The 5 Times of the Biosphere – Risks for Mediterranean civilisation and sea biodiversity

Abstract

Geology, Palaeontology and History can be brought together under the auspices of biogeography, the ‘frontier’ disciplines, to guide us in the explanation of the orders and disorders of a World in perpetual movement through the theory of the ‘5 Times of the Biosphere’. The subject of Fernand Braudel’s geohistorical work, the Mediterranean sea and the Mediterranean region are like the cradle of a renewed reflection on Time and its rhythms in the light of climate change and rising salt water levels, which are accelerating at an alarming rate. This calls into question the biogeographical characteristics of the Grande Bleue or Big Blue and its shores. Global warming is thus likely to seriously weaken civilisations whose sustainability depends to a large extent, and even essentially, on the availability of water and an atmosphere that is simply breathable and physiologically bearable.