History of ecology
The history of ecology as a scientific discipline within biology began in the second half of the 19th century by the introduction of the concept of ecology and embossing by Ernst Haeckel.
One of the founders of ecology, among others, Justus von Liebig, Charles Darwin, Karl August Möbius, Aldo Leopold, Ellen Swallow Richards, Arthur George Tansley and August Thienemann be counted alongside Haeckel. As the "father of ecology" in the Anglo- American sphere applies the Danish explorer and botanist Johannes Eugenius Bülow Warming.
- 5.1 Notes and references
- 5.2 Literature
Origins of Ecology
Although the history of ecology as a scientific discipline only ecology began with the coining of the term by Ernst Haeckel in 1866, since ancient times, there have been research approaches that meet today's ecology. So it was already in the historical descriptions of outbreaks of locusts and their impact on agriculture in the early high cultures of ecological observations, the explanation of which, however, usually by supernatural, divine phenomena took place.
Above all, Aristotle and his pupil Theophrastus observed and described organisms directly related to their habitat and other species, so that they anticipations of ecological research in ancient times. Pliny the Elder described in the first century after Christ also observations of nature as those on the aestivation of snails in the Mediterranean region as well as the coexistence of the shell guard ( pinnothere ), a cancer type, and the pen shell ( Pinna nobilis). Albertus Magnus rezipierte the works of Aristotle with his own comments on the life of the animals and also the works of many other naturalists such as Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, August Johann Roesel Rosenhof, Jacob Christian Schäffer and especially Carl Linnaeus and Georges -Louis Leclerc de Buffon contained information on ecology of plants and animals. The General Natural history of Lorenz Oken and Animal life of Alfred Brehm contained ecological descriptions of the treated organisms.
The basic principles of ecology developed in line parallel with those of other disciplines of natural history, especially of zoology and botany until it has established itself as a separate discipline.
Beginning of the research discipline of ecology
A significant influence on the development of ecology as a distinct discipline was Charles Darwin, who in his travelogue The Zoology of the Voyage of HMS Beagle and other writings published a wealth of ecological descriptions and together led to his theory of evolution in 1859 published On the Origin of Species. A major factor of evolution presented by Darwin is the natural selection ( natural selection ), the ( struggle for life ) is characterized in constant interaction with the environment through the struggle for existence. This concept was introduced by the book for the first time to a wider public and popular as Darwinism. Other works, including through the pollination of plants by insects, carnivorous plants and soil formation by the activity of earthworms provide environmental issues explicitly dar.
The geographer and naturalist Alexander von Humboldt analyzed the spatial distribution of rocks ( abiotic ), plants and animals, trying to make connections. His five-year excursion ( 1799-1804 ) contributed to the South American continent help to show how people, as well as all other organisms are adapted to the specific environmental conditions and influence each other. He elaborated ecological insights that would fall today's disciplines of biogeography and human ecology.
Ernst Haeckel and the beginning of Ecology
The first definition of the term "ecology" comes from the year 1866 by Ernst Haeckel, a German biologist and supporter of Darwinism. Haeckel meant by ecology the study of the conditions of living beings in the struggle for existence and the economy of nature:
"Under Oecologie we understand the whole science of the relations of the organism to the surrounding outside world, where we can all conditions of existence ' expected in a broader sense. These are partly organic partly inorganic. "
Haeckel attacked the definition of ecology in this and several subsequent works again and again and modified it several times, especially in light of the theory of evolution, which he already anticipated the principles developed in the 20th century Evolutionary Ecology partially. Already in the representations Haeckel two essential elements of ecology indicate for Carl Schroeter 1902 in a work on the vegetation of Lake Constance, the terms " autecology " ( ecology of organisms) and " Community Ecology " ( Community Ecology ) were introduced.
Although the term was coined in 1866 established itself as a comprehensive discipline ecology but only much later. Initially it was - mainly due to the rigorous academic separation between zoology and botany - rather than scientific natural history of animals ( Animal Ecology ) understood and had as such in the established sciences only a very bad state. Although a number of researchers have recognized the importance of ecology as a science and correspondingly high einschätzten, it was devalued by the majority of established disciplines of science as a purely descriptive natural history. Charles Sutherland Elton defined animal ecology in his work Animal Ecology 1927 show as " scientific natural history ", which he still reinforced this view.
The Plant Ecology and Geobotany thereof developed largely separately. One also developing in the 19th century branch was the Hydrobiology, rather than "Hydro Ecology" to understand today that dealt with the life circumstances of aquatic organisms in their environment during animal and plant ecology mainly on the terrestrial habitat, ie the mainland, limited.
Development of Animal Ecology
The ecology concept Haeckel was applied almost exclusively to the ecology of animals in the early days and led according to the development of animal ecology. This initially dealt exclusively to the descriptive account of life claims of individual species ( autecology ) and to the consideration of communities ( Community Ecology ) has been extended until the 1920s.
