THE GLOBAL PICTURE

Abstract

The acid test for any idea is whether it works in practice. As we have seen throughout this book, complexity theory teaches us many lessons that have immediate practical uses in landscape ecology, in conservation and in environmental management. However, if complexity theory teaches us any lessons at all, it teaches that we cannot understand ecosystems by studying them in isolation. To get the full picture, we need to set each ecosystem in the context of its surrounding region. Nor can we understand an entire region without understanding how the elements in its ecological mosaic interact with one another.