Human adaptability : a history and compendium of research in the International Biological Programme / K.J. Collins and J.S. Weiner.

Date:
1977
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Credit: Human adaptability : a history and compendium of research in the International Biological Programme / K.J. Collins and J.S. Weiner. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    15/376 (page 1)
    I. INTRODUCTION; ICSU, IG Y, IBP During the decade 1964-1974 many thousands of biologists from more than fifty countries worked together in the International Biological Programme (IBP). These biologists were all interested in living communities, in the factors that govern the survival of plants, animal and human communities throughout the world. The IBP was launched by the body that represents the world community of research workers, their scientific societies and academies—the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU). It was, of course, ICSU that organized the highly successful International Geophysical Year (IGY) and which lasted much longer than that satellite year of 1957. The IGY comprised a world-wide co-ordinated programme of research into the behaviour of the earth's physical 'shell', the geosphere of our planet—the land, the sea and the encircling atmosphere. The IBP was conceived as a logical sequel—as a world