ENVIRONMENT, POWER, AND SOCIETY ODUM HO\Ai\RD T J 5o ENVIRONMENT, AND POWER, SOCIETY Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 http://www.archive.org/details/environmentpowerOOodunn ENVIRONMENT, AND POWER, SOCIETY HOWARD ODUM T. University of North Carolina Chapel Hill WILEY-INTERSCIENCE A Division of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. New York London Sydney Toronto Copyright (c) 1971, by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved. Xo part of tliis book may be reproduced by any means, nor transmitted, nor translated into a machine language without the written permission of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 78-129660 Cloth: ISBN 471 65270 9 Paper: ISBN 471 65275 X Printed in tlie United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 To Howard Washington Odum PREFACE In recent years studies of the energetics of ecological systems have suggested general means for applying basic laws of energy and matter to the complex systems of nature and man. In this book, energy language — is used to consider the pressing problem of survival in our time the partnership of man in nature. An effort is made to show that energy analysis can help answer many of the questions of economics, law, and religion, already stated in other languages. Models for the analysis of a system are made by recognizing major divisions whose causal relation- ships are indicated by the pathways of interchange of energy and work. Then simulation allows the model's performance to be tested against the performance of the real system. When systems are considered in energy terms, some of the bewildering complexity'of ourworld disappears; situations ofmany types and sizes turn out to be special cases of relatively few basic types. An ideal expressed by the Society for General Systems Theory and elsewhere suggests that a general systems view of the world is possible and preferable in the orientation and education of man. Toward this ideal energy flows are illustrated with ecological systems and then applied to all kinds of situations from very small biochemical processes to the large overall systems of man and the biosphere. Energy diagraming helps us consider the great problems of power, pollution, population, food, and war free from our fetters of indoctrination. Intended for the general reader, this account also attempts to intro- duce ecology through the energy language. Hopefully, it may be useful to the widespread efforts under way in undergraduate colleges to develop courses in human ecology that are pertinent to a new generation grappling for survival on the planet. Whereas mathematics is not re- quired, footnotes and an appendix do provide formulations of some basic definitions emphasizing that the concepts in use are all quantita- tively defined and measurable. Grateful acknowledgments are due my former professor, George Evelyn Hutchinson of Yale University, for his example and my wife, Virginia Wood Odum, for encouragement to venture in interscience generalization. Many colleagues and former students here and at my former universities (Florida, Duke, Texas, Puerto Rico) aided in devel- opment of these theses. A memorial tribute is due Richard C. Pinkerton, viii Preface whose untimely death cut short an earHer collaboration. Research on ecological models and microcosms was supported by the U. S. Atomic Energy Commission and the National Science Foundation. The book is dedicated to m\- father Howard Washington Odum who suggested a synthesis of science and societ)'. I acknowledge the shared effort toward this aim with my brother Eugene P. Odum, Universit)' of Georgia. This work was completed while at North Carolina. Mv present address is Graduate Research Professor, Department of En\ironmental Engineer- ing, Universit\- of Florida, Gainesx'ille, Florida. Howard T. Odum Chapel Hill, North Carolitia May 1970