I'm a prof at a small liberal arts college, and I love using this text in my course on global environmental change. It works well with non-science majors, as well as with the more advanced science students. The Earth System Kump 3rd Edition does a superb job with climate change science, which is one of the major focii in my course. It doesn't hesitate to use real physics, math, and chemistry, yet at the same time is accessible to the non-science folks. Lee Kump is one of the premiere geoscientists in the field, and he has lent his broad understanding to this excellent text. It might also be fun to simply read The Earth System Kump 3rd Edition if you are not a student.
The 3rd edition is quite similar to the 2nd, with additional material from the 2007 IPCC report
Product Details
Paperback: 432 pages
Publisher: Prentice Hall; 3 edition (August 10, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0321597796
ISBN-13: 978-0321597793
Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 0.6 x 10.9 inches
The Earth System Kump 3rd Edition