orrery-software.webs.comorrery-software.webs.com/02-Interests/02-C-Biophysic… · Web viewOrrery Software44Contextual Redefinition of the Anthroposphere. Annex A – Online Definitions

A Contextual Redefinition of the Anthroposphere

Authors: Garvin H BoyleDate: 18 August 2014


ContentsIntroduction......................................................................................................................................1Why Redefine ‘Anthroposphere’?...................................................................................................1

The Problem of Externalities.......................................................................................................2The problem of anthropocentrism...............................................................................................3The Problem of Global Life Support Systems.............................................................................5The Problem of Slippery Slopes..................................................................................................6

Meanings and Usages of Related Words.........................................................................................8The Earth’s Spheres.....................................................................................................................9

Contextual Redefinition of the Anthroposphere............................................................................12Old Definition of Anthroposphere.............................................................................................14Redefinition of Artifact..............................................................................................................15Redefinition of Technosphere....................................................................................................15Redefinition of Noösphere.........................................................................................................16Definition Of Biospheric Environment.....................................................................................16Redefinition of Biosphere..........................................................................................................17New Definition of Phenosphere.................................................................................................17

Phenosphere, Example #1......................................................................................................19Phenosphere, Example #2......................................................................................................20Phenosphere, Example #3......................................................................................................22

Redefinition of Anthroposphere................................................................................................23Putting it all Into Context..........................................................................................................26

Table of Contents

ANNEX A – Online Descriptions of Selected Words...................................................................28Atmosphere................................................................................................................................28Tropopause................................................................................................................................29Troposphere...............................................................................................................................30Planetary Boundary Layer.........................................................................................................30Biosphere...................................................................................................................................31Anthroposphere..........................................................................................................................31Noösphere..................................................................................................................................31Hydrosphere...............................................................................................................................31Pedosphere.................................................................................................................................32Lithosphere................................................................................................................................33Anthropocene.............................................................................................................................34Anthropogenic...........................................................................................................................35Biodiversity................................................................................................................................35Technodiversity.........................................................................................................................35Ecosystem..................................................................................................................................35Novel Ecosystem.......................................................................................................................37Biome.........................................................................................................................................39Anthrome...................................................................................................................................41Phenosphere...............................................................................................................................42Artifact.......................................................................................................................................42Environment..............................................................................................................................42

References - Online.......................................................................................................................44References – Other........................................................................................................................44

Table of Contents

Orrery Software 1 Contextual Redefinition of the Anthroposphere


IntroductionThis article is the first of a planned series of four articles intended to discuss the flow of energy through an economy, as part of a larger study of sustainability. The goal of this paper is to provide a contextual definition of the word ‘anthroposphere’ to be used in the follow-on articles.

The approach will be: To identify the need for a clear definition; To examine current definitions and usages of the word, and related words; and To provide a contextual definition of anthroposphere as an instance of a

phenosphere.

Why Redefine ‘Anthroposphere’?In brief, the argument goes like this: An economic externality exists when the costs of an economic action are born

by someone other than the actors who receive the benefits. Such externalities add to the widening gap between the wealth of the very poor and the very rich. Ecological economic externalities are those for which not just members of society, but the biosphere as a whole, pays the cost, while a small number of economic actors receive the benefits, in the form of financial profits. Ecological economic externalities lead to the rampant destruction of the life support systems of the biosphere for the short-term benefit of humankind.

The dominant modern economic theories are fundamentally and dangerously anthropocentric. Most of nature is treated as a source of unlimited free resources, for which the only purpose is extraction and consumption by humankind. Those heterodox branches of economic theory that are interested in deep long-term ecological and social sustainability denounce this anthropocentric style of economic theory, but, at the same time easily slip back down the slippery slope into some form of dangerous anthropocentrism.

For the purposes of this series of papers, in which we plan to explore some aspects of the energetics of a modern society from the perspective of sustainable economics, it is proposed that a definition of the anthroposphere in a larger non-anthropocentric context will provide the needed perspective.


The Problem of ExternalitiesAn economic externality, usually just called an externality, is a cost of production that is not paid by the producer, and therefore not included in the market price of the product.

Suppose a mining company pays employees a very low wage, and the working conditions are unhealthy. The cost of the labor is included in the metal sold. But suppose those employees then suffer bad health due to the working conditions and need medical help, for which the employee, or an insurance company or society at large must pay. Some of the costs of production are then paid by society. We might say that such an externality involves damage to the health of its employees, of which the cost of restoration is not included in the price of the product.

We can extend that concept to include damage to the environment about us. An ecological economic externality is an economic externality which involves damage to an ecosystem, of which the cost of restoration is not included in the price of the product.

Neoclassical economic (NCE) theory has historically viewed all natural resources as free and unlimited inputs. Under NCE theory, the cost of extraction of resources usually includes expenses for license fees, labor and capital equipment, but the resource itself is considered to be free. What’s more, the costs of restoration of the environment and waste disposal were also free, or very low, because is was assumed that the restorative forces of nature would take care of that. The market value of the resources extracted usually greatly exceeded the total cost of extraction. This is true both from a financial perspective, and from a biophysical perspective. The financial argument is fairly obvious. You spend a little money and you reap a lot of money. The biophysical argument is essentially the same for energy and mass. You spend a little energy and you reap a lot of energy. You spend a little mass (e.g. wear and tear on equipment) and you reap a lot of mass.

The extraction of resources benefits producers and buyers and society as a whole, fuelling a growth economy and enabling all of the benefits of the modern world. Resources that are very useful and very plentiful have low prices. NCE theorists would say this is right and good. But, this results in the creation of ecological economic externalities in two ways.

First, consider the impact on a third type of stakeholder that may have been receiving some stream of benefits prior to the extraction of this resource. During


the extraction ecosystems are damaged. This damage reduces the stream of benefits to the third party; benefits for which no payment was made, and which may have not even been monetized. When such costs of extraction of resources are externalized to a third party, the profit to the extractor can be increased, and the benefit passed on to the buyer can be increased. The third party stakeholder pays the price indirectly, for example, through increased costs of health care, through loss of livelihood, or reduced quality of life. From a purely anthropocentric point of view, this is an issue of intra-generational social justice. But if we step out of that narrow point of view and see it from the perspective of other species, this is an issue of inter-species justice.

But a second serious difficulty arises, for example, if the resource is or is caused to become non-renewable. Suppose a natural resource endowment is plentiful, and cheap, and society comes to depend on a constant flow of benefits and growth ensues. When the endowment is depleted, then the stream of benefits ceases to flow for all extractors and all buyers in not just this generation, but all future generations. If those benefits have become critical to the ongoing sustainability of society, then later generations are deprived of the social benefits due to the carefree and selfish exploitation of the resource by the earlier generations. This becomes not just an issue of inter-generational social justice, but a serious question of long term sustainability. This is especially so if the depleted endowment involves food (ingestible energy) such as a collapsed fishery, or a depleted fossil fuel deposit (non-ingestible energy) such as oil, gas and coal deposits.

The problem of anthropocentrismThere are several branches of heterodox economic theory that appear to be making a serious attempt to put economic theory on a more sound scientific basis. Among these are: Ecological Economics (EE) – based on the work of Herman Daly; and Biophysical Economics (BE) – based on the work of H. T. Odum.

It seems that each of these groups of economic rebels formed in response to a disagreement with particular tenets of the orthodox branch of economic theory referred to as neo-classical economics (NCE).

In the case of EE, Herman Daly, an economist, emphasized, for example, that stocks and flows of mass and energy are as important as stocks and flows of money. In addition, he also argued that economic growth cannot continue forever. His views have been captured in a text book co-authored with Josh Farley. (xxxx, Daly & Farley).


In the case of BE, the biologist H.T. Odum studied the stocks and flows of mass and energy in a large number of ecosystems. He also postulated that the insights gained there were directly applicable to human economic systems. This view was further developed by his student C.A.S. Hall who undertook extensive studies of the energetics of human societies. The views of H. T. Odum have been captured in a collection of essays edited and published by C. A. S. Hall. (1995, Hall, Ed.)

While EE and BE have substantially different intellectual roots and somewhat different histories of development, they share a common biophysical understanding of the nature of human economic systems. They both agree that a real economy is a biophysical system, constrained by the same laws that constrain physical, chemical and biological systems, and shaped and formed by the same phenomena that control the development of such systems.

In November of 2013 I had opportunity to attend the joint conference of EE and BE economists, which was organized in recognition of their shared views. What became apparent at that conference was a significant difference in practice that was a source of great contention, and that contention arose from the ‘costing of ecosystem services’ and the practice of internalizing things that were formerly ecological economic externalities.

At that conference, while sitting at table with BE practitioners over coffee breaks, I heard these opinions. They mentioned that, in the 1960s a group of heterodox economists collectively referred to as environmental economists attacked the problem of costing these ecological externalities. This practice eventually morphed into the present-day techniques called ‘costing ecosystem services’ and was carried into the ranks of the EE practitioners. These BE gurus believed that many young well-intentioned economists – conservation-minded, but trained in the anthropocentric mind set of NCE – were now unintentionally and slowly taking EE back into the orthodox fold. The BE gurus saw this as a very bad thing, and the EE gurus with whom they were talking did not disagree!

