the four major components of the earth's life support system are the atmosfer air, the hydrosfer

water, the geosphere (rock,soil and sediment) and the biosphere living thing.
Ecosystem Services, Terrestrial (land) rain forest, coniferous forest, savanna, desert.
aquatic, marine, ocean, fresh water, lake river, transitional between terrestrial and aquatic (wet land)
swamps, mangrove.
this diagram demonstrates that average precipitation and average temperature, acting together as
limiting factor over a long time, help to determine the type of desert, grass land, or forest in a
particular area, and thus the type of land, animals, and decomposers. found in that area
(assuming it has not been distrubed by human activities)
aquatic ecosystem. Aquatic communities, are characterized by differences in sunlight penetration,
water temperature, salinity, dissolved gases, rate of water movement and depth
Estuaries, intertidal zone, coral reefs, oceanic pelagic, abyssal zones
Transitional ecosystem. However the biosphere has been greatly altered by human and there
increasing population
Used, seminatural, wild. Dense settlements, villages, croplands, rangelands, seminatural, wildlands.
Urban, dense settlements, rice, irrigated, rainfed pastoral, residential, populated, remote.
Therefore, ecosystems can also be classified as : natural ecosystems (change naturally without
human interference), man-made ecosystem : require human interferences to manage and add
energy or matter in order to maintain ecosystem balance(city,village,cropland)
Humans in the biosphere

Remember; ecosystems consist of abiotic (non-living) and biotic (living) component, including
human beings.

Human are part of the ecosystem , but they differ from other organisms because they have ability
to widen their range of tolerance to environment through the ability to thing, develop technology
and modify nature.

Tendency to consider themselves apart from the ecosystem.

Potential to cause negative changes to the ecosystem.

Other organism adapt themselves to the environment, while humans modify and exploit
environment to suit themselves.

Law of tolerance. The existence, abundance and distribution of a species in ecosystems are
determined by whether the level of one or more physical or chemical factors fall within the range
tolerated by that species..

The world”s human population has reached 7 billion in October 2011

(we will discuss more about world population in upcoming lectures)

Human perspectives on earth as a biosphere:

Gaia hypothesis ; all organisms and their inorganic/abiotic surroundings on earth are closely
intergrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system , maintaining the conditions for
life on the planet.

Spaceship earth: earth is often given the analogy of being a spaceship in universe carryng its own
life support system (air,water,food). Increase in human population, resource exploitation, and
environmental degradation are now threatening this system, similar to a situation in which
decreasing availability of oxygen, threatens an astronaut in his spaceship(we are all astronauts on
spaceship earth.

The biosphere and its ecosystems are a very complex and not fully understood by human-case
example of biosphere ii

Biosphere ii

Designed to be a self-sustaining life support system to mimic earth (biosphere i) with 8 people
living inside.

After 2 years numerous unexpected problems were encountered, such as:

Oxygen decreased mysteriously

N cycling failed to function properly

CO2 consentration increased to levels that threatened the humans

Most animals and plants species became extinct.

In brief: biosphere ii fail to maintain a life-support system for 8 people.

Ecosystem service

Ecosystem provide services for human survival.

Ecosystem services fo human will being

Ecosystem change by humans

Human activity can change and potentially damage ecosystems.

Hopes vs Disasters

Human impacts on ecosystem and the biosphere and approaches to solve and environmental
problems wil be further discussed in upcoming lectures.