The latter evolved together with the approaches of the population ecology or Demökologie which at this time has its roots and shoots developed in the 1960s primarily through the textbooks of forest ecologists Fritz Schwerdtfeger on. How Schwerdtfeger, many ecologists concerned with the practically applicable knowledge of ecological research that were relevant especially in the field of pest control in agriculture and forestry, in the fishing industry and in medicine in the consideration and thus corresponding sub-disciplines led ( Forest Ecology, Agroecology, fisheries biology, parasitology ). The connection on the behavioral biology (ethology) also led to behavioral ecology.
Development of Plant Ecology
Parallel to the animal ecology, the plant ecology developed as a separate area, with its roots in the form of environmental information also date back to ancient times. As in animal ecology were also the living conditions of the individual plant, so the autecology, in the foreground. These were often associated with issues of plant geography, such as in the publications of Carl Linnaeus and Georg Forster in the 18th century as well as Alexander von Humboldt in the early 19th century. Humboldt worked in his descriptions of the geography of plants first physiognomic approaches that understand the diversities of vegetation as a result of different environmental influences. Alphonse de Candolle founded in 1855 these influences physiologically in his work Géographie botanique raisonné.
Already in the early 18th century, the relationship between the practical forestry and the " Biology of Plants " was ( as the previous name of Plant Ecology ) mainly researches of Heinrich Cotta in the course of traditional forest sustainability principle, the intensive deals with the ecology forests dealt and so decisively established the Forest Science as a scientific discipline and the modern silviculture justified. Wilhelm Arrow developed the maxim from the influence of the Local. He stressed that it is not possible all forests to be managed rigidly to the same general rules, but each location, so the soil and climate conditions and their consequences, the forestry decisions are taken into account. Hence by the so-called " Eberswalde school" represented locally appropriate forestry developed. Also Gottlob king, who coined the term " forest site customer " first coined, was already a firm supporter of the connection between economics and ecology. The first person on the influence of forests went down in detail on the welfare and prosperity of the people, was Carl Heinrich Edmund Freiherr von Berg. In his Handbook State Forestry Administration ( 1850) came in to the purely economic view of the forest such as sustainable timber production only secondary to its effects on welfare. The State Government, therefore, must pursue this goal in the first place according to Berg:
Around the middle of the 19th century, science was formed out of the plant communities with the ideas of reciprocal influence between species and vegetation with the soil. The vegetation on this established customer was doing in South and Central Europe is heavily influenced by the works of Oswald Heer, Otto Sendtner, Joseph Roman Lorenz and Anton Kerner von Marilaun. In Northern Europe, Hampus of mail, Ragnar Hult, Rutger Sernander or Aimo Kaarlo Cajander have contributed major methodological foundations for modern vegetation ecology.
By Simon Schwendenerstrasse, which dealt primarily with the physical principles of plant structure and the braiding for the first time recognized as a symbiosis between fungi and algae, derived basic descriptions to understand the histological structure of the plant and the relationship with the living conditions of the plants. His work has been deepened and continued by Alexander Tschirch, Emil Heinricher, Georg Volkens, Henry Schenck and especially Gottlieb Haberlandt as the founder of physiological plant anatomy, whose research focused mainly on plants in extreme habitats such as aquatic plants and xerophytes. Ernst Stahl began about the same time as the elucidation of the physiological aspects and experimental procedures resulted in the ecology of a ( Experimental Ecology ). He examined in this way the influence of light on the plant and later the defense mechanisms of plants against animal's consumers. In 1900, he revealed the symbiosis between the mycorrhiza, a fungal mycelium in the root zone of the trees, and the forest trees. Basic knowledge on Mykorrhizabildung of forest trees contributed Robert Hartig, was named after the later the " Hartigsche network ". The summary of the anatomical and histological and physiological results with the additional knowledge on the ecology of plants (eg, blooms ecology, fruit and seed dispersal ) summarized Anton Kerner von Marilaun in 1890 in his magnum opus plant life together.
Around the turn of the century to the 20th century, the term plant ecology emerged for the first time in publications, in particular Johannes Eugenius Bülow Warming, Andreas Franz Wilhelm Schimper, Frederic Edward Clements and Oscar Drude are worth mentioning. The works of Schimper also represent a starting point for the development of modern Physiological Ecology, Josias Braun- Blanquet developed during the plant sociology own research direction of Vegetation Science. Even within the Geobotany, considered the plant as part of the communities of the earth, there was a further fragmentation in the phytogeography, the General and the Special Geobotany.
In the second half of the 20th century, Heinz Ellenberg had a major role in the development of plant ecology in Central Europe and beyond by having delivered to almost all areas of this research contributions.
Development of Hydrobiology
Significant early insights for the development of ecology resulted from the work of Karl August Möbius, August Thienemann and François- Alphonse Forel, which focused mainly on aquatic habitats and thus justified the research branch of Hydrobiology with a focus on limnology and marine biology. The Hydrobiology it deals with the interactions in aquatic habitats, where both interactions between organisms as well as to inanimate environment have been considered very early. Since the aquatic habitat, especially in the form of freshwater lakes, as a closed habitat can be viewed here systemare approach could already mint comparatively early.
