Frank Herbert - ‘The Ecology of Dune'

The thing the ecologically illiterate don't realize about an ecosystem is that it's a system.

A system!  

A system maintains a certain fluid stability that can be destroyed by a misstep in just one niche. A system has order, a flowing from point to point. If something dams the flow, order collapses.

The untrained miss the collapse until too late. That's why the highest function of ecology is the understanding of consequences.

 

Taken from ‘The Ecology of Dune’, an appendix in Frank Herberts 1965 brilliant sci-fi novel Dune. [If you haven’t read it – Why? (JG)]

 

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

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_%28novel%29

The full text of the ecology of Dune can be found here:
http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/Sci-Tech-Society/Dune-AppendixI.htm