14. Biosphere: A First-Class Wealth Organization

Biosphere: A First-Class Wealth Organization
Bob Komives
::

In setting forth his Critical Path for humankind R. Buckminster Fuller made a distinction between class-one and class-two evolution. Class-two evolution assumes humankind runs the universe. It includes the events that seem to us to come from human initiative and control. We like class-two evolution.

I planted a seed

here somewhere, where
today there should be
(by my rights)
a seedling-

here on time, when
the packet guaranteed
(to my sight)
a sprouting-

if not now, then
it had better be
(as I hope)
by morning-

here somewhere, where
it might have been seen
tomorrow
(by evening).

Seeds And Rights

Class-one evolution transcends our vision, and (as one finds out waiting for seeds to grow) it often voids our class-two-right to have things happen as we told ourselves they should. Class-one evolution came first and will leave last. It put humankind on Earth. It is typified by "ephemeralization," by which we do more and more with less and less, and by "acceleration," by which the time between changes gets less and less.

The biosphere and humankind continually organize and reorganize. Life grew in complexity and robustness by organizing itself. Simple forms of life organized themselves into cells. Some cells organized their reproduction so that instead of creating totally new and independent creatures they created specialized organs within a multiple cell creature. The invention of organs exemplifies ephemeralization, because cells working in a multi-cell and multi-organ individual can often do more with available resources than can the same number of single-celled creatures.

Since we need old fashioned cell-into-cell reproduction to make and sustain our organs, we multi-celled creatures need some enhancement to reproduce our entire organized selves. Class-one evolution gave some of us sex. Sex became an unwitting accelerator of evolution as we mix and re-mix the gene pool (inclined as we are to attract strange mates). New species and communities of species could now evolve faster. Evolution is subject to its own class-one evolution. It accelerates as the gene pool diversifies.

I wish to emphasize the obvious; the word, organization, comes from the root-word, organ. We say that people get organized (into committees and such) while their bodies have organs (heart, lung, foot, skin). It sounds fine to say that the human body is organized, and it sounds only a little strange to say that the police department is an organ of the city government. At the edges of evolution, then, organs and organizations form. Through class-one organization the biosphere develops, reproduces, modifies, and discards patterned interactions.

Class-one organization,
first-class organization,
is biospheric economic development.
Unwittingly,
we participate.
Wittingly,
but ignorantly,
our second class efforts
often retard or threaten our wealth,
our biosphere's wealth.
Our species is organ to the biosphere.
We are organs to our species.
Looking inward,
we see our organs
as their cells and genes organize them.
Looking outward,
we see ourselves
as parts in several organizations:
. family,
. neighborhood,
. team,
. school,
. country,
. ecosystem,
. bioregion,
. species,
. biosphere.
Organs work neither perfectly nor forever.
(Such is the trial-and-error of evolution.)
Organized, imperfect, timed interaction
among species,
between species and their environment;
call it ecosystem.
Around the planet
call it biosphere.
Across space,
someday call it bio-universe.

Biosphere sustains life and culture,
changes as inanimate environment changes,
changes as life alters itself.
Energy captured by biosphere,
organized into life,
organized to support life,
reorganized by life,
this energy is biospheric knowledge.
Biosphere knows
to preserve,
create,
re-create,
to continue a habit of change.
Without such knowing,
life
into lifeless ignorance,

will end.

||

:: Bob Komives, Fort Collins © 2006 :: Plum Local IV :: 14. Biosphere: A First Class Wealth Organization ::
With attribution these words may be freely shared, but permission
is required if quoted in an item for sale or rent

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