dynamic ecosystems. Adaptation, so long as it must be linked to the variables of 

 direct experience by the organism or population, is unlikely to provide much of the 

 final explanation of how parts work within whole systems in nature. 



The state of ecology is relevant to environmental concerns, for environmental 

 protection can fare no better than the theory in which its practice is rooted. 

 Throughout the 1980s we can expect to see repeated efforts to manage populations, 

 establish safe standards for exposure to hazardous substances, and otherwise 

 mitigate problems of the environment to end in frustration and dismay. Billions will 

 be spent on meaningless environmental monitoring, but nearly no resources will be 

 aimed at the exposition of the systems nature of environment which is at the heart of 

 every difficulty. The decade will have its own litany of failures and its own lexicon of 

 events and substances which frighten us all. If it can only be realized sooner rather 

 than later that wholeness and indirect causality are the key missing ingredients in 

 present understanding and approaches, perhaps our own adaptive response during 

 the 1980s might make it possible to enter the new century with an environmental 

 science that is precise, quick and sure. The key to this aspiration is ecosystem. 



ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 



1 acknowledge with thanks the technical assistance of M. Craig Barber, Susan L. 

 Durham, Randall E. Hicks, and Elizabeth F. Vetter of Ecology Simulations, Inc. 

 This is University of Georgia's, Contributions in Systems Ecology. No. 55. 



NOTES 



a. Mason and Lagenheim' dti'int environmental phenomena as those that actually 

 or potentially have an operational relation with any organism. The environ- 

 mental relation of an organism is the sum of empirical relations between the 

 environmental phenomena and any individual organism. The set of environ- 

 mental relations of an organism constitutes the relation o{ natural selection. The 

 operational environment of an organism consists of those instantaneous 

 environmental phenomena that actually enter a relation with the organism; the 

 concept applies to specific individual organisms. Potential environment consists 

 of environmental phenomena which may enter an environmental relation at 

 some point in the ontogeny of an organism. "The environment of any organism is 

 the class. . .of those phenomena that enter a reaction system of the organism or 

 otherwise directly impinge on it to affect its mode of life at any time throughout 

 its life cycle as ordered by the demands of the organism or as ordered by any 

 other condition. . .that alters its environmental demands." Nonenvironment 

 consists of all phenomena (indirect, historical or organism caused) which never 

 enter into a direct environmental relation with the organism. "[Indirect and 

 historical] factors both function to condition a phenomenon. . .to which an 

 organism then reacts. Important as this is to the ecosystem, the only [organism] 

 reaction. . .is to an already conditioned phenomenon. The state of a phenomenon 

 prior to its conditioning is outside the scope of. . .operational. . .and. . .potential 

 environment *** It follows that we must reject the implication that. . .[causal] 

 chains constitute a unitary event playing a significant role in the environmental 

 relation even though the steps are very important to the ecosystem *** There is 

 also a philosophical reason for removing indirect factors from the concept 

 environment. To introduce indirect factors into causal relations within the 

 environment is to introduce an infinite regress into the system of explanation. 

 Every cause has in turn itself a cause which becomes an indirect cause of the most 

 recent effect. The regress is toward the limbo of ultimate cause along an infinitely 

 reticulating path; for this we have neither finite description nor finite 

 explanation. . . To include such relations in environment is to confuse 

 environment with its history." Direct causes only are admitted in the orthodoxy 

 of environment. 



102 



