for recovery of the ecosystem following 
catastrophic destruction. The “behav- 
ioral patterns of species using this strat- 
egy,” they write, 
suggest that it may have evolved specifi- 
cally in response to the highly specialized 
conditions that follow serious disturbance of 
a previously intact ecosystem. In terms of 
system dynamics, the strategy is not simply 
exploitation of an injured ecosystem but is 
also part of an elaborate feedback mecha- 
nism that acts rapidly to limit temporarily 
accelerated nutrient export and return the 
system to a condition of greater stability. 
At the risk of being picky, we can ask 
whether an ecosystem, the ensemble of 
living organisms and associated mineral 
constituents, can become “injured.” 
Has pin cherry evolved dormant seeds to 
“limit . . . nutrient export . . . and return 
the system to . . . greater stability,” as 
implied in the quote above? Ah, you say, 
this is but a figure of speech, not to be 
taken literally. At this point readers may 
accuse me of getting stuffy about lan- 
guage and metaphor in science. I plead 
guilty to the charge of extracting a sin- 
gle quote, out of an exceptional work of 
scholarship, upon which to hang a fine 
distinction, and I ask the reader’s indul- 
gence while I try to delineate an impor- 
tant matter of interpretation. 
What’s wrong with an organismic 
metaphor lying within the model of for- 
est recovery? After all, an ecosystem 
behaves as if it were a living organism. 
And, by analogy with an organism, it 
appears to have a mechanism of self- 
repair, a healing process that leads to 
the return of normal function. Why 
couldn’t a process much like the capac- 
ity for tissue reconstruction in the indi- 
vidual have evolved in the ecosystem? 
Does the choice of the language with 
which an abstract model is constructed 
have any effect on the quality of the 
science? 
I am as susceptible as anyone to the 
intuitive beauty of a finely chosen meta- 
phor in any medium. The problem arises 
when our metaphors take on a life of 
their own and become so deeply rooted 
in our minds that they generate funda- 
mental misconceptions about nature. 
Metaphors do more than affect how we 
understand our perceptions; they ac- 
tively shape the kinds of questions with 
which we approach our ignorance. Once 
passed on to our students, metaphors 
truly acquire independent flight, free 
from the contextual qualifications that 
accompanied their birth. 
Perhaps the question of ecosystem 
evolution can be clarified through appli- 
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