Question Earthority!

“There once was a concept of ‘potential natural vegetation’ of the United States, which was thought to be what would eventually appear in the absence of human management. The modern view of forest dynamics is somewhat different, but, nonetheless, the ‘natural’ distribution of the oak-pine forest pretty much corresponds to the inland reach of the strongest hurricanes. OK, that was my original Ph.D. topic proposal, back in a 1971 paper at the University of Chicago. It was laughed at, because, at the time, ecologists didn’t think weather or climate were very important modulators of ecosystem behavior. Four years later, the surface temperature of the planet began to rise. About a third of a century later, a hurricane was blamed for the largest ecological disaster in our history. Now it’s the other way around. Weather and climate are now assumed to be driving the world into ecological chaos. It seems reasonable that, say, 30 years from now, something else will be to blame.” (11/28/07)