at war with the planet

Part IV (10--11) The closed cyclical process of ecosphere and the linear process of technosphere Para. 10 The closed cyclical process of ecosphere Para. 11 The linear process of technosphere

Basic laws of the ecosphere

Everything is connected to everything else

Everything has to go somewhere

Nature knows best

There is no such thing as a free lunch

Para. 10The second law of ecosphereEverything has to go somewhere

Key words

respire[r 'spa ] v. to breathe in and out e.g. She respires when she reaches the top of the hill.

excrete[ k'skri t; ek-] v. to get rid of waste material from your body through your bowels , your skin etc. e.g. The skin excretes sweat. Certain plants excrete a sweet juice, apparently for the sake of eliminating something injurious from their sap.

mold[m ld] n. any of various fungi that often cause disintegration of organic matter(能引起 有机物质分解的真菌) e.g. Throw that bread away. It has been kept for so many days, and there is mold on it .

ingest[ n'd est] v. to take (food) into the stomach e.g. The elephant needs to ingest at least 40kgs of bananas. digest[da 'd est; d -] v. to convert food into absorbable substances e.g. I cannot digest milk products.

r e s p i r e

respired

photo synthetically

Aquatic plants

e x c r e t e

wastemetabolized by aquatic bacteria and molds

含氮的 有机化合物废物

nitrate 硝酸盐

Closed circular system

How does the author illustrate the closed cyclical processes in the ecosphere? The author again uses the fish as an example. He tries to show that in the closed circular system, everything produced in one part of the cycle goes somewhere and is used in the later step. So there is no such thing as “waste”.