Lawrence Joseph has written on science, nature, politics and business for the past twenty five years. In 1990, he published Gaia: The Growth of an Idea, exploring the Gaia Hypothesis that the global ecosystem adjusts and regulates itself more like a living organism than a geological machine, as traditional Earth science holds. His current book, Apocalypse 2012: A Scientific Investigation into Civilization's End, is a personal inquiry into the confluence of ancient Mayan prophecy and contemporary solar physics projections indicating that the year 2012 will be pivotal, perhaps catastrophic. Currently, he is Chairman of the Board of Aerospace Consulting Corporation (AC2), an Albuquerque, New Mexico firm developing ultra-high temperature plasma furnaces designed to completely disintegrate highly toxic biological, chemical and medical wastes.