Part 5: Ecology: How Do We Understand Natural Systems?
"In this section we focus on the “economy of nature,” the science of ecology. In 1866, Ernst Haeckel defined ecology (Ökologiein German) as a science for understanding how organisms relate to their “external world.” We are not so much concerned here with “the” ecology (a term sometimes used to refer to the natural world), as the changing worldview created by the methods of this particular science. As it developed in the twentieth century, its concepts influenced thinking about policy making for global change." Se även denna text där denna utveckling belyses.Essay on the Geography of Plants (1807) (pp. 209-219)
ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT, AIMÉ BONPLAND and STEPHEN T. JACKSON
Based on measurements and observations performed on location, from the tenth degree of boreal latitude to the tenth degree of austral latitude in the years 1799, 1800, 1801, 1802, and 1803. When one ascends from sea level to the peaks of high mountains, one can see a gradual change in the appearance of the land and in the various physical phenomena in the atmosphere. The plants in the plains are gradually replaced by very different ones: woody plants decrease little by little and are replaced by herbaceous and alpine plants; higher still, one finds only grasses and cryptogams. La grunden för "Earth System science".
“The Use and Abuse of Vegetational Concepts and Terms” (1935) (pp. 220-232)
A. G. TANSLEY and LIBBY ROBIN
It is now generally admitted by plant ecologists, not only that vegetation is constantly undergoing various kinds of change, but that the increasing habit of concentrating attention on these changes instead of studying plant communities as if they were static entities is leading to a far deeper insight into the nature of vegetation and the parts it plays in the world. A great part of vegetational change is generally known as succession, which has become a recognised technical term in ecology, though there still seems to be some difference of opinion as to the proper limits of its connotation... "he introduced the ecosystem concept (sv)[fn 1][4] In the 1930s ecological thinking was dominated by the work of Clements, who thought of ecological communities as organisms, and associations as superorganisms.[4] Tansley devised the concept to draw attention to the importance of transfers of materials between organisms and their environment,[13] regarding ecosystems as the basic units of nature.[4].
"På 1930-talet lanserade Arthur Tansley begreppet ekosystem, vilket starkt påverkade ekologernas syn på sin vetenskap. Det blev sedan Eugene Odum som under 1950-talet ledde ekologforskningen in på studier av ekosystem" (källa Enander (2007) "Ekologi, skog och miljö : vetenskap och idéer under 300 år", sid 223):
Principles and Concepts Pertaining to the Ecosystem and Biogeochemical Cycles 1953 (pp. 233-244)
EUGENE P. ODUM, chapter 2 in "Fundamentals of ecology" (inledning femte utgåvan, utkom på svenska 1966). and STEPHEN BOCKING
"Living organisms and their nonliving (abiotic) environment are inseparably interrelated and interact upon each other. Any entity or natural unit that includes living and nonliving parts interacting to produce a stable system in which the exchange of materials between the living and nonliving parts follows circular paths is an ecological system or ecosystem.¹ The ecosystem is the largest functional unit in ecology, since it includes both organisms (biotic communities) and abiotic environment, each influencing the properties of the other and both necessary for maintenance of life as we have it on the earth." Se även "Odum School of Ecology" - "it is named after Eugene Odum, renowned UGA biologist and the father of ecosystem ecology". Odum utgav 1996 "Ecology. A Bridge Between Science and Society", intressant titel!
(2014 kom en "Essentials of Ecolgy" av Begon, Hoarth & Townsend; dvs en helt annan bok, med andra författare - men liknande titel)
Resilience and Stability of Ecological Systems (1973) (pp. 245-260)
C. S. HOLLING and LIBBY ROBIN
Individuals die, populations disappear, and species become extinct. That is one view of the world. But another view of the world concentrates not so much on presence or absence as upon the numbers of organisms and the degree of constancy of their numbers. These are two very different ways of viewing the behavior of systems and the usefulness of the view depends very much on the properties of the system concerned." "His 1973 paper on the resilience of ecological systems had a substantial impact within ecology and other natural and social sciences" (källa, källa).
Efterord: "När kemisten James Lovelock på 1970-talet lade fram sin Gaia-hypotes anslöt sig Odum till denna. – Gaia var det antika Greklands ”Moder jord”. – Odum förklarade: ”The Gaia-hypothesis, in Lovelock´s words, states that the biosphere is a self-regulating entity with the capacity to keep our planet healthy by controlling the chemical and physical environment. In other words, the earth is a superecosystem – with numerous interacting functions and feedback loops – that moderate extremes of temperature and keep the chemical composition of the atmosphere and the oceans relatively constant.” Odum jämför med människans nervsystem, vilket håller kroppstemperaturen konstant trots fluktuationer i omgivningen... Odum tillämpar ett annat ingångssätt i resonemanget, när han talar om att organismerna ”aktivt skapar” en livsduglig miljö för sig själva och nya organismer, och att de kan ”kontrollera” denna miljö... Ekologerna poängterar emellertid samtidigt, att Odums Fundementals of Ecology (1953) hade stor betydelse för utvecklingen av matematiska modeller för ekosystemstudier. I dessa modeller koncentrerar Odum sig på energiflödet. Han konstaterar att energi är den gemensamma nämnaren för alla ekosystem, vare sig de är naturliga eller påverkade av människan...Det finns i Odums uttalanden om exempelvis organismer som kontrollerar miljön och i Gaia-hypotesen en underton av tidigare filosofier om en ändamålsenlig natur. Hans syn på ekosystemen som självreglerande och kontrollerande enheter torde emellertid intressera vissa människor, liksom de naturliga ekosystemens förmåga att hålla planeten sund enligt Gaia-hypotesen. Efter hans död år 2002 uttalades från Georgia University, att Odums idé om jorden som en väldig uppsättning av sammankopplade ekosystem har varit ett dominerande tema inom miljörörelsen sedan 1970, då den första ”Jordens dag” firades. Även hans tes, att man inom ”humanekologin” har mycket att lära av naturliga ekosystem torde vara tilltalande för många människor. Uddenbergs (2004) bedömning är att det var viktigt för miljörörelsen, att Odum poängterade människans beroende av väl fungerande ekosystem" (källa, sid 155-156).
Det är intressant att se hur begrepp som ekosystem har "bearbetats" av många: Frederic Clements, botanist, som såg att växter var beroende av varandra (som en organism), sen Arthur Tansley på 1930-talet, vilket lär ha påverkat ekologernas syn på sin vetenskap. Eugene Odum ledde sen under 1950-talet in ekologforskningen på studier av ekosystem. Hans "Fundamentals of ecology" (1953) utgavs på svenska 1966, och lär ha bidragit att föra fram betydelsen av ekosystem för såväl akademi som allmänhet. Odum utgav 1996 "Ecology. A Bridge Between Science and Society", intressant titel! Holling förde med "Resilience and Stability of Ecological Systems" (1973) förde in begreppet Resilence för att beskriva ekosystems "uthållighet" mot förändring. Som Robin tar upp i Robin, Sörlin & Warde (2013, s 257) så blev detta grunden för "Resilience community". Spontant funderar jag, liksom de gör i artikeln "Resilience and Vulnerability: Complementary or Conflicting Concepts?" om resilience och vulnerability är i konflikt, dvs som det är uthållighet eller känslighet som kan/ska framhållas när förändringar inom och mellan ekosystem beskrivs.
Alla dessa begrepp (biosfär, ekosystem etc) som används för att greppa jorden som helhet. Många behöver engageras för att beskriva, förklara, förstå och föreslå vägar framåt rörande samhällets "accelerande" relation med naturen, dvs både naturvetare och samhällsvetare/humanister! Framhålls bland annat i "Earth System science":
"Early works discussing Earth system science, like these NASA reports [ Earth System Science: Overview (1986), and Earth System Science: A Closer View (1988)], generally emphasized the increasing human impacts on the Earth system as a primary driver for the need of greater integration among the life and geo-sciences, making the origins of Earth system science parallel to the beginnings of global change studies and programs" (källa)
Part 6: Technology: Does Technology Create More Problems Than It Solves?
Introduction] (pp. 261-263)Technology has long been a double-edged sword when it comes to human relations with nature. It is in large part through technology that we have come to our modern understanding of the environment, giving us the capacity to measure, analyze, and view it from a microscopic to a global level. In this sense, we can even say that technology has been a crucial element in constructing the very idea of the environment.
The Tree of Science (1857) (pp. 264-272)
EUGÈNE HUZAR and JEAN-BAPTISTE FRESSOZ
Modern civilization, unlike Greek or Roman civilizations, is not limited to a town or an empire, it can be found in Europe, Asia, Africa and the South Sea Islands, as such it is a very specific phenomenon to which nothing can be compared…. All these historical civilizations have fallen through invasions, wars, political or religious upheavals; modern civilization however will fall in harmony, not through conquest or invasions but under the weight of its own force and power, in an excited wave of immense scientific discovery, and for the present we cannot possibly conceive the repercussions of this.
To Choose a Future (1972) (pp. 273-281)
ALVA MYRDAL and ARNE KAIJSER
The concept of the welfare state has hitherto been seen as closely harnessed to the rapid development of science and technology. However, this development is now also being recognized as a source of danger for our societies because of over-hasty transformations and unforeseen negative effects. There is broad agreement that scientific and technological capacity will be a crucial factor in our common efforts to bring acceptable material standards of living to all people. But are the present large-scale technologies really furthering this aim? What alternative choices exist? How are cumulative technological innovatory processes to be reconciled with slower...
“The Dynamics of Energy Systems and the Logistic Substitution Model” (1979) (pp. 282-290)
CESARE MARCHETTI, NEBOJSA NAKICENOVIC and PAUL WARDE
One of the objectives of IIASA’s Energy Systems Program is to improve the methodology of medium- and long-range forecasting in the areas of the energy market and energy use, demands, supply opportunities and constraints. This is commonly accomplished with models that capture and put into equations the numerous relationships and feedbacks characterizing the operation of an economic system or parts of it. Such an approach encounters many difficulties, which are linked to the extreme complexity of the system and the fairly short-term variation of the parameters and even of the equations used. Consequently, these models lend themselves to short- and...
Hur hänge ekosystem och teknosystem ihop? (och hur bör de "vårdas" och utvecklas?)
Klassiska funderingar. Ska vi som Huzar är inne på skapa en ”Världskommitté” som bestämmer vad varje nation får använda för typ av naturliga resurs? Eller, ska vi, som Myrdal är mer inne på, satsa på god utbildning och demokratiska beslutsprocesser för att forma världen (såväl den "ekologiska" naturen som den våra tekniska samhällen) efter oss; och för undvika att världen ska forma vår vardag, våra samhällen. Men är det inte just relationen mellan den "ekologiska" naturen och våra tekniska samhällen som behöver beskrivas, analyseras, förstås och vårdas?
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