BASIC SCIENCE OF ENVIRONMENT


 Howard T. Odum
 Environmental Engineering Sciences
 University of Florida


 At a time when the world most needs an understanding of the way resources
 are changing the structure of humanity and environment, research on this realm
 is being diminished, partly because there is a lack of perception that a
 holistic understanding of the system is amenable to science. Perhaps a new
 science is emerging for this realm, ready for recognition. First, a case is made
 for landscape science as basic; next, some of its research needs are suggested,
 and third, importance of basic research on the system of nature and man for
 national needs is identified with changes anticipated in human patterns due to
 decline of non-renewable resources.

 For almost every size realm of nature there is a basic science such as
 chemistry for molecules, biology for organisms, etc. For the size realm that
 includes the landscape and the patterns and processes of humans, there has
 not been.a single discipline recognized. Instead, many fields have dealt with
 various parts and processes such as economics, forestry, hydrology, political
 science, planning, agronomy, sociology, geography, etc. However, studies of
 the abundant evidence of organized phenomena such as the organization of
 landscape shows hierarchical organization, spatial patterns, energy webs,
 material cycles, networks of money flow, cycles of order and disorder, etc.
 There is obviously a unity of systems processes with its own unique aspects
 that emerge from the organization of the flows of energy, materials, and
 information. Is it now time for a recognition that this size realm is a basic
 science,one in which understanding of basic principles can have far reaching
 applications in better use and planning for the pattern of nature and man in
 the future?

 Whereas many highly respectable traditional fields have advanced knowledge
of parts of the system, understanding and prediction of the whole landscape
has lagged behind for lack of more holistic treatment. Because of the ability
of humans to chose and direct affairs of man and nature, many have thought of
phenomena at this level to be indeterminate, dependant on human preference or
on randomness. Although the human choices are one of the most important
features of the system, it is becoming equally obvious that the self-organizing
actions of humans interacting with the physical nature generate the same kinds
of patterns, energy use, and systems designs found in other realms of science.
The collective actions of human decision system seem to be as limited by
systems principles as where humans are less prominent. In other words,
individually humans try most everything, but collectively we chose and organize
what works and this is predictable from principles of energetic, the landscape
realities of water and rocks, and the systems aspects of the human control
patterns.