From the ecological point of view an outbreak can be defined as an explosive increase in the abundance of a particular species that occurs over a relatively short period of time. From this perspective, the most serious outbreak on the planet earth is that of the species Homo sapiens.Related posts:
"A peculiar anthologic maze, an amusing literary chaos, a farrago of quotations, a mere olla podrida of quaintness, a pot pourri of pleasant delites, a florilegium of elegant extracts, a tangled fardel of old-world flowers of thought, a faggot of odd fancies, quips, facetiae, loosely tied" (Holbrook Jackson, Anatomy of Bibliomania) by a "laudator temporis acti," a "praiser of time past" (Horace, Ars Poetica 173).
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Sunday, January 10, 2010
Outbreak
Alan A. Berryman, "The Theory and Classification of Outbreaks," in Pedro Barbosa and Jack C. Schultz, edd., Insect Outbreaks (New York: Academic Press, 1987), quoted by David Quammen, Wild Thoughts from Wild Places (New York: Scribner, 1998), p.120: