Exploring Nature In Illinois

Loaded with full color photographs and evocative descriptions, Exploring Nature in Illinois provides a panorama of the state's overlooked natural diversity. Naturalists Michael Jeffords and Susan Post explore fifty preserves, forests, restoration areas, and parks, bringing an expert view to wildlife and landscapes and looking beyond the obvious to uncover the unexpected beauty of Illinois's wild places. From the colorful variety of birds at War Bluff Valley Audubon Sanctuary to the exposed bedrock and cliff faces of Apple River Canyon, Exploring Nature in Illinois will inspire readers to explore wonders hidden from urban sprawl and cultivated farmland. Maps and descriptions help travelers access even hard-to-find sites while a wealth of detail and photography offers nature-lovers insights into the flora, fauna, and other aspects of vibrant settings and ecosystems. The authors also include diary entries describing their own impressions of and engagement with the sites. A unique and much-needed reference, Exploring Nature in Illinois will entertain and enlighten hikers, cyclers, students and scouts, morning walkers, weekend drivers, and anyone else seeking to get back to nature in the Prairie State.

The second edition of the Field Guide to Amphibians and Reptiles of Illinois offers up-to-date information on the state’s 102 species of frogs and toads, salamanders, turtles, lizards, and snakes. Detailed descriptions by the authors include habitats, distinguishing features, behaviors, and other facts, while revised range maps and full-color photographs help users recognize animals in the field. In addition, an identification key and easy-to-navigate page layouts guide readers through extensive background material on each species' population, diet, predators, reproduction, and conservation status. A one-of-a-kind resource, the Field Guide to Amphibians and Reptiles of Illinois is a definitive guide aimed at biologists, teachers, students, wildlife specialists, natural resource managers, conservationists, law enforcement officials, landowners, hobbyists, and everyone else eager to explore herpetology and nature in the Prairie State.

Following the success of their previous collaborations, Illinois Hiking and Backpacking Trails, Revised Edition and A Guide to Mountain Bike Trails in Illinois, Walter and George Zyznieuski offer this concise and handy resource for all outdoor enthusiasts interested in the outstanding nature centers and interpretive trails throughout Illinois. The 135 sites detailed in this illustrated guide are located in municipal and county parks, forest preserves, state parks, wildlife refuges, and the Shawnee National Forest. Sites range from the Apple River Canyon State Park in northwest Illinois to the Cache River State Natural Area in southern Illinois. This guide will assist individuals and groups in successfully planning visits to these areas by clearly identifying trails that are fairly short and well suited for families and those nature centers that provide hands-on experiences viewing wildlife and nature exhibits and participating in a nature program or activity. Also, those trails that are accessible to families with strollers, individuals with disabilities, and the elderly are identified with symbols and described throughout the book. Detailed descriptions of each center and trail are included along with directions, some maps and photographs, hours of operation, and contact information, including web sites, where available. Sixty-seven nature centers and interpretive trails are featured for northern Illinois, including Chicago Botanic Garden, Spring Valley Nature Sanctuary and Volkening Heritage Farm, The Morton Arboretum, the Chicago Portage National Historic Site, and the Black Hawk State Historic Site. For those interested in central Illinois, forty-one nature centers and trails are listed, including Kickapoo Creek Park, Chautauqua National Wildlife Refuge, Valentine Park, Salt Fork River Forest Preserve, Merwin Nature Preserve, Forest Park Nature Center and Adams Wildlife Sanctuary. Twenty-seven nature centers and trails are described for southern Illinois. Among these are Lusk Creek Canyon, Giant City State Park, Cache River State Natural Area, Ferne Clyffe State Park, Rim Rock, and Crab Orchard National Wildlife Refuge.

Discover the breathtaking beauty and unforgettable adventures that await in Illinois state parks. Lee Mandrell and DeeDee Niederhouse-Mandrell highlight the incredible diversity and natural beauty of the landscapes, flora, and fauna of the state. Marvel at the unique rock formations and 55 foot opening at Cave-In-Rock State Park, or leave the land behind to explore the waterways at Chain O' Lakes State Park. Step into history at Fort Massac State Park, or sit back and enjoy a striking sunset over the cypress grove at Eldon Hazlet State Park, Illinois' largest campground. Just in time for the state bicentennial, Illinois State Parks brings together more than 130 gorgeous full-color photographs highlighting some of the most beautiful and popular state parks in Illinois.

Illinois Wilds is a natural history of the wildlands found in Illinois. This book is a historical depiction of what Illinois was like before settlement by Europeans, and is also a showcase of the remaining natural heritage of the state. Historical accounts of Illinois described huge trees, vast grasslands, and extensive wetlands. The seemingly endless prairies possessed a great diversity of many-hued plants; a traveler could go from central Illinois to Wisconsin and encounter few trees. The prairies were teeming with life - passenger pigeons by the millions, snakes basking along the dusty trail, a myriad of grasshoppers darting through the air like arrows from a medieval army. Although we no longer have the luxury of standing on a hillock or an old glacial moraine and viewing a limitless expanse of prairie or forest, we do have the opportunity to experience the essence of these places; that is what the authors have attempted to document in this work. They identify the most distinguishing feature of various Illinois habitats, whether the vegetation is predominantly trees, grasses or forbs, the soil a deep loess, sand or gravel, or the ground surface dry or covered by water. The majority of the photographs in this book are of plants and animals that can be used to determine a habitat or simply be seen by the casual visitor. It is the authors' wish that these images not only excite and emotionally involve the viewer, but that they also inspire movement towards a conservation ethic.

