摘要
Problems of environmentalism—environmental protection, conservation, and preservation—are now widely appreciated as important to human enterprise and destiny. Called to attention by advances in descriptive empirical ecology, the new problems are too complex for this same ecology to solve without further expansion of basic knowledge. Environmentalism needs an ecological science of complex systems, but its development is hindered by over-commitment of attention and resources to the applied problems. Certain aspects of environmentalism may run against the grain of how nature works; it is important to get the science right.A selection of ecological and environmental topics is reviewed from a systems ecology perspective. The ecological topics include system dynamics (linearity vs. nonlinearity, steady vs. non-steady state behavior) and indirect effects. The environmental topics are global change, overpopulation, biodiversity, and sustainability.A comprehensive hypothesis is formulated to emphasize that two kinds of science are needed, one empirical focusing on what is immediate and tangible, and the other theoretical dealing with what is indirect and intangible. Empirically based environmentalism is attentive to only the first. The hypothesis has the following elements: (1) Living processes degrade their immediate and nearby environments. (2) A maximum power principle holds that this degradation should be as quick and complete as possible. (3) By direct harnessing of maximum power, biota perform work to maximize their fitness (Type I, biological), at the cost of degraded environments. The life-environment relationship therefore becomes win-lose. (4) Maximum power also contributes to a network property, dominant indirect effects, giving rise to (5) network synergism that converts proximate interactions, mainly ( , −), and negative ones (−,−) to predominantly positive ( , ) relations, which become quantitatively dominant. (6) In following the indirect line from maximum power to network synergism, biota do work that maximizes both their own and their environment's fitness (Type II, biological and ecological). By this, the life-environment relationship becomes win-win. (7) This hypothesis has a built-in paradox: the invisible positive benefits deriving from the network synergism → Fitness-II line are (i) proportional to, and (ii) greater in magnitude than, the negative costs generated by the tangible, immediate, maximum power → Fitness-I line. (8) Therefore, environmental programs designed to power down to reduce environmental degradation will reduce not only Fitness-I, but also Fitness-II by foregoing the network synergism benefits that exceed the maximum power costs. (9) Misguided environmentalism could then produce the worst case of a lose-lose life-environment relationship. (10) Environmentalism must resolve and manage this apparent conflict, and ecology as its foundational science must expand to provide the knowledge to do so.