Karl August Möbius coined in his work The oyster and the oyster industry in 1877 for the first time the concept of living together ( as "life community " or " biocenosis " ) and set the relationship between organisms and the external conditions dar. He set the foundation stone for the marine biological research. In 1885, the characterization of the village pond as a closed social group through the pedagogue Friedrich boy during 1887 Stephen Alfred Forbes described the lake as a microcosm. François- Alphonse Forel in 1891 described the biology of a freshwater lake and also presented here for the first time extensive biogeochemical cycles in the lake as well as the integration of the lake into the water and energy balance of the Earth dar.
The further development of hydro- biologist occurred mainly in the early 20th century by August Thienemann, who performed in the lakes of the volcanic Eifel first physical and chemeische measurements and those in relationship with the living in the lake organisms - sat in relationship - essentially with the larvae of midges. From 1922, the term limnology is a naturalized for the observation of freshwater systems ( lacustrine systems ), and shortly afterwards appeared, inter alia, by Thienemann basic publications, which were the main features of this newly -defined research area.
Parallel to freshwater biology, marine biology, which initially focused mainly on the study of the coastal seabed ( benthic ) developed. Research into the open water areas ( pelagic zone ) was introduced from 1845 onwards mainly by Johannes Müller, specially developed for the capture of floating in open water organisms ( " lift " today " Plankton " ) fishing gear in the form of plankton nets. The resulting 1846 resulting scientific discipline of plankton research in the then British island of Helgoland culminated with a school of faunistically working marine biologists and their work in 1892 in the founding of the " Royal Prussian Biological Institute on Helgoland ", today's Biologische Anstalt Helgoland. The net fishing technique was subsequently used in the lacustrine area. Victor Hensen coined for the small organisms that can be caught with the help of the network, the term plankton.
Development of modern ecology
In Germany, the ecology had already tried to establish itself in the 1920s as a scientific research field and propagated to acquire research funding in the context of the basis of the blood- and-soil rhetoric of the Nazi period.
Today's modern ecology formed by the merger of animal ecology, plant ecology and Hydrobiology in the 1930s to the 1950s between the introduction of the ecosystem approach by Arthur George Tansley in his Journal article The Use and Abuse of vegetational Concepts and Terms and establishing itself ends dissemination of the concept Eugene P. Odum in the Fundamentals of ecology in 1953. essence of this concept is the assumption of definable functional units of the biosphere, through the interaction contained in organisms and the abiotic environment are determined ( ecosystems). The individual ecosystems interact with each other and make according to Contact a global ecosystem.
As this concept applies to both plants such as animals, it broke through the separation of the original disciplines and led to a holistic and interdisciplinary view of nature. Accordingly, this claim after 1960 the study of terrestrial habitats, inland waters and seas in interdisciplinary teams, in addition to animal and plant ecologists and population ecologists, microbiologists, climatologists, soil scientists, physicists and chemists and computer for data processing include began.
The modern developments of ecology focus on increasingly to replace the original descriptive ecology by models and laws, and are focusing on the field of theoretical ecology. These attempts on modeling to explain the ecological relationships and to make tangible. Another fairly new field represents the human ecology that is with each other and with nature surrounding it considers the interactions of humans and closely aligned accordingly in parts to the sociology.
Expansion and popularization of the concept of ecology
UNESCO contributed substantially to that of the ecological research approach was used and popularized. Already through its International Biological year and by the Man- and- Biosphere Programme, the research has evolved far beyond the narrow scientific context of biology. In the 1960s, also broke at the age of environmental protection. In Ecology and 'organic' under the Resource and healthy environment since many friendly, sustainable use of nature and also a " natural " life understood.
Great deal of interest, the American biologist Rachel Carson in 1962 with its warning of a "silent spring ", which ultimately led to an almost global ban on DDT and other persistent environmental toxins. For the first time ecological and environmental protection originating concerns were publicity connected. Ecological knowledge is also increasingly set with areas of society in relationship and partially transferred to this. Other pulse were published by the Club of Rome study Limits to Growth (1972) and the report to the U.S. President Global 2000 (1980).
As people are indeed bound to a biological environment, but this changed inadvertently or deliberately framing, also contributed to political intentions help to use the term ecology in general environmental contexts. The ecology quickly became the " leading science " of this environmental movement. By the word ecology but found its way into the daily vernacular, its meaning changed content. The originally neutral science has a positive connotation, so that ecologically used interchangeably in part with environmentally friendly, clean, considerate, or even with good or right. The short form " eco " in combination with names which are linked to an ecological economic models together, sits enhanced by: eg organic farmer ( organic farmer goes out ), eco-city, eco-estate, green energy or green energy, eco-fashion, " ökofair " ( ecologically grown and fairly traded ). Even if some of it was initiated a marketing perspective, it documents the progress of the sustainability principle into everyday life.
In the context of social-ecological research also the material and symbolic relations between society and nature are examined and an attempt made to find solutions to social problems of sustainability.