This open access book features essays written by philosophers biologists ecologists and
conservation scientists facing the current biodiversity crisis. Despite increasing
communication accelerating policy and management responses and notwithstanding improving
ecosystem assessment and endangered species knowledge conserving biodiversity continues to be
more a concern than an accomplished task. Why is it so?The overexploitation of natural
resources by our species is a frequently recognised factor while the short-term economic
interests of governments and stakeholders typically clash with the burdens that implementing
conservation actions imply. But this is not the whole story. This book develops a different
perspective on the problem by exploring the conceptual challenges and practical defiance posed
by conserving biodiversity namely: on the one hand the difficulties in defining what
biodiversity is and characterizing that thing to which the word 'biodiversity' refers to on
the other hand the reasons why assessing biodiversity and putting in place effective
conservation actions is arduous.