There is a serious dilemma here. I do not want to argue that costing ecosystem services is a bad thing. It can only be right that all of the costs of production are included in the price of the product. But I also see that every time an ecosystem service is costed, and included in a product price, the defining edges of the economy are extended to include yet another part of the formerly wild biosphere. We are on a slippery slope to extinction.


If we consider the anthroposphere to be that portion of the biosphere that is under the control of humankind, then we see that the anthroposphere is in the process of absorbing virtually all of the biosphere. How is it possible to define a non-anthropocentric economic theory when the anthroposphere appears to be about to encompass the whole of which it has been, until now, only a part?

The Problem of Global Life Support SystemsHumanity evolved as one species among an estimated 1.5 million contemporary species. We not only share the same DNA coding schema, the same proteins and the same amino acids as all of the other species, we must also ingest those other species as food. We evolved as a part of the Earth’s trophic web, in which are omnivores and top predators, and we are 100% dependent on it to live. Our continued existence depends on a wide range of species located throughout the tropic web, from the bacteria in the soil that fix nitrogen, to the worms that aerate the soil, to the great variety of plants and animals that we use for food, clothes and housing, all the way back down to those organisms that consume our wastes.

But the biosphere of the Earth can be said to be more than the sum of its parts. The biosphere in which our species evolved and of which our species is an integral part has developed along a relatively stable path for the past 65 million years. It is a global self-regulating system in which the environment has evolved along with the biota that live within it. For example, after 65 million years of evolution: It has found a delicate balance between those organisms that consume oxygen

and produce carbon dioxide (respiring plants and animals), and those organisms that consume carbon dioxide and release oxygen (photosynthetic plants). The cellular life functions (i.e. the chemical pathways within the bodies and cells that are needed for life to continue) of most land-based organisms are tuned to the current mixture of nitrogen, oxygen and carbon dioxide found in the air.

It has maintained an average global temperature just above the freezing temperature of water. The biological functions, the chemical pathways, within our bodies are each optimally effective each at its own specific temperature. Of course, the surface temperatures on land have seasonal variations, and those species that are subject to such variations have either evolved the ability to keep body temperatures constant, or have evolved alternate chemical pathways for key life functions that work over the range of seasonal temperatures. But the oceans have been maintained at such a constant temperature for many millions of years that most plentiful oceanic biota have not developed such alternate chemical pathways, and cannot now live in water that is too cool, or too warm.


However, the biosphere cannot be considered robust in those time frames and those scales that interest humanity. Its ability to absorb our wastes at the necessary rate has been overwhelmed. It cannot process our wastes either at the speed or in the volume required to support our current and rising population. Its ability to control global temperatures has been compromised so badly that we are facing a potentially radical and rapid climate change, along with the extirpation of much of life now in the ocean. Humankind is just starting to understand this biosphere, this life sustaining self-regulating system, just as it is starting to fail under the onslaught of our relentlessly growing global population, society and economy.

In short, the biosphere is a very complex, finely tuned and little understood system of which humanity is but a part. Humanity’s single-minded focus on the financial economics of our part of the biosphere, and our unprecedented success in growing our once small economy to become a globe encircling system, has put us the dangerous position that we are destroying the life support systems of the world that we so assuredly need for our continued survival, and of which we understand so little.

The Problem of Slippery Slopes In the practice of project management the concepts of ‘scope of influence’ and ‘scope of control’ are important to understand. ‘Scope creep’ refers to the tendency for the mandate of a project to grow incrementally as time passes. Scope creep is probably the most common cause of project failure, and it usually creeps because the distinction between influence and control is poorly understood and poorly managed. The common meaning of anthroposphere (see Annex A) implies it to be analogous to the scope of control of humanity. Certainly, especially in recent history, humankind has been able to control most of the biosphere and influence virtually all of it. However, experienced project managers know that the duo of influence and control are not a binary pair, but, rather, the two ends of a continuum of influence. When does increased influence start to morph into control? When does weakening control morph into mere influence?

This is an example of a logical and ethical problem colloquially called ‘the slippery slope’. Slippery slopes may be of an ethical, legal or practical nature. The slope referred to is a continuum of actions that range from ethically or pragmatically bad at one end (the bottom of the slope) to ethically or pragmatically acceptable at the other end (the top of the slope). Reality demands that we all live at some optimally practical location in the middle of this continuum, so we draw a somewhat arbitrary line perpendicular to the slope, and all agree that actions on one side of the line are ethically unacceptable, or even illegal, and actions on the other side of


the line are ethically acceptable, legal, or even moral. For those people who live a distance (ethically speaking) from the line, it is easy to decide if they are bad or good. But for those who live close to the line, a precise description of the line is needed, and judges make a good living, as do lawyers, arguing just where the line is actually located. The problem is this: Penalties for stepping over the line must be harsh if they are to be effective

deterrents; but Many people are forced to live close to the line due to the pressures of survival

in a push-and-shove society often, and they accidentally or intentionally, step over the line, just a little; and

As the majority of society regularly step over the line, however incrementally, from time to time, the common definition of right and wrong shifts in the direction of making small transgressions more and more acceptable, and jurisprudence shifts in the same direction.

So, over time, the location of the line slips down the slope, and what used to be considered unethical becomes ethical, and what was to be avoided becomes acceptable, or even desired.

What does this mean for us in ecological terms? We may all appreciate the need for wild spaces in our cities, but when one more parcel of urban forest must be cleared to build a much needed school, we make the hard decision, clear the land and build the school, for the sake of our children’s future. The line that defines the anthroposphere slips a small incremental step down the slippery slope to human extirpation, as yet another urban forest is extirpated.

Professional project managers and engineers of complex systems are well aware of the slippery slope and have developed reasonably effective tools to prevent that slippage. When legitimate activities within the scope of control of a project appear to control concomitant changes outside of the scope of control, it is natural to consider those things to be also within the scope of control, and so, the scope of control creeps outwards. The perennial problem is this: the incremental inclusion of each such thing at the edges of the scope of control of the project causes an increase in project complexity hugely out of proportion to the size of the marginal scope change, or the size of the marginal costs and benefits to be realized. A small potential benefit must be compared to a large increase in the probability of total failure. To combat this, the project manager must refuse to allow such scope creep, and, usually, this means acting like a bit of an asshole, denying the client apparently easy potential benefits at apparently small cost. Nevertheless, to truly manage the problem of scope creep, a project manager must draw a line in the sand and say, this is under my control, and on this side of the line I am king, and my


scope of control will not change without my agreement. And just so, the techniques of configuration management and scope management were born.

Similarly, to understand the nature of our influence on the remnants of our once vibrant wild biosphere, we need to draw that line in the sand, for the sake of the biosphere, and maintain acute awareness of its implications in every decision we make. That line in the sand is the edge of the anthroposphere. We are at that point in our history where every small expansion of the anthroposphere greatly increases the probability of failure of this project in which we are the de facto managers. We must stop the slide down the slippery slope to extinction. We have ‘creeped’ the biosphere to near extermination and it must stop. Every time we extend our scope of control at this point we make failure all the more certain.

My point is not that we should cease to influence or care about the portion of the biosphere outside of the scope of control, outside of the anthroposphere, which is just and simply defined by that arbitrary line drawn in the sand. My point is that drawing such an arbitrary line, and then defending it as if it is a fortress wall, is the best, most effective and time-tested means of stopping scope creep, of ensuring that a project has a chance of success, of stopping the slide down the proverbial slippery slope. I have saved many projects from failure by being that asshole standing at the edge of an arbitrary (and apparently silly) line in the sand and arguing like a fool that it cannot be erased and redrawn, because we would all regret it if we did.

Meanings and Usages of Related WordsPrior to undertaking the redefinition of ‘anthroposphere’, a brief review of relevant words and their common modern meanings is in order. Annex A is a lexicon of relevant words and phrases, along with contextual descriptions of commonly understood meanings, all drawn from a modern dynamic lexical engine – Wikipedia. It is recommended that the Annex be reviewed prior to continued reading of this article, unless the reader is very familiar with the selected words in the lexicon.

The studies of geology, Earth sciences, and ecosystem sciences, from whence many of these words arise, are evolving sciences. Many older printed dictionaries do not reflect current usage of words from these branches of science, and or may not contain a given word at all. The arrival of the internet has made the publication of printed dictionaries a less profitable business, so good up-to-date printed dictionaries are less available. On the other hand, Wikipedia has extended


descriptions of key technical words at the beginning of related articles. These descriptions would seem to be the best, most up-to-date contextual definitions available. For this reason, Wikipedia is the exclusive sources of definitions for the lexicon at Annex A.

The word ‘anthroposphere’ (the domain of humankind) has appeared in technical writings recently, as have other words such as ‘anthropocene’ (the era of humankind) and ‘anthropogenic’ (the products of humankind). The appearance of these words in recent years is, I believe, indicative of the rising interest and concern expressed by many in the immense detrimental impact humankind is having on the biosphere. While not explicitly described as such, the anthroposphere is most often used in opposition to the concept of the biosphere. Humankind are seen as apart from the biosphere and protecting it, or nurturing it, as if it were a garden, or as attacking it as if it were an enemy, or consuming it as if it were a meal. This is the perspective I refer to as anthropocentrism. This perspective infuses virtually all of the words used in discussions of sustainability.

