Geoscience Reference
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2
A TALE OF TWO LAKES
Although our world is huge and seems impervious to human insults,
life on earth is in fact a fragile system. It is full of organisms, linked
together in a complex web of relationships, all of which are made pos-
sible by the warmth of the sun and the protection of the atmosphere.
We need only look at our moon, which receives about the same amount
of solar radiation each year as the earth, to recognize the contingency
of our earth's systems. There on the moon, but for the grace of our at-
mosphere, would we go. Perhaps living systems have evolved elsewhere
in the universe. But it seems highly unlikely that the living systems of
our earth—our plants, animals, humans, and human civilizations—are
found anywhere else. The drama that is life on earth will play only once. 1
I can illustrate the fragility of life on earth with a tale of two lakes.
The fi rst is a small string of salt ponds in southern New England, where
I love to visit in the summer. 2 Twenty thousand years ago, during the
last ice age, New England was buried under a mountain of glacial ice.
The ponds were coastal estuaries left behind as the glaciers retreated.
Today, they are home or way station for piping plovers, least terns,
horseshoe crabs, and multicolored jellyfi sh. On the ocean side of the
ponds are long barrier beaches.
The ponds are vulnerable spots, subject to abuse from many quar-
ters. Developers, hurricanes, and motorboats all beat upon the fragile
coastline. Conservationists, ecologists, and environmental agencies fi ght
back. In recent years, there has been a standoff between the forces of
preservation and those of degradation.
 
 
 
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