Harold Mooney, an environmental biologist from Stanford University, will deliver the annual Lane Family Lecture at the WSU Pullman campus. The lecture, titled “Taking Stock of Nature’s Assets,” is slated for 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 26, in the Todd auditorium.
Mooney will discuss a recent international assessment of the world’s ecosystems by 1,300 social and natural scientists that focused on the future capacity of these systems to provide goods and services for human well-being. According to Mooney, the results of the evaluation are troubling and clearly indicate that we are degrading our natural support base and the “free” services it provides. He will describe the assessment process and discuss the trends, tradeoffs and ways forward.
The Lane Family Lecture and the Lane Fellowships in Environmental Science, which will be announced that evening, were created through gifts from Bill and Jean Lane, former owners of Sunset magazine, and their son, WSU alumnus Robert Lane.
