In practice the world is too complex for disciplines which wish to reduce its complexity. The grounds for post-disciplinary conversations are, clearly, less to do with making one discipline's obsessions and norms comparable with another. Rather, they derive from the realization that day-to-day practices undertaken by people going about their daily lives incorporate multiple influences that cannot be dismissed or downgraded merely because they do not fit within prevailing disciplinary norms of analysis or understanding. (Lee, 2002, p. 344). IntroductionThe UK Met Office has estimated that 70% of UK firms may be affected by the weather (Met Office, 2001); in the USA, estimates suggest that between 25% and 42% of the US gross domestic product (more than $2.7 trillion) is weather sensitive (National Research Council, 2003, p. 11). Examples of this weather sensitivity abound in the business pages of newspapers. Adverse weather, be it too warm, cool, wet or dry, affects the sale of goods and the day-to-day operations of transport, construction and utilities companies ([Anonymous, 2004a] and [Anonymous, 2004b]). Growing awareness and measurement of the economic costs of weather, fuelled by unease about climate change and weather variability, is one of the latest manifestations of scholarly and popular interest in the climate-society relationship. This paper explores some intellectual and practical dimensions of collaboration between human and physical geographers who have explored how firms are using relatively new financial productsweather derivatives -to displace any costs of weather-related uncertainty and risk.1 Our aim here is not to present an empirical examination of the weather derivatives industry or to focus on the limited nature of intra-disciplinary communication, but rather to draw attention to the possibilities and potentials of collaboration. There is little doubt that the human and physical strands of geography, conceived broadly, are characterized by markedly differing ontological positions, methodologies and work practices. Yet, the potential for synergistic interaction between the two sides of the discipline has, seemingly, long tormented the Anglo-American geography community and thus any current lack of integration should not be contrasted with a lost 'golden age' of harmonious interaction. Nevertheless, Western understandings of the relationship between society and nature do add to a general feeling that geographers could be contributing more assuredly to key contemporary debates. The empirical focus of the paper is the nascent market in weather derivatives which has developed markedly during the last decade from its roots in North America. In what follows, we are not suggesting that geography as a disciplinary nexus is uniquely suited to a critical exploration of this market. We start from the premise that geography, however conceived, is not a naturally irreducible body of scientific thought and practice and we acknowledge the specificities of its social history buttressed by a whole range of ve...

The Russian geographical tradition of landscape science (landshaftovedenie) is analyzed with particular reference to its initiator, Lev Semenovich Berg (1876-1950. The differences between prevailing Russian and Western concepts of landscape in geography are discussed, and their common origins in German geographical thought in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are delineated. It is argued that the principal differences are accounted for by a number of factors, of which Russia's own distinctive tradition in environmental science deriving from the work of V. V. Dokuchaev (1846Dokuchaev ( -1903, the activities of certain key individuals (such as Berg and C. O. Sauer), and the very different social and political circumstances in different parts of the world appear to be the most significant. At the same time it is noted that neither in Russia nor in the West have geographers succeeded in specifying an agreed and unproblematic understanding of landscape, or more broadly in promoting a common geographical conception of human-environment relationships. In light of such uncertainties, the latter part of the article argues for closer international links between the variant landscape traditions in geography as an important contribution to the quest for sustainability. Key Words: geographies of scientific knowledge, history of geographical and environmental thought, landscape, Russia, the Russian geographical school, sustainability.The greatest and highest charm of natural history-the kernel of natural philosophy [consists in the] existence of an eternal genetic and ever orderly connection between the vegetable, animal and mineral kingdoms on the one hand, and man, his life and even his spiritual world on the other.-V. V. Dokuchaev 1898 (quoted in Glinka 1927a)

Enlighten -Research publications by members of the University of Glasgow http://eprints.gla.ac.uk V.I. Vernadsky and the noosphere concept: Russian understandings of society-nature interaction

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held in Johannesburg on the tenth anniversary of the first Earth Summit, provides the opportunity to reflect on the meaning of the sustainable development concept. This paper uses the case study of the Russian Federation to explore the relationship between official interpretations of sustainable development and alternative understandings concerned with the betterment of humankind, which draw on Russia's cultural and scientific heritage. It is suggested that there is much to be gained from reopening the sustainable development debate to incorporate such cultural particularities, both at the national and international levels.