The Earth’s SpheresIn the field of study called Earth Sciences it is recognized that a number of spherical shells of differing types can be identified associated with the spherical shape of the Earth. These are called the Earth’s spheres. The full list, as obtained from Wikipedia, provides an excellent entry to start contextualizing ‘anthroposphere’.

Earth's spheres - The Earth's spheres are the many "spheres" into which the planet Earth is divided. The four most often recognized are the atmosphere, the biosphere, the hydrosphere and the geosphere. As a whole, the system is sometimes referred to as an ecosphere. Listed roughly from outermost to innermost the named spheres of the Earth are:

MagnetosphereAtmosphere [W], the gases that surround the Earth (its air)

By altitude – Exosphere, Exobase, Ionosphere, Thermopause, Thermosphere, Mesopause, Mesosphere, Stratopause, Stratosphere, Ozone layer, Tropopause [W], Troposphere [W], Planetary boundary layer [W]By air turbulence – Heterosphere, Turbopause, Homosphere

Biosphere, all life on EarthAnthroposphere [W]

Noösphere (rare) [W]


Hydrosphere [W] (all water [near] the surface of Earth)Cryosphere (sometimes)

Pedosphere [W]Geosphere [W]

Lithosphere [W]Crust (geology)

AsthenosphereMesosphereEarth's mantleEarth's core

Outer coreInner core

It is useful to examine modern descriptions of these somewhat technical terms. In Annex A a number of definitions and descriptions have been excerpted from online sources and are preserved there, to facilitate access, but also to fix the wording on sometimes volatile Wikipedia descriptions. In particular, words here and throughout this document marked with a ‘W’ in square brackets were accessed in Wikipedia, and an edited version of the text placed in Annex A. As such, they represent a snapshot in time for a dynamic collection of words and phrases.

Figure 1 is a schematic diagram that shows the relationship between the troposphere, the planetary boundary layer, and the lithosphere. The planetary boundary layer is the relatively thin shell, varying from time to time, and from place to place, between 200 m and 2,000 m in depth, in which turbulent weather happens. Turbulence is due to

Figure 1 – The Anthroposphere is concentrated at the bottom of the planetary boundary layer.


drag when winds come into contact with land or water. Above the planetary boundary layer much less turbulent wind flows dominate. As a rule of thumb, you could say that the lowest clouds tend to rest on the top of the planetary boundary layer.

Much of the detail of the structure of the troposphere is dynamic but relatively stable. Hot air rises at the equator, spreads, then cools and falls in a massive convection current called the Hedley cell. This in fact is a torus that encircles the globe. The falling air at the northern (leftmost) edge of the Hedley cell drags down air from the southern (rightmost) edge of the Ferrel cell, driving it like a water wheel, and it in turn drives the polar cell. The Southern hemisphere has an identical set of three tori. Between the tori, near the tropopause, are the jet streams that mark the boundaries, travelling parallel to the winds in the cells, and reaching speeds of up to 160 km/hour. The scale of this diagram is misleading. The Hedley cell might be as much as 17 km tall, but has a width in the north-south dimension of approximately 3,000 km.

The planetary boundary layer is where we humankind live out much of our existence.

The structure of the hydrosphere and lithosphere cannot be easily shown in cross-section, and so are shown as the combined blue and brown area to the bottom of Figure 1. But it is important to understand how the atmosphere, lithosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere and pedosphere are spatially connected. For this we turn to Figure 2.

Figure 2 shows atmosphere and lithosphere as separate – for the most part, the lithosphere being below and the atmosphere above. Certainly, there is some air below the upper surface of the lithosphere, in caves and caverns, and in cracks in rocks, but they are largely separate. As such, it is right to think of each of these as integral and distinct shells. This is not entirely the case with the hydrosphere. Some of the hydrosphere is dissolved in or mixed with the troposphere in the form of water vapor or liquid or ice precipitates. Some is between the atmosphere and the lithosphere in the form of streams, rivers, lakes, seas and oceans. Some is mixed into the lithosphere in the form of groundwater aquifers, or in cracks in rocks, or even, for example, in some granites, as moisture between the crystals in the solid rock. For practical purposes, we can assume that the hydrosphere is limited above by the tropopause, and limited below by the upper edge of the mantle. So the hydrosphere is not a distinct shell, but substantially overlaps both the atmosphere and the lithosphere.


The pedosphere is where soil is formed. It is closely associated with the interface between the lithosphere, which provides the basic raw material for soil formation, and the atmosphere and the hydrosphere, which provide the physical processes and chemical solvents for soil formation. Water dissolves minerals, weakening the structure of rocks. Ice cracks rocks. Weather provides changes in temperature and regular doses of water to enable such action. Variations in the surface of the lithosphere cause water to run off in streams and rivers, and so erode deposits of soil and move them about.

Contextual Redefinition of the AnthroposphereThere are fundamentally two different reasons for making a definition, and each has a different process associated, peculiar to that reason. The purpose of most dictionaries is to succinctly summarize current usage in a way that both clarifies

Figure 2 – The five physical Earth’s spheres most closely associated with the anthroposphere are connected to each other in a complex spatial relationship.


and standardizes usage of a word, while, at the same time, tracking changes in usage over time. Most dictionaries publish brief statements of meaning. Some dictionaries publish carefully selected and dated examples of usage, and so define a word implicitly. The material from Wikipedia contained in Annex A might be considered descriptions of meanings, and so are not truly definitions, but they might be considered carefully constructed examples. As such, they fall into this broad category of definition.

However, sometimes a word must be given a limited or restricted meaning within a certain context. This approach is common in legislation, and in legal documents such as contracts, in which terms are defined for use within that document. Or, in a highly technical field of study in which nuanced concepts are discussed, often jargon that has special meaning is developed. Such concepts are not commonly discussed outside of the field, and therefore not widely used, and so do not appear in common dictionaries. It is in this spirit that I believe a new definition of ‘anthroposphere’ must be fabricated and used in discussions of sustainable economics.

So, in this part of the article I take up the task of creating a definition of ‘anthroposphere’ that is practical, contextualized, and detailed. But, to what purpose? Humankind and our global economies are currently expanding the anthroposphere at high speed and reshaping or consuming the rest of the biosphere in the process. If this is not halted and reversed, the ultimate end is guaranteed to be social collapse. Unfortunately for the rest of the biosphere, we are poised to take many of the species with whom we share this planet with us in a massive concurrent ecological collapse. Both types of collapse are worthy of effort to be avoided.

Humankind must take up a global multi-generational project to learn how to live sustainably on this planet. Call it the ‘Sustainability Project”. The scope of influence of this project is, I suppose, everything from the exosphere down to the core of the Earth. The scope of control of this project is, by definition, the anthroposphere. The scope of control of a project is something that is determined not by common general usage, but, rather, by consensus agreement between the stakeholders, written into a contract, and amended only with careful deliberation.

But, perhaps that is too expansive a purpose for this small series of articles. A less expansive project is the ‘Layered Societies’ project, in which I will discuss the energetics of a modern but stable and sustainable society in a few articles. But,


again, the scope of the project will be the anthroposphere, as herein defined, and the intent is that this definition would be conceptually the same for both projects.

To be practical this definition must pass certain tests: Problem of anthropocentrism – the anthroposphere must be viewed as just one

of many sub-spheres of the biosphere, each legitimately competing for the Earth’s common resources. This will require a more specific definition of ‘biosphere’, to be congruent. This paradigm shift away from anthropocentrism has three important aspects: Problem of Externalities – the idea that all of the anthroposphere’s economic

externalities can be monetized must be discarded and thereafter avoided. Some biophysical phenomena have importance at the level of the biosphere that far surpasses the importance to a single species. They must not be defined as yet-to-be-understood extensions of the anthroposphere.

Problem of global life support systems – The global life support systems that exist in the biosphere outside of the anthroposphere should not be implicitly defined as the residual that’s left after the anthroposphere is removed. These life support systems must be viewed as of supreme importance, above the importance of mere anthropocentric concerns.

Problem of slippery slopes – A very clear line, however arbitrary, must be drawn across that slippery slope that leads back to anthropocentrism, and every practical, moral and legal means that our global society can muster must be used to defend that arbitrary line.

Old Definition of Anthropospherehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthroposphere The definition of ‘anthroposphere’ as found in Wikipedia is in Annex A for completeness sake. I repeat it here for easy reference.

The anthroposphere (sometimes also referred as technosphere) is that part of the environment that is made or modified by humans for use in human activities and human habitats. It is one of the Earth's spheres. As human technology becomes more evolved, so do the impacts of human activities on the environment. Examples: deforestation for housing, land setup, etc.

I have some difficulty with this concept ‘anthroposphere’ as described, but, at the same time I see it as a necessary concept to develop. With the intent of having clear and consistent definitions for the constellation of words associated with the

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthroposphere


anthroposphere, in this section I redefine the words artifact, technosphere, noösphere, environment, biosphere, phenosphere, and, finally, anthroposphere.

Redefinition of ArtifactThe word artefact [W] is currently used mostly in the context of archeology, but is used in other fields of study as well. I means an object or effect made intentionally or accidentally by people.

Proposed redefinition – artifact of a named species – a physical object, effect or alteration to the biophysical environment form as the result of an action or process undertaken by a member of the named species. Artifacts include, but are not limited to, all of the creations, manufactures, or changes in the local environment that any member of the named species produces, whether temporary phenomena, such as emanations of sound and light, or of a more permanent nature, such as may be carved in, fixed in, or converted to stone.

Explanation – The existing definition of ‘artifact’ is ‘a man-made object’. It is often used in an anthropocentric fashion, placing natural products in opposition to man-made artifacts, as if all man-made products are artificial, unnatural, and not real, in some sense. On the other hand, I would argue that all man-made products are as real and natural as the products of any other species, and this dichotomy or distinction is misleading, confusing, and unnecessarily anthropocentric. To the extent that we can easily recognize the artifacts of humankind from the artifacts of other species, that distinction is valid. But, for example, when comparing the artifacts of humankind and the artifacts of, say, rabbit-kind, there is absolutely nothing less natural about the artifacts of humankind. They may be more potent, more toxic, or more clever, and so distinguishable, but they are not less natural. The same natural biophysical processes that acted to evolve all species have acted, and are acting, to control our evolution, in our past and now. Those processes shape not just the genome, but also the phenosphere, to be defined below, which includes all of our artifacts and practices.

Redefinition of TechnosphereTwo different descriptions of the meaning of ‘technosphere’ [W] are included in Annex A. In one instance, it is equated with ‘anthroposphere’. In the other instance, it is described in relation to a ‘novel ecosystem’ [W]. In both cases, the concept is anthropocentric. I would like to redefine it in more general terms.

Proposed redefinition – technosphere of a named species – the aggregate of all physical artifacts made by any and all members of the named species.


Explanation – every species has a technosphere. It includes, but is not limited to, dens, trails, manufactures, tools, art works, temporarily repurposed objects or substances, body exudations, emanations and excretions, and persistent or contemporaneous bodily remains. The technosphere of a species can be viewed as the aggregate of all material removed from the environment, made from the environment, inserted back into the environment, and the physical marks left in the environment made by actions taken.

The technosphere of some species will be extremely rudimentary, but will still nevertheless exist.

Redefinition of NoösphereThe word ‘noösphere’ [W] is not commonly used, but generally means the knowledge of humankind. This is clearly an anthropocentric meaning, but can and should be expanded to be generally applicable to any and all species.

Proposed redefinition – noösphere of a named species – the aggregate of all instinctual and learned practices of the named species.

Explanation – Every species has a noösphere. These include but are not limited to practices associated with mating, seeking food, hiding from predators, resisting parasites, making dens or homes, and all processes that are associated with creating artifacts that are part of the technosphere of the species. Knowledge is a non-physical concept. But knowledge as written books (artifacts) and as read (a practice) falls within the definitions of technosphere and noösphere.

The noösphere of some species will be extremely rudimentary, but will still nevertheless exist.

Definition Of Biospheric EnvironmentThis definition may be unnecessary, as it may not add a lot, but I put it here for now as a clarification. In this series of papers, the word environment will usually be taken to mean the ‘biospheric environment’. This is slightly different from each of the two meanings identified in Annex A: in terms of one organism or one population of organisms (biophysical environment [W]), or in terms of the planet as a whole (global environment [W]).

Proposed definition – biospheric environment – the aggregate of all portions of the Earth’s spheres that are currently in contact with living organisms and dynamically


interacting and/or co-evolving with them, including portions of the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, the lithosphere, and the pedosphere. It can be viewed as the union of the biophysical environments of all contemporary organisms living on the Earth.

Explanation – This coincides with a common meaning of the word ‘environment’ [W] in most instances, but is meant to highlight the dynamic aspects, and at the same time exclude some aspects of a broader interpretation of the word. In this definition, for example, the exosphere and the Earth’s core are not part of the environment, but intrusions from either sphere might be. However, biospherical environment as here defined is more expansive or all inclusive than biophysical environment. The biospheric environment then becomes an active agent and participant in the biophysical economies of the Earth.

The biospheric environment is equivalent to the union of the technospheres of all living organisms.

Redefinition of BiosphereThe word ‘biosphere’ [W] was first coined in the 1800s and has been widely used for more than a century. It’s meaning has evolved over that time from ‘all organisms’ to ‘all ecosystems’, as indicated in the excerpt from Wikipedia in Annex A.

Proposed definition – Earth’s biosphere – the aggregate of: the bodies of all contemporaneous living organisms on the Earth, plus the technospheres of all living organisms; plus the noöspheres of all living organisms.

Explanation – This explicit inclusion of the biosopheric environment in the definition of the biosphere, while excluding non-effective portions of the Earth’s spheres, brings it into alignment with the concepts implied in anthroposphere. The biosphere explicitly has biological components, technological components, and behavioral components.

New Definition of PhenosphereThe current usage of the word phenosphere [W] is very rare, very technical and has little association with the present topic. It has some usage in chromatography, in cybernetics, and in mathematics. I hereby propose an additional definition.

Proposed new definition – phenosphere of a named species – that portion of the environment that is within the scope of control of the named species, and includes


the sum of all organisms of that named species, the technosphere of the species, the noösphere of the species, as well as all organisms under the control of the organisms in that named species.

Explanation – In this case the word ‘sphere’ is not meant to imply a spherical shell about the centre of the Earth, but, rather, a sphere of control, outside of which control is diluted, and inside of which control is concentrated. The processes of evolution act on the phenotype of a species. The phenotype in interaction with the biophysical environment shapes the phenosphere. As a species evolves, the phenotype evolves in interaction with the dynamically changing biophysical environment, and a key component of that dynamically changing biophysical environment is the array of other species found therein. The phenosphere evolves in dynamic interaction with the phenosphere of all species that are predators, prey, parasites, commensals, and competitors for resources of the named species in all of its geographic ranges. But not all members of those species are in the phenosphere of the named species, since some are not under control.

Phenosphere – The Scope of Control of a Named SpeciesIncluded in the phenosphere of a

named speciesExcluded from the phenosphere of a

named speciesOrganisms that are members of the Organisms that are competitors of

Figure 3 – The biosphere overlaps the atmosphere, lithosphere and hydrosphere in space. A phenosphere is a part of the biosphere, exerting some control on other phenospheres, but also controlled by and controlling some aspects of the Earth’s spheres. Arrows indicate control.


named species members of the named species Plus all artifacts – such as burrows,

trails, tools, wastes Plus all practices – such as mating

practices, feeding practices, defensive practices, nesting practices

Organisms that are prey of, or hosts to, members of the named species

Organisms that are competitors of, or predators of, or that parasitize, members of the named species

Organisms that are under direct control of members of the named species, such as livestock, pets, or industrialized organisms Plus artifacts and practices of the

controlled organisms

Phenosphere, Example #1The phenosphere of the mollusk Oliva Porphyria, a carnivorous mollusk, consists of all members of the species at all stages of life (eggs, larvae, adults), and all of their artifacts, and practices.

Technosphere of O. Porphyria – Artifacts include tracks, feces, the shells of dead O. Porphyria, and the remains (shells) of those other mollusks and organisms killed by O. Porphyria but not digested.

Noösphere of O. Porphyria – Practices include diurnal cycles of activity, resting/hiding under the mud with its protruding syphon, mating practices, and prey capture practices. Prey capture involves forming a balloon-like pocket with its foot, engulfing the prey, and smothering it with mucus, prior to slicing it up with its saw-like mouthparts.

I am not aware that O. Porphyria has control over the entirety of any species. It has momentary control over its prey, when captured.

Discussion: In deciding what to include in the phenosphere, there is an arbitrary line that separates scope of influence from scope of control. I include the tracks made by the organisms, however temporary they may be, as the action of a member of O. Porphyria directly caused this change. Similarly, a member of O.


Porphyria made its own shell, and directly caused the death of other organisms and left the refuse behind. The shells of the prey of O. Porphyria then form a part of two phenospheres – that of the predator species, and that of the prey species, and it is clear that phenospheres can and do overlap. There are also a number of species that prey upon or parasitize O. Porphyria which are not included in the phenosphere of O. Porphyria. They are within the scope of influence, but not within the scope of control.

Over time, there is an arms race, or Red Queen Effect, as the ability of O. Porphyria to capture prey evolves, and the abilities of prey species to avoid or escape capture evolves. Similarly, those species that prey upon or parasitize O. Porphyria are also co-evolving. These species all influence each other in different ways over different time scales. On a short time scale, for example, O. Porphyria may extirpate prey species in a given locale. On a longer time scale, a prey species might evolve to a larger adult size, making it a competitor, or even predator, of O. Porphyria, and so ultimately extirpate O. Porphyria in that locale. In general, genomes evolve, phenotypes evolve, and phenospheres evolve.

Phenosphere, Example #2The phenosphere of the ant Atta Cephalotes, a leaf-cutter ant, consists of all members of the species at all stages of life (eggs, larvae, pupae, adults) and in all of its forms (queens, drones, majors, mediae, minors and minims), and all of their artifacts, their practices, and controlled members of other species.

Technosphere of A. Cephalotes – Artifacts include the colonies (central mound and radial sub-mounds), and inter-colonial tunnels and tracks, fungal gardens, refuse heaps for spent and discarded material from the fungal gardens, dirt and plants that form the harvesting trails, damaged and denuded trees, bodily secretions such as pheromones (used to mark trails, etc.), and glandular outputs (used for fungicidal cleansing of leaves).

Noösphere of A. Cephalotes – The instinctual or learned practices of A. Cephalotes are quite sophisticated. Standard tasks are divided among the forms of ants (the castes) within a colony, but are also varied by age and by need. Details of these divisions of labor can be read in the references. But, some practices are outstanding. For example:


leaves are harvested, fed to fungi in gardens within their mounds, and the fungi are harvested for food for the larval ants;

once a tree is marked for harvest, they may choose to strip it of all leaves, in analogy to clear-cut forestry;

minims usually manage the gardens and larval young, but also ride on the massive heads of the majors, acting as guardians, warding off tiny parasitic flies;

aged ants are reassigned from standard duties to maintaining the refuse pile, which is a source of parasites and contagion. These workers tend to not be very healthy once they take up this work, and are generally excluded from the healthy part of the colony.

A. Cephalotes lives in important mutual symbiotic relationships with two other species of organism, and the affected members of these species are considered controlled organisms within the phenosphere of A. Cephalotes. Each species of leaf-cutter ant has its own species of fungus from the Lepiotaceae family that it uses in its gardens. The queen carries a sample of the fungus in her mouth when she goes to start a new colony. The ants secrete enzymes that can stimulate or suppress the growth of the fungi. The relations between ant and fungus are obligate. They need each other to survive. But, also, the ant’s metapleural glands are home to actinobacteria of the genus pseudonocardia, a type of bacterium that produces toxins fatal to molds that attack the fungi in the gardens.

Phenosphere, Example #3The phenosphere of the hominid Homo Sapiens, a great ape, consists of all members of the species, and all of their artifacts, their practices, and any controlled organisms.

The technosphere – All artifacts of H. Sapiens, which include but are not limited to houses, towns, cities, clothes, tools, machines, farms, buildings,

Figure 6 – The phenosphere of H. Sapiens is the most complex. Learned practices have supplanted many instinctual practices, and the


trails, roads, refuse, environmental alterations, cultural performances, and economic inventions.

The noösphere – All the instinctual or learned practices of H. Sapiens, which include but are not limited to mating and social practices, religious practices, educational practices, recreational practices, political practices, and economic practices.

H. Sapiens lives in a symbiotic relationship with many other species. For example, an adult person has about 10 trillion cells in the body, complemented by about 100 trillion bacteria of many species referred to as ‘normal flora’, most of which are necessary for the continued health of the person. On a somewhat grander scale, we are dependent on many farmed or captured species of plants and animals for our daily supply of food and liquids. The relationship is obligate for many of these species, as they cannot survive without the aid of H. Sapiens. On the grandest scale, we are dependent on the organisms that produce the oxygen we breathe. The relationship is obligate, since, without them, we would perish.

Discussion: The recording and transmission of ideas and bodies of knowledge involves artifacts in the technosphere and practices (both instinctual and learned) in the noösphere.

Redefinition of AnthroposphereThere is a great but brief article in Wikipedia entitled ‘Novel Ecosystem’ [W] in which the author brings together many ideas derived from or associated with the idea of the anthroposphere. It covers concepts such as anthropogenic biomes (anthromes), the technosphere, the noösphere, technodiversity (as opposed to biodiversity) and others. It is exceptional for its long list of references. Unfortunately, it is steeped in and continues the anthropocentric ‘man vs nature’ dichotomous perspective in which all of ecological writing seems to be trapped. Nevertheless, my concept of the anthroposphere is closely aligned to the concept found there.

Proposed redefinition – The anthroposphere is simply the phenosphere of the species H. Sapiens.

Discussion: The process of generalizing the concept of the anthroposphere is what lead to the definition of a phenosphere. Some of the logic went like this: If the anthroposphere is associated with the technosphere, then are buildings,

roads, tools and art works all included. Yes.

Figure 6 – The phenosphere of H. Sapiens is the most complex. Learned practices have supplanted many instinctual practices, and the


What about things that we make incidentally, or unintentionally, like mine scars, or oil spills? Yes.

Is the anthroposphere to be only inanimate objects and substances? No. That portion of the environment that is a necessary part of the anthroposphere must include domesticated animals such as cattle, sheep and goats, and must include research animals such as rabbits, rats and primates.

Why include people in the anthroposphere? Is it reasonable to include all of these animals and not include the poor human wage-earners who build and maintain the technosphere?

And so, the concept of anthroposphere expanded.

The anthroposphere is a subset of the biosphere, but where is the edge of it? To try to put some meaning into that ‘edge of the anthroposphere’ concept, one asks what is included, and what is excluded? This is messy, but here’s a shot at it.

In terms of organisms, all of humanity, all of our livestock, and all of those organisms that are integrally a part of our biological functions such as the micro-organisms in our gut and on our skin. I have heard that approximately 90% of all of the DNA in the human body actually belongs to this micro-ecosystem in our bodies. The same is true for all organisms in our livestock. It would also include all of the organisms and micro-organisms in our farms of all kinds, drug factories, breweries, composting facilities, or other such facilities.

Food is tricky. The anthroposphere includes, I would

Figure 7 – The anthroposphere is appropriating more and more of the biophysical environment as it expands.


think, all foods which are the products of organisms both within and without the anthroposphere once the foods have been harvested. Harvested wild animals and their products become part of the anthroposphere once harvested.

Those wild animals that could be harvested but escape should not be included. They are on the edge of our somewhat arbitrarily drawn line, just over the line, and appear to be within our scope of control, but are merely massively influenced thereby. Similarly, I think the anthroposphere would not include wild animals that live among us or in distant wilderness places; it would not include parasites that reside within us; and it would not include many organisms on which we depend for our continued lives. It also excludes unfarmed populations of fish, crabs, kelp, and other ‘sea foods’. These are organisms that, in the course of pursuing their own existence in accordance with the evolutionary imperatives, happen to perform so-called ‘ecological services’. Humankind has not planned or controlled their location or function, but benefits therefrom. It also excludes the photosynthesis-capable micro-organisms in the oceans of the world, as well as grass and trees in wild places that convert light and CO2 into O2.

I realize this is a fuzzy concept, and whether a particular organism is or is not included might be up for debate. But if we focus on humankind, its livestock, and the contents of our farms and factories – those organisms that we directly control – that catches the bulk of the organisms in the anthroposphere.

In terms of the components that are not living, the anthroposphere includes all of our roads, buildings, farms, tools, manufactured goods, art works, social systems, scientific and technical processes, cultural events, and recreational activities. I would also be inclined to classify our wastes as part of the anthroposphere.

This seems like a very reasonable scope of control for this project we call sustainability.

So. There we have it – our scope of control. What does this mean for us as project managers? The implications are in the descriptions of the slides, I think, but, to make a point, let me be, now, that asshole-of-a-fool standing on the beach, defending this line I have just drawn in the sand, as if it was a fortress wall, and arguing that we DO NOT want to redraw that line or we may all regret it. Parasites and diseases are out of scope for this project we call ‘sustainability’. As a project manager I would stop all research in this area. Our streams of waste are in scope. I would redirect all of the funds, educational resources, institutions and flows of dollars, mass and energy now being spent on those out-of-scope activities towards


research on how to effectively and efficiently rehabilitate all of our waste streams to make them useful to other phenospheres.

That would be the right decision, professionally, as a project manager, and morally and ethically, as a right-thinking member of a society that is destroying all life on Earth with our waste streams while trying to save the lives of a few more wealthy people suffering from disease. When viewed in that light, research on diseases and parasites starts to look like busy work, rearranging the chairs on the deck of the Titanic, as they say, taking our minds off of the catastrophe that is underway. Such decisions are extremely difficult, with immense moral implications, but failing to take corrective action when you know it must be done is immature, irresponsible, and arguably grossly immoral as well. Are we between Scylla and Charybdis, or is that a delusion?

Putting it all Into ContextIt is now possible, using the new definitions, to put this together. First, we can summarize some relationships in a bulleted list. The biosphere occupies a very thin shell around the Earth, having a depth of

about 30 km (deep ocean to tropopause), but most of the biosphere is concentrated on the surface of the Earth, at the bottom of the planetary boundary layer, and in the oceans.

The biosphere is co-located with the pedosphere and hydrosphere. Biosphere=∑ biomes+∑ anthromes Biome=∑ ecosystems Anthrome=∑ ecosystems+∑ novel ecosystems Biosphere=∑ ecosystems+∑ novel ecosystems Biosphere=phenospheres Phenosphere=Organisms+techno sphere+noösphere Technosphere of the species=∑ artifactsof the species Noösphere of the species=∑ instinctive∧learned practices Anthroposphere=phenosphere of H .Sapiens Technosphere of the species=∑ artifactsof the species

Does this provide insight into the problem of externalities? Potentially. Any action taken within the anthroposphere that affects another phenosphere is an ecological externality. When ecosystem services are evaluated from the point of view of the anthroposphere, it may also be possible to also evaluate them from the point of view of the significant complementary phenospheres. I believe the concept of phenospheres adds some texture, perhaps another dimension, to the concept of ecological economic externalities (eee). We might define an eee of the


first type to be one which for which the cost is paid by phenospheres which do not intersect with the anthroposphere. An eee of the second type is one for which the costs is paid by phenospheres which do intersect with the anthroposphere. An eee of the third type is one for which the cost is paid for by people. I think that, when we evaluate lost ecosystem services, we are only looking at eees of the third type.

Does this provide insight into the problem of anthropocentrism? Yes. It redefines key words and phrases in a more generalized and less anthropocentric paradigm. No really new ideas are offered, but a significant shift in perspective is enabled. Perhaps with such a shift in perspective a form of ecological economics or biophysical economics could be developed that counter-balances the attractive forces of anthropocentric neo-classical economic theory. A tremendous volume of work has been done in the study of ecosystems. I wonder to what extent some of that can be recast, usefully, as biophysical economic theory with a non-anthropocentric perspective.

Does this provide insight into the problem of global life support systems? Yes. Rather than viewing the anthroposphere and biosphere as a pair of opposites, such that a win on one side is a loss on the other, it positions the anthroposphere as a natural but dominant and out-of-control component of the biosphere. The anthropocentrism of the past comes not just from the dominance of the anthroposphere among phenospheres, but also from mere fact that we are self-serving.

Does this provide insight into the problem of the slippery slope. I think the answer to this question is highly dependent on the successful resolution of the other problems. It is also dependent on the effective definition and use of the definition of the anthroposphere.

From the point of view of a project manager, the scope of any project must be agreed-upon by all key stakeholders. Once agreed-upon, the project manager must have authority to redirect project resources away from out-of-scope activities towards in-scope activities. Thirdly, all project activities must be well-defined, achievable and coordinated.

I believe that this approach to a definition of the problem makes it possible to imagine a solution. Stakeholders acting in good faith could craft a definition of the scope of the problem and make plans to solve it using these or similar ideas.


ANNEX A – Online Descriptions of Selected WordsIn any modern discussion of the economics of biophysical systems, or of the sustainability of biophysical systems, a variety of words are commonly used. Sometimes these words have a very specific and well-understood meaning that has been stable for some time. However, often the meanings of words are changing over time, or vary from document to document. The purpose of this annex is to provide a lexicon of words with descriptions of their current meanings as of August 2014. The primary source is the Wikipedia site on the internet. The standard format for a Wikipedia article includes a summary description of the concept as a lead-in, prior to a formal table of contents. In most cases, only the lead-in description has been reproduced here. Many Wikipedia articles have citations of well-chosen references, lexical or etymological information, or historical information. In most cases, that information has been edited out before inclusion. Readers interested in such information should refer to the original articles online.

AtmosphereAt Ref 2 the atmosphere Wikipedia describes the atmosphere of the Earth as follows:

The atmosphere of Earth is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth that is retained by Earth's gravity. The atmosphere protects life on Earth by absorbing ultraviolet solar radiation, warming the surface through heat retention (greenhouse effect), and reducing temperature extremes between day and night (the diurnal temperature variation).The common name given to the atmospheric gases used in breathing and photosynthesis is air. By volume, dry air contains 78.09% nitrogen, 20.95% oxygen, 0.93% argon, 0.039% carbon dioxide, and small amounts of other gases. Air also contains a variable amount of water vapor, on average around 1%. Although air content and atmospheric pressure vary at different layers, air suitable for the survival of terrestrial plants and terrestrial animals currently is only known to be found in Earth's troposphere and artificial atmospheres.The atmosphere has a mass of about 5.15×1018 kg, three quarters of which is within about 11 km (6.8 mi; 36,000 ft) of the surface. The atmosphere becomes thinner and thinner with increasing altitude, with no definite boundary between the atmosphere and outer space. The Kármán line, at 100 km (62 mi), or 1.57% of Earth's radius, is often

Annex A – Online Definitions as of August 2014


used as the border between the atmosphere and outer space. Atmospheric effects become noticeable during atmospheric reentry of spacecraft at an altitude of around 120 km (75 mi). ...

This is a great description providing some context in a variety of ways. If the atmosphere is assumed to be 100 km in thickness, and if we shrank the Earth to the size of an NBA basketball (9 inches diameter, or 22.86 cm), then the atmosphere would form a film of thickness 1.79 mm in thickness, but the bulk of the atmosphere, at 11 km in thickness, would form a film of less thickness than 0.2 mm. Imagine dipping a basketball into a bucket of water and pulling it out. The film of water on the ball would be about the same at the film of atmosphere on our Earth.

Tropopause

At Ref xx Wikipedia provides the following description of the tropopause.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropopause

The tropopause is the boundary in the Earth's atmosphere between the troposphere and the stratosphere.

DefinitionGoing upward from the surface, it is the point where air ceases to cool with height, and becomes almost completely dry. More formally, the tropopause is the region of the atmosphere where the environmental lapse rate changes from positive, as it behaves in the troposphere, to the stratospheric negative one. [ ... ]

The tropopause as defined above renders as a first-order discontinuity surface, that is, temperature as a function of height is continuous through the tropopause, but the temperature gradient is not.

LocationThe troposphere is one of the lowest layers of the Earth's atmosphere; it is located right above the planetary boundary layer, and is the layer in which most weather phenomena take place. The troposphere extends upwards from right above the boundary layer, and ranges in height from an average of 9 km (5.6 mi; 30,000 ft) at the poles, to 17 km (11 mi; 56,000 ft) at the Equator. In the absence of inversions and not considering moisture, the temperature lapse rate for this layer is


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropopause


6.5 °C per kilometer, on average, according to the U.S. Standard Atmosphere. A measurement of both the tropospheric and the stratospheric lapse rates helps identifying the location of the tropopause, since temperature increases with height in the stratosphere, and hence the lapse rate becomes negative. The tropopause location coincides with the lowest point at which the lapse rate falls below a prescribed threshold.

TroposphereAt Ref 3 the troposphere of the Earth is described as follows:

The troposphere is the lowest portion of Earth's atmosphere. It contains approximately 80% of the atmosphere's mass and 99% of its water vapour and aerosols. The average depth of the troposphere is approximately 17 km (11 mi) in the middle latitudes. It is deeper in the tropics, up to 20 km (12 mi), and shallower near the polar regions, approximately 7 km (4.3 mi) in winter. The lowest part of the troposphere, where friction with the Earth's surface influences air flow, is the planetary boundary layer. This layer is typically a few hundred metres to 2 km (1.2 mi) deep depending on the landform and time of day. The border between the troposphere and stratosphere, called the tropopause, is a temperature inversion.

The troposphere is where weather happens. This is where 300 km wide hurricanes spin, where tornado-producing cells form, where 160 km/hour jet streams meander, where cumulonimbus clouds tower, where cold fronts and high pressure systems sweep across the land. But the planetary boundary layer at the bottom tenth of the troposphere is the part of the atmosphere in which we experience weather. Returning to the example of the basketball, the planetary boundary layer would be about 0.035 mm thick, at best, with a total volume of about 6 cc.

Planetary Boundary Layer

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_boundary_layer

The planetary boundary layer (PBL), also known as the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL), is the lowest part of the atmosphere and its behavior is directly influenced by its contact with a planetary surface. On Earth it usually responds to changes in surface radiative forcing in an hour or less. In this layer physical quantities such as flow velocity,


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_boundary_layer


temperature, moisture, etc., display rapid fluctuations (turbulence) and vertical mixing is strong. Above the PBL is the "free atmosphere" where the wind is approximately geostrophic (parallel to the isobars) while within the PBL the wind is affected by surface drag and turns across the isobars. The free atmosphere is usually non-turbulent, or only intermittently turbulent.

BiosphereAt Ref 6 Wikipedia provides this description of the biosphere.

The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. It can also be termed the zone of life on Earth, a closed system (apart from solar and cosmic radiation and heat from the interior of the Earth), and largely self-regulating. By the most general biophysiological definition, the biosphere is the global ecological system integrating all living beings and their relationships, including their interaction with the elements of the lithosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere. [...]

AnthroposphereAccording to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthroposphere ) the anthroposphere is defined as follows: The anthroposphere (sometimes also referred as technosphere) is that part

of the environment that is made or modified by humans for use in human activities and human habitats. It is one of the Earth's spheres.

As human technology becomes more evolved, so do the impacts of human activities on the environment.

Examples: deforestation for housing, land setup, etc.

This definition may be accurate, but it is not very explicit. To be useful, the concept needs to be developed in much more detail.

Noöspherehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NoosphereAt Ref x the noosphere is described as follows:

The noösphere is a concept used by Vladimir Vernadsky and Teilhard de Chardin to denote the "sphere of human thought". [ ... ]

HydrosphereAt Ref 4 Wikipedia provides this description of the hydrosphere.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noosphere

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthroposphere


The hydrosphere [...] in physical geography describes the combined mass of water found on, under, and over the surface of a planet.Igor Shiklomanov, the man selected by the United Nations to do its world inventory of water resources, estimated that there are 1386 million cubic kilometres of water on earth. This includes water in liquid and frozen forms in groundwaters, glaciers, oceans, lakes and streams. Saline water account for 97.5% of this amount. Fresh water accounts for only 2.5%. Of this fresh water 68.7% is in the "form of ice and permanent snow cover in the Arctic, the Antarctic, and in the mountainous regions. Next, 29.9% exists as fresh groundwaters. Only 0.26% of the total amount of fresh waters on the Earth are concentrated in lakes, reservoirs and river systems where they are most easily accessible for our economic needs and absolutely vital for water ecosystems." The total mass of the Earth's hydrosphere is about 1.4 × 1018 tonnes, which is about 0.023% of the Earth's total mass. About 20 × 1012 tonnes of this is in the Earth's atmosphere (the volume of one tonne of water is approximately 1 cubic metre). Approximately 75% of the Earth's surface, an area of some 361 million square kilometers (139.5 million square miles), is covered by ocean. The average salinity of the Earth's oceans is about 35 grams of salt per kilogram of sea water (3.5%)

PedosphereAt Ref 7 Wikipedia provides this description of the pedosphere.

The pedosphere [...] is the outermost layer of the Earth that is composed of soil and subject to soil formation processes. It exists at the interface of the lithosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere and biosphere. The sum total of all the organisms, soils, water and air is termed as the "pedosphere". The pedosphere is the skin of the Earth and only develops when there is a dynamic interaction between the atmosphere (air in and above the soil), biosphere (living organisms), lithosphere (unconsolidated regolith and consolidated bedrock) and the hydrosphere (water in, on and below the soil). The pedosphere is the foundation of life on this planet. There is a realization that the pedosphere needs to be distinctly recognized as a dynamic interface of all terrestrial ecosystems and be integrated into the Earth System Science knowledge base.



The pedosphere acts as the mediator of chemical and biogeochemical flux into and out of these respective systems and is made up of gaseous, mineralic, fluid and biologic components. The pedosphere lies within the Critical Zone, a broader interface that includes vegetation, pedosphere, groundwater aquifer systems, regolith and finally ends at some depth in the bedrock where the biosphere and hydrosphere cease to make significant changes to the chemistry at depth. As part of the larger global system, any particular environment in which soil forms is influenced solely by its geographic position on the globe as climatic, geologic, biologic and anthropogenic changes occur with changes in longitude and latitude.

The pedosphere lies below the vegetative cover of the biosphere and above the hydrosphere and lithosphere. The soil forming process (pedogenesis) can begin without the aid of biology but is significantly quickened in the presence of biologic reactions. Soil formation begins with the chemical and/or physical breakdown of minerals to form the initial material that overlies the bedrock substrate. Biology quickens this by secreting acidic compounds (dominantly fulvic acids) that help break rock apart. Particular biologic pioneers are lichen, mosses and seed bearing plants but many other inorganic reactions take place that diversify the chemical makeup of the early soil layer. Once weathering and decomposition products accumulate, a coherent soil body allows the migration of fluids both vertically and laterally through the soil profile causing ion exchange between solid, fluid and gaseous phases. As time progresses, the bulk geochemistry of the soil layer will deviate away from the initial composition of the bedrock and will evolve to a chemistry that reflects the type of reactions that take place in the soil.

LithosphereAt Ref 5 Wikipedia provides this description of the lithosphere.

A lithosphere [...] is the rigid, outermost shell of a rocky planet, and can be identified on the basis of its mechanical properties. On Earth, it comprises the crust and the portion of the upper mantle that behaves elastically on time scales of thousands of years or greater. The outermost shell of a rocky planet is, the crust, defined on the basis of its chemistry and mineralogy.



AnthropoceneAt Ref 10 Wikipedia provides a definition of Anthropocene.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropocene

The Anthropocene is an informal geologic chronological term that marks the evidence and extent of human activities that have had a significant global impact on the Earth's ecosystems. The term was coined in the 1980s by ecologist Eugene F. Stoermer and has been widely popularized by the Nobel Prize-winning atmospheric chemist, Paul Crutzen, who regards the influence of human behavior on the Earth's atmosphere in recent centuries as so significant as to constitute a new geological epoch for its lithosphere. To date, the term has not been adopted as part of the official nomenclature of the geological field of study.

In 2008 a proposal was presented to the Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London to make the Anthropocene a formal unit of geological epoch divisions. A large majority of that Stratigraphy Commission decided the proposal had merit and should therefore be examined further. Steps are being taken by independent working groups of scientists from various geological societies to determine whether the Anthropocene will be formally accepted into the Geological Time Scale.

Many scientists are now using the term and the Geological Society of America entitled its 2011 annual meeting: Archean to Anthropocene: The past is the key to the future. The Anthropocene has no precise start date, but based on atmospheric evidence may be considered to start with the Industrial Revolution (late eighteenth century). Other scientists link the new term to earlier events, such as the rise of agriculture and the Neolithic Revolution (around 12,000 years BP).

Evidence of relative human impact such as the growing human influence on land use, ecosystems, biodiversity, and species extinction is controversial; some scientists believe the human impact has significantly changed (or halted) the growth of biodiversity. Those arguing for earlier dates posit that the proposed Anthropocene may have begun as early as 14,000 to 15,000 years before present, based on lithospheric evidence; this has led other scientists to suggest that "the onset of the Anthropocene should be extended back many


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropocene


thousand years"; this would be closely synchronous with the current term, Holocene.

AnthropogenicAt Ref 10 Wikipedia provides a definition of Anthropogenic.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_impact_on_the_environment

Human impact on the environment"Anthropogenic" redirects here. It is not to be confused with Anthropogeny or Anthropization.

Human impact on the environment or anthropogenic impact on the environment includes impacts on biophysical environments, biodiversity, and other resources. The term anthropogenic designates an effect or object resulting from human activity. The term was first used in the technical sense by Russian geologist Alexey Pavlov, and was first used in English by British ecologist Arthur Tansley in reference to human influences on climax plant communities. The atmospheric scientist Paul Crutzen introduced the term "anthropocene" in the mid-1970s. The term is sometimes used in the context of pollution emissions that are produced as a result of human activities but applies broadly to all major human impacts on the environment.

Biodiversityhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiversity

Biodiversity is the degree of variation of life. This can refer to genetic variation, species variation, or ecosystem variation within an area, biome, or planet. Terrestrial biodiversity tends to be highest near the equator, which seems to be the result of the warm climate and high primary productivity. Marine biodiversity tends to be highest along coasts in the Western Pacific, where sea surface temperature is highest and in mid-latitudinal band in all oceans. Biodiversity generally tends to cluster in hotspots, and has been increasing through time but will be likely to slow in the future.

Technodiversity(See under ‘Novel Ecosystem’)

Ecosystemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecosystem


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecosystem

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiversity

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_impact_on_the_environment


An ecosystem is a community of living organisms (plants, animals and microbes) in conjunction with the nonliving components of their environment (things like air, water and mineral soil), interacting as a system. These biotic and abiotic components are regarded as linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. As ecosystems are defined by the network of interactions among organisms, and between organisms and their environment, they can be of any size but usually encompass specific, limited spaces (although some scientists say that the entire planet is an ecosystem).

Energy, water, nitrogen and soil minerals are other essential abiotic components of an ecosystem. The energy that flows through ecosystems is obtained primarily from the sun. It generally enters the system through photosynthesis, a process that also captures carbon from the atmosphere. By feeding on plants and on one another, animals play an important role in the movement of matter and energy through the system. They also influence the quantity of plant and microbial biomass present. By breaking down dead organic matter, decomposers release carbon back to the atmosphere and facilitate nutrient cycling by converting nutrients stored in dead biomass back to a form that can be readily used by plants and other microbes.

Ecosystems are controlled both by external and internal factors. External factors such as climate, the parent material which forms the soil and topography, control the overall structure of an ecosystem and the way things work within it, but are not themselves influenced by the ecosystem. Other external factors include time and potential biota. Ecosystems are dynamic entities—invariably, they are subject to periodic disturbances and are in the process of recovering from some past disturbance. Ecosystems in similar environments that are located in different parts of the world can have very different characteristics simply because they contain different species. The introduction of non-native species can cause substantial shifts in ecosystem function. Internal factors not only control ecosystem processes but are also controlled by them and are often subject to feedback loops. While the resource inputs are generally controlled by external processes like climate and parent material, the availability of these resources within the ecosystem is controlled by internal factors like decomposition, root competition or shading. Other internal factors include disturbance, succession and the types of species present. Although



humans exist and operate within ecosystems, their cumulative effects are large enough to influence external factors like climate.

Biodiversity affects ecosystem function, as do the processes of disturbance and succession. Ecosystems provide a variety of goods and services upon which people depend; the principles of ecosystem management suggest that rather than managing individual species, natural resources should be managed at the level of the ecosystem itself. Classifying ecosystems into ecologically homogeneous units is an important step towards effective ecosystem management, but there is no single, agreed-upon way to do this.

Novel Ecosystemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novel_ecosystem[ This is a brief but thought-provoking article, reproduced almost in its entirety, here, but with references stripped out. There are over 30 good references provided in the online article. This mini-lexicon provides a good contextual definition of these important concepts.]

[Initial Description]Novel ecosystems are human-built, modified, or engineered niches of the Anthropocene. They exist in places that have been altered in structure and function by human agency. Novel ecosystems are part of the human environment and niche (including urban, suburban, and rural), they lack natural analogs, and they have extended an influence that has converted more than three-quarters of wild Earth. These anthropogenic biomes include technoecosystems that are fuelled by powerful energy sources (fossil and nuclear) including ecosystems populated with technodiversity, such as roads and unique combinations of soils called technosols. Vegetation associations on old buildings or along field boundary stone walls in old agricultural landscapes are examples of sites where research into novel ecosystem ecology is developing.

