Environmental Restoration.

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Like a lawyer admitting a defendant's worst sins in court, this book begins by saying it originated in a four-day conference at the University of California at Berkeley. For new movements to originate or at least to be baptized at Berkeley is a mixed blessing, and this book proves the point. That nature can be restored to its original condition is a concept that should be discussed and tested before we go spending the world's wealth on the dream.

Unfortunately, editor Berger introduces this first big compendium on restoration with an attack vocabulary. Resources are being "decimated. " Population growth is "rampaging." He accepts all the doomsday scenarios as true. I suggest that readers skip the raging preface and start with an essay on a familiar topic.

Unfortunately, some of the papers are printed only as abstracts. Such is the case for an interesting paper on site selection for disposal of low-level radioactive waste, in which a developer proposes restoration of desert-tortoise habitat and an environmental group argues against restoration.

We'll be hearing a lot about environmental restoration in resource debates. From oceans to deserts, this book introduces most of the arguments proponents will use.