Jacques Grinevald
French university professor

Jacques Grinevald is recognized as a key expert on biospheres His studies and publications regarding the concept's initiator, Vladimir Vernadsky who published his work on the subject first in 1926, have comprised the substance of Grinevald's work as a scientific historian and philosopher.

Grinevald has been on the faculty of the University of Geneva (Switzerland) since 1987, serving as a part-time lecturer. He received a science degree in policies from the University Institute of High International Studies in Geneva in 1970; and his doctorate of 3rd cycle of philosophy, Paris X-Nanterre, in 1979. His early career included positions at the University of Geneva as an assistant in charge of research and teaching to the faculty of law, in addition to duties as the person in charge of press information; part-time lecturer position at the federal polytechnic school of Lausanne, serving as program man technique environment beginning in 1981; and, serving as an invited professor at the Federal Universidade of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) in 1980 and 1984. His active schedule has taken him all over the world for conferences and seminars. Grinevald retains membership in several professional societies, including International Society for Ecological Economics; European Association for Bioeconomic Studies; and, World Council for the Biosphere .

Grinevald has been published extensively. His writings—among them chapters and articles in various books and journals—include, The Greening of Europe in 1990; "The Revolution Carnotienne: thermodynamics, economy and ideology," from the European Review of Social Sciences, 1976; and, "There is holistic total concept for deep and ecology : the Biosphere," for Fundamenta Scientiae, 1987. He has lectured and written on subjects that include the biosphere, the greenhouse effect , and famous scientists such as Stephen H. Schneider, a native New Yorker, whose research has focused on the greenhouse effect on civilization. He has been a regular contributor to a journal established by a group at the University of Geneva in 1990, Strategies Energetiques Biosphere et Society (Energy Strategies, Biosphere and Company) (SEBES). What began as a special volume became a publication devoted to the biosphere.

Writing for the publication Etat De La Planete (State of the Planet), Grinevald discussed the key issues of the biosphere. "This concept underlines the fac that the Life exceeds the individuals and is an ecological phenomenon of solidarity on various scales, microbial communities on a planetary scale of the Biosphere . It is the observer which decides scale of observation, so much [more] at the geographical level than at the temporal level. It is our world civilization which discovers the Biosphere as a phenomenon characteristic of the face of the Earth in cosmos. That implies a certain responsibility. The interdisciplinary and holistic concept of Biosphere associates astronomy, geophysics, meteorology , biogeography , evolutionary biology, geology, the geochemistry and, in fact, all science of the ground and the living."

[Jane Spear ]

RESOURCES

BOOKS

Freeman, William. The Biosphere. San Francisco: Scientific American, 1970.

PERIODICALS

Grinevald, Jacques. "Biodiversity and Biosphere." Etat De La Planete. No. 1. Grinevald, Jacques. "On Holistic Aconcept for Deep and Global Ecology: The Biosphere." Fundamenta Scientiae (1987): 197–226.

OTHER

University of Geneva. "The Effect Greenhouse of the Biosphere Thermo-industrial Revolution with Total Ecology." 1990 [cited July 2002]. & lt:http://unige.ch/sebes>.

University of Geneva. "Stephen H. Schneider." SEBES. 1995 [cited July 2002]. &lt:http://unige.ch/sebes>

University of Geneva Faculty Web Page. [cited June 2002]. &lt:http://w3.unige.ch>.

ORGANIZATIONS

University of Geneva, 24 street Rothschild, Geneva, Switzerland Email: Jacques.Grinevald@iued.unige.ch, www.unige.ch