James Lovelock's 'Gaia hypothesis' has challenged conventional thinking about the nature of the earth as an integrated system. Gaia proposes that the earth acts like a living organism — that life is part of a self-regulating system, manipulating the physical and chemical environment to maintain the planet as a suitable home for life itself. Lovelock has developed this idea in a series of books, from 'Gaia: A new look at life on earth' (1979) through to 'Revenge of Gaia' (2006) and 'The Vanishing Face of Gaia' (2009). He argues that as changes in the physical earth system occur, living systems respond so as to mitigate such changes.

How can a planet be alive?

In claiming that Gaia is 'lifelike', Lovelock notes the difficulty of defining life. He points out that a biological emphasis on (potential for) reproduction would, for example, exclude postmenopausal women. On the other hand, a physical emphasis on entropy reduction would include refrigerators. This leads Lovelock to emphasise[...]

[Published in GreenNews - Read the original article]