Living Planets



People throughout time have championed the concept that the earth is in someway alive. This hypothesis is based on the idea that the biomass of life self-regulates the conditions on the planet to make its physical environment more hospitable to the species that constitute its "life". In fact this is the premise of Gaia hypothesis. Yet the analogy of a living human and a living planet is easily misused. Our planet is not alive . Planet earth is a closed system with respect to material-essentially we do not receive new materials from outer space but continuously recycle what is already present-but an open system with respect to energy, whereas all organisms are "open" systems with respect to both.

(Life as we don`t know)

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