The Human Component of Ecosystems

Abstract

One of the outstanding biological characteristics of the human organism is its aptitude for culture. ¹ We can assume that this attribute was of considerable selective advantage under the conditions prevailing in the environment in which the early hominids evolved. Certainly, from the outset, culture brought about important changes in the relationships between our ancestors and the other components of the ecosystems in which they found themselves, and these impacts, in turn, then influenced humans themselves and their culture (Fig. 7.1). In fact, interplay between cultural and biological processes has been a consistent and highly significant feature of all human situations that have ever existed. It occurs in all ecosystems of which humans are a part or on which they have any influence.

Article Footnote

The word culture is used here in the abstract sense, referring to such aspects of human situations as knowledge of language, assumptions, understanding, values, world view, and techno-logical know-how. The word nature is used for things and processes of a kind that existed before human culture came into being.