This is a wide-ranging study of current and likely future species extinction rates, aimed at students and researchers in the environmental sciences. It highlights apparent differences in extinction rates among taxonomic groups and places, aiming to identify unresolved issues.

Preface ; 1. Assessing extinction rates ; 2. Extinctions in the fossil record ; 3. Constancy and change of life in the sea ; 4. Insect faunas in ice age environments: why so little extinction? ; 5. Bird extinctions in the Central Pacific ; 6. Extinctions in Mediterranean areas ; 7. Recent past and future extinctions in birds ; 8. Rates and patterns of extinction among British invertebrates ; 9. Assessing the risk of plant extinction due to pollinator and disperser failure ; 10. Population dynamic principles ; 11. Estimating extinction from molecular phylogenies ; 12. Biological models for monitoring species decline: the construction and use of databases ; 13. Classification of species and its role in conservation planning ; 14. The scale of the human enterprise and biodiversity loss ; Author index ; Subject index

'EXTINCTION RATES is a breath of fresh air ... EXTINCTION RATES is a gold-mine of hard data and solid science which should be read by all with a serious interest in biodiversity -- past, present, and future.' David M. Raup, University of Chicago, Science `a well integrated set of 14 research articles and reviews that attempt to put the study of extinction rates on a more rigorous footing ... Extinction Rates is a gold mine of hard data and solid science that should be read by all with a serious interest in biodiversity - past, present and future.' David M. Raup, University of Chicago, Nature, Volume 375, June 1995 `The last book we looked at, Extinction Rates, is without doubt the cream of a bumper crop.' Joshua R. Ginsberg, Andrew Balmford, Zoological Society of London, TREE, vol. 10, no. 9, September 1995 `I would strongly recommend Extinction Rates to all those listed as being the target audience on the back cover (senior undergraduates, postgraduate students, and research workers in the general fields of ecology, conservation biology and the environmental sciences). It would make an extremely good basis for a final year undergraduate course, or for a graduate school discussion class. I suspect that a wider audience would also gain from reading it.' Chris D. Thomas, Journal of Animal Ecology, 65, 1996