This volume, with a Foreword writer Sir Roger Penrose, discusses the foundations of computation in relation to nature. It focuses on two main questions: What is computation?How does nature compute? The contributors are world-renowned experts who have helped shape a cutting-edge computational understanding of the universe. They discuss computation in the world from a variety of perspectives, ranging from foundational concepts to pragmatic models to ontological conceptions and philosophical implications. The volume provides a state-of-the-art collection of technical papers and non-technical essays, representing a field that assumes information and computation to be key in understanding and explaining the basic structure underpinning physical reality. It also includes a new edition of Konrad Zuse's “Calculating Space” (the MIT translation), and a panel discussion transcription on the topic, featuring worldwide experts in quantum mechanics, physics, cognition, computation and algorithmic complexity. The volume is dedicated to the memory of Alan M Turing — the inventor of universal computation, on the 100th anniversary of his birth, and is part of the Turing Centenary celebrations. Contents:Foreword (R Penrose)PrefaceAcknowledgementsIntroducing the Computable Universe (H Zenil)Historical, Philosophical & Foundational Aspects of Computation:Origins of Digital Computing: Alan Turing, Charles Babbage, & Ada Lovelace (D Swade)Generating, Solving and the Mathematics of Homo Sapiens. E Post's Views on Computation (L De Mol)Machines (R Turner)Effectiveness (N Dershowitz & E Falkovich)Axioms for Computability: Do They Allow a Proof of Church's Thesis? (W Sieg)The Mathematician's Bias — and the Return to Embodied Computation (S B Cooper)Intuitionistic Mathematics and Realizability in the Physical World (A Bauer)What is Computation? Actor Model versus Turing's Model (C Hewitt)Computation in Nature & the Real World:Reaction Systems: A Natural Computing Approach to the Functioning of Living Cells (A Ehrenfeucht, J Kleijn, M Koutny & G Rozenberg)Bacteria, Turing Machines and Hyperbolic Cellular Automata (M Margenstern)Computation and Communication in Unorganized Systems (C Teuscher)The Many Forms of Amorphous Computational Systems (J Wiedermann)Computing on Rings (G J Martínez, A Adamatzky & H V McIntosh)Life as Evolving Software (G J Chaitin)Computability and Algorithmic Complexity in Economics (K V Velupillai & S Zambelli)Blueprint for a Hypercomputer (F A Doria)Computation & Physics & the Physics of Computation:Information-Theoretic Teleodynamics in Natural and Artificial Systems (A F Beavers & C D Harrison)Discrete Theoretical Processes (DTP) (E Fredkin)The Fastest Way of Computing All Universes (J Schmidhuber)The Subjective Computable Universe (M Hutter)What Is Ultimately Possible in Physics? (S Wolfram)Universality, Turing Incompleteness and Observers (K Sutner)Algorithmic Causal Sets for a Computational Spacetime (T Bolognesi)The Computable Universe Hypothesis (M P Szudzik)The Universe is Lawless or “Pantôn chrêmatôn metron anthrôpon einai” (C S Calude, F W Meyerstein & A Salomaa)Is Feasibility in Physics Limited by Fantasy Alone? (C S Calude & K Svozil)The Quantum, Computation & Information:What is Computation? (How) Does Nature Compute? (D Deutsch)The Universe as Quantum Computer (S Lloyd)Quantum Speedup and Temporal Inequalities for Sequential Actions (M Żukowski)The Contextual Computer (A Cabello)A Gödel-Turing Perspective on Quantum States Indistinguishable from Inside (T Breuer)When Humans Do Compute Quantum (P Zizzi)Open Discussion Section:Open Discussion on A Computable Universe (A Bauer, T Bolognesi, A Cabello, C S Calude, L De Mol, F Doria, E Fredkin, C Hewitt, M Hutter, M Margenstern, K Svozil, M Szudzik, C Teuscher, S Wolfram & H Zenil)Live Panel Discussion (transcription):What is Computation? (How) Does Nature Compute? (C S Calude, G J Chaitin, E Fredkin, A J Leggett, R de Ruyter, T Toffoli & S Wolfram)Zuse's Calculating Space:Calculating Space (Rechnender Raum) (K Zuse)Afterword to Konrad Zuse's Calculating Space (A German & H Zenil) Readership: Graduate students who are specialized researchers in computer science, information theory, quantum theory and modern philosophy and the general public who are interested in these subject areas. Keywords:Digital Physics;Computational Universe;Digital Philosophy;Reality Theories of the Universe;Models of the World;Thring Computation RandomnessKey Features:The authors are all prominent researchersNo competing titlesState-of-the-art collection of technical papers and non-technical essays