Economies as Ecosystems

“Both political camps accept a version of the elegant premise of economic equilibrium, which inclines them to a deterministic, linear way of thinking. But why not look at the economy in terms of the messy complexity of natural systems, such as the fractal growth of living organisms or the frantic jive of atoms? These frameworks are bigger than the sum of their parts, in that you can’t predict the behaviour of the whole by studying the step-by-step movement of each individual bit.”

—George Zarkadakis, “The economy is more a messy, fractal living thing than a machine“

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Noise and Ecosystems

Inwood Hill Park

Research suggests noise can rattle an ecosystem. Birds, for example, rely on their voices to woo mates, size up rivals, scrounge for dinner. Horn blasts and engine revs can scramble auditory cues. Birds try singing louder, singing at a higher frequency, singing at night. Some abandon their nests altogether. This can trigger an ecological cascade, one that extends even to vegetation; noise can scare away some birds that would normally scatter seeds.

—Ashley Powers, “Preserving the Quietest Places” in The California Sunday Magazine

More on sound and noise:

• Noise Affects Learning
• The Sound of Schools: To Catch the Light
• Anxiety and Normality: Coping with Autism

 

A Balanced Complexity

An interesting relationship to consider:

1. A balanced complexity of ecosystem sounds = environmental health
2. A balanced complexity of brain activity = mental health

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you’re interested in the concept of self-organized criticality or networks, more here:

• A Self-Organizing Criticality, Somewhere Between Boredom and Chaos
• A Brain is More than the Sum of its Parts
• These Little Avalanches
• Can Schools Tame the Chaos of the Mind?

Like students, plants give up after years of failure, too

By Famartin (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

“The plant life of Australia’s outback may have “given up”, according to satellite-based maps tracking the impact of changing climatic conditions, such as rainfall and temperature, on the world’s ecosystems.

“The study suggests the vegetation of our interior does not respond to sudden increases in rainfall because it has “learned” that drought will soon follow. . . .

“‘Sometimes when you subject an ecosystem to some kind of disturbance, such as a drought or fire, they behave differently depending on their past,’ he explained. . . .

“‘They don’t care if it is good favourable conditions now, because they know it is temporary and it is not worth investing in growing more at this time because they become bigger and it is a lot more to care of when the drought returns,’ he said.”

–Dani Cooper, “Global satellite map highlights sensitivity of Australia’s plants to changes in rainfall and temperature” on ABC Science News