The Gaia Hypothesis
In the early 1960's, James Lovelock was invited by NASA to participate
in the scientific research for evidence of life on Mars. His job was
to design instruments, capable of detecting the presence of life,
which could be sent on a spacecraft to Mars.
This led him to think about what constitutes life, and how it can be
detected. He decided that the most general characteristic of life was
that it takes in energy and matter and discards waste products. He
also reasoned that organisms would use the planet's atmosphere as a
medium for this cyclic exchange, just as we breathe in oxygen and
expel carbon dioxide.
The atmosphere of Mars, like Venus, was about 95% carbon dioxide, with
some oxygen and no methane. The Earth was 77% nitrogen, 21% oxygen,
and a relatively large amount of methane. Mars was chemically dead;
all the reactions that were going to take place had already done so.
The Earth, however, was far from chemical equilibrium. For example,
methane and oxygen will react with each other very easily, and yet
they are both present in the atmosphere.
Lovelock concluded that for this to be the case the gases must be in
constant circulation, and that the pump driving this circulation was
living organisms.
It was life processes (respiration and photosynthesis), the cumulative
actions of countless organisms, that were controlling the atmosphere.
Looking at the Earth as a whole or from outer space, the mass effect
of these processes was that the Earth itself appeared as a living
entity - especially in comparison with its dead neighbours like Mars
and Venus.
Lovelock realised that the Earth coul...
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...ome of the more poetical thoughts of the originator of the
theory.
At the end of Chapter 1 in his first book, Lovelock writes:
"If Gaia exists, the relationship between her and man, a dominant
animal species in the complex living system, and the possibly shifting
balance of power between them, are questions of obvious
importance...The Gaia hypothesis is for those who like to walk or
simply stand and stare, to wonder about the Earth and the life it
bears, and to speculate about the consequences of our own presence
here. It is an alternative to that pessimistic view which sees nature
as a primitive force to be subdued and conquered. It is also an
alternative to that equally depressing picture of our planet as a
demented spaceship, forever travelling, driverless and purposeless,
around an inner circle of the sun."
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...; quest for new frontiers continues today as earthlings burst terrestrial bonds and begin the endless voyage beyond planet and galaxy into the illimitable dark.
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