OverviewHuman society has transformed the planet to such an extent that we may have ushered in a new epoch known as the Anthropocene. The ecological niche of the anthropocene contains entirely novel ecosystems that include technosols, technodiversity, anthromes, and the technosphere. These terms describe the human ecological


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novel_ecosystem


phenomena marking this unique turn in the evolution of Earth's history. The total human ecosystem (or anthrome) describes the relationship of the industrial technosphere to the ecosphere.Technoecosystems interface with natural life-supporting ecosystems in competitive and parasitic ways. [ ... ]

Novel EcosystemsA novel ecosystem is one that has been heavily influenced by humans but is not under human management. A working tree plantation doesn't qualify; one abandoned decades ago would. Novel ecosystems "differ in composition and/or function from present and past systems". Novel ecosystems are the hallmark of the recently proposed anthropocene epoch. They have no natural analogs due to human alterations on global climate systems, invasive species, a global mass extinction, and disruption of the global nitrogen cycle. Novel ecosystems are creating many different kinds of dilemmas for conservation biologists. On a more local scale, abandoned lots, agricultural land, old buildings, or field boundary stone walls provide study sites on the history and dynamics of ecology in novel ecosystems.

Anthropogenic biomes (See also: Total Human Ecosystem)Anthropogenic biomes tell a completely different story, one of “human systems, with natural ecosystems embedded within them”. This is no minor change in the story we tell our children and each other. Yet it is necessary for sustainable management of the biosphere in the 21st century. Ellis identifies twenty-one different kinds of anthropogenic biomes that sort into the following groups: 1) dense settlements, 2) villages, 3) croplands, 4) rangeland, 5) forested, and 6) wildlands. These anthropogenic biomes (or anthromes for short) create the technosphere that surrounds us and are populated with diverse technologies (or technodiversity for short). Within these anthromes the human species (one species out of billions) appropriates 23.8% of the global net primary production. "This is a remarkable impact on the biosphere caused by just one species."

Noösphere[ ... ] (See under its own description.)

Technosphere



The technosphere is the part of the environment on Earth where technodiversity extends its influence into the biosphere. "For the development of suitable restoration strategies, a clear distinction has to be made between different functional classes of natural and cultural solar-powered biosphere and fossil-powered technosphere landscapes, according to their inputs and throughputs of energy and materials, their organisms, their control by natural or human information, their internal self-organization and their regenerative capacities."

TechnoecosystemsThe concept of technoecosystems has been pioneered by ecologists Howard T. Odum and Zev Naveh. Technoecosystems interface with and are competitive toward natural systems. They have advanced technology (or technodiversity) money-based market economies and have a large ecological footprints. Technoecosystems have far greater energy requirements than natural ecosystems, excessive water consumption, and release toxic and eutrophicating chemicals. Other ecologists have defined the extensive global network of road systems as a type of technoecosystem.

Techno-ecotopes"Bio-agro- and techno-ecotopes are spatially integrated in larger, regional landscape units, but they are not structurally and functionally integrated in the ecosphere. Because of the adverse impacts of the latter and the great human pressures on bio-ecotopes, they are even antagonistically related and therefore cannot function together as a coherent, sustainable ecological system."

TechnosolsTechnosols are a new form of soil group in the World Reference Base for Soil Resources. Technosols are "mainly characterised by anthropogenic parent material of organic and mineral nature and which origin can be either natural or technogenic."

TechnodiversityTechnodiversity refers to the varied diversity of technological artifacts that exist in technoecosystems.

BiomeAt Ref 8 Wikipedia provides a description of a biome.



Biomes are climatically and geographically defined as contiguous areas with similar climatic conditions on the Earth, such as communities of plants, animals, and soil organisms, and are often referred to as ecosystems. Some parts of the earth have more or less the same kind of abiotic and biotic factors spread over a large area, creating a typical ecosystem over that area. Such major ecosystems are termed as biomes. Biomes are defined by factors such as plant structures (such as trees, shrubs, and grasses), leaf types (such as broadleaf and needleleaf), plant spacing (forest, woodland, savanna), and climate. Unlike ecozones, biomes are not defined by genetic, taxonomic, or historical similarities. Biomes are often identified with particular patterns of ecological succession and climax vegetation (quasiequilibrium state of the local ecosystem). An ecosystem has many biotopes and a biome is a major habitat type. A major habitat type, however, is a compromise, as it has an intrinsic inhomogeneity. Some examples of habitats are ponds, trees, streams, creeks, under rocks and burrows in the sand or soil.

The biodiversity characteristic of each extinction, especially the diversity of fauna and subdominant plant forms, is a function of abiotic factors and the biomass productivity of the dominant vegetation. In terrestrial biomes, species diversity tends to correlate positively with net primary productivity, moisture availability, and temperature.

Ecoregions are grouped into both biomes and ecozones.A fundamental classification of biomes are: Terrestrial (land) biomes which includes grassland, tropical

rainforest, temperate and tundra Aquatic biomes (including freshwater biomes and marine biomes)

Biomes are often known in English by local names. For example, a temperate grassland or shrubland biome is known commonly as steppe in central Asia, prairie in North America, and pampas in South America. Tropical grasslands are known as savanna in Australia, whereas in southern Africa they are known as certain kinds of veld (from Afrikaans).



Sometimes an entire biome may be targeted for protection, especially under an individual nation's biodiversity action plan.Climate is a major factor determining the distribution of terrestrial biomes. Among the important climatic factors are: Latitude: Arctic, boreal, temperate, subtropical, tropical Humidity: humid, semihumid, semiarid, and arid

seasonal variation: Rainfall may be distributed evenly throughout the year or be marked by seasonal variations.

dry summer, wet winter: Most regions of the earth receive most of their rainfall during the summer months; Mediterranean climate regions receive their rainfall during the winter months.

Elevation: Increasing elevation causes a distribution of habitat types similar to that of increasing latitude.

The most widely used systems of classifying biomes correspond to latitude (or temperature zoning) and humidity. Biodiversity generally increases away from the poles towards the equator and increases with humidity.

AnthromeAt Ref 9 Wikipedia provides a description of anthrome.

Anthropogenic biomes, also known as anthromes or human biomes, describe the terrestrial biosphere in its contemporary, human-altered form using global ecosystem units defined by global patterns of sustained direct human interaction with ecosystems.

For more than a century, the biosphere has been described in terms of global ecosystem units called biomes, which are vegetation types like tropical rainforests and grasslands that are identified in relation to global climate patterns. Taking into account the fact that human populations and their use of land have fundamentally altered global patterns of ecosystem form, process, and biodiversity, anthropogenic biomes provide a framework for integrating human systems with the biosphere in the Anthropocene.

Anthromes include dense settlements (urban and mixed settlements), villages, croplands, rangelands and seminatural lands and have been mapped globally using two different classification systems, viewable on Google Maps and Google Earth:



http://ecotope.org/anthromes/maps/

PhenosphereExample of usagehttp://neocybernetics.com/report151/S7.pdfWhen the cognitive system was taken as an example of cybernetic systems, some general aspects of the cybernetic models – like the possibilities and interpretations of sparse coded subspaces – could be made better comprehensible. But, after all, perhaps that example best illustrated how different the systems in different phenospheres can be. Whereas intelligence can be defined as the capability of tackling with and managing in new, unknown environments, life can be characterized as the capability of tackling with and managing in familiar, known environments. Intelligence is manifested in creativity, but life is manifested in routine.

Example of Usagehttp://www.phenomenex.com/A technical term in the sales literature of the Phenomenex company in the marketing of high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) equipment.

Artifacthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artifact_(archaeology)

An artifact or artefact (from Latin phrase arte factum, [ made from skill ] [ ... ] ) is "something made or given shape by man, such as a tool or a work of art [ ... ]".

Environmenthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_(biophysical)

The biophysical environment is the biotic and abiotic surrounding of an organism or population, and includes the factors that have an influence in their survival, development and evolution. The term environment can refer to different concepts, but is often used as a short form for the biophysical environment. This practice is common, for instance, among governments which entitle agencies dealing with the biophysical environment with denominations such as Environment Agency. Whereas the expression "the environment" is often used to


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_(biophysical)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artifact_(archaeology)

http://www.phenomenex.com/

http://neocybernetics.com/report151/S7.pdf




refer to the global environment, usually in relation to humanity, the number of biophysical environments is countless, given that it is always possible to consider an additional living organism that has its own environment.



References - Online1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_spheres#Earth.27s_spheres 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Earth 3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troposphere 4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrosphere 5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithosphere 6. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosphere 7. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedosphere 8. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biome 9. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropogenic_biome 10. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaf-cutter_ants 11. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atta_cephalotes 12. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1448011/Lepiotaceae 13. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_sapiens 14. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novel_ecosystem 15. http://myplace.frontier.com/~dffix/medmicro/normal.htm 16.

References – Other1. List them here.2.

References

http://myplace.frontier.com/~dffix/medmicro/normal.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novel_ecosystem

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_sapiens

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1448011/Lepiotaceae

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atta_cephalotes

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaf-cutter_ants

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropogenic_biome

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biome

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedosphere

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosphere

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithosphere

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrosphere

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troposphere

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Earth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth's_spheres#Earth.27s_spheres

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