Dr. Harry W. Greene, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at Cornell University, will present “Pleistocene rewilding: Lions in the den of Daniels?” at 7 p.m. Saturday, April 30, at Hardin Hall 107. The event is free and open to the public.
The Maps & More Store will host a booksigning in coordination with the presentation. Two of Greene’s books, “Snakes: The Evolution of Mystery” and “Tracks and Shadows: Field Biology as Art,” are for sale at the store.
Greene is the Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellow at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. He also is senior scholar for the Center for Humans and Nature. He built his career as a herpetologist and researcher of evolutionary biology and vertebrate conservation.
“About 10 years ago, a group of us published papers in “Nature” and “American Naturalist” that proposed partially restoring the lost North American Pleistocene megafauna with conspecifics or closely related proxies for tortoises, cheetah, elephants, and other species,” Greene said, describing his speech. “In this seminar, I will summarize our initiative and the subsequent response from conservation biologists and the public, with emphasis on implications for conserving biodiversity on a rapidly changing Earth.”
Greene also will be present and discuss “Teaching Biodiversity & the Tree of Life” from 9:30 to 11 a.m. at Hardin Hall 107. The speech is open to students, faculty and The Amphibian Group, an interagency and inter-university organization. He will reflect on his 15-plus years of teaching biodiversity and will describe mistakes made and lessons learned.
For those unable to attend either SNR function, Greene will host a booksigning and presentation “Natural history and aesthetics: Why should we care about nature?” from 6 to 8 p.m. Friday, April 29, 2016, at the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha.
Greene’s honors include Berkeley’s Distinguished Teaching Award; the Edward O. Wilson Naturalist Award; and being named one of Cornell’s “Top Ten Professors” by Business Insider in 2014. His book “Snakes: The Evolution of Mystery in Nature,” won a PEN Literary Award, garnered a two-page spread in Time magazine, and made the New York Times’ annual list of 100 Most Notable Books.
Greene was professor and curator in the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley, for two decades before moving to Cornell in 1999. He’s taught vertebrate natural history, herpetology, introductory biology, evolution and biodiversity, and field ecology, while studying the biology and conservation of predators. He was featured in The Natural Histories Project for his work.
-- Shawna Richter-Ryerson, Natural Resources
More details at: http://go.unl.edu/3d8k