real
- Catastrophe, social collapse, and and human extinction
- The continuing threat of nuclear war
- Catastrophic nuclear terrorism: a preventable peril
- Biotechnology and biosecurity
- Nanotechnology as global catastrophic risk
- The totalitarian threat
- Acknowledgements
- Index
- Author's Biographies
by "Nielsen BookData"