Tim Flannery is on a mission. He believes human activity is drastically altering the earth’s climate, and in time these changes will have a devastating effect. In The Weather Makers: How Man is Changing the Climate and What it Means for Life on Earth, he traces the story of climate change over millions of years and exposes the substantial, human-induced impact and likely effects if this process continues. He then proposes a plan to halt, and ultimately reverse, this trend. The book has been published in 32 countries and has played a key role in international discussion of the issue. A regular contributor to The New York Review of Books and The Times Literary Supplement, Flannery also contributes to NPR and the BBC.
He is an Australian writer, scientist, explorer, zoologist, paleontologist, and specialist in mammology. Throughout a distinguished scientific career, Flannery has published many scientific papers and over a dozen award-winning books, including the definitive ecological histories of Australia, The Future Eaters (1994), and North America, The Eternal Frontier: An Ecological History of North America & Its Peoples (2001). Other books include Tree-Kangaroos (1996), Throwim Way Leg (1998) about his travels in New Guinea, and in collaboration with the artist Peter Schouten, the much honored A Gap In Nature: Discovering the World’s Extinct Animals. Flannery’s most recent publication is the groundbreaking book on global warming, The Weather Makers: The History and Future Impact of Climate Change (2005).
A leading thinker in environmental science, Dr Flannery has spent a year teaching at Harvard as Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, was Director of the South Australian Museum 1999-2006, and will take up a position at Sydney’s Macquarie University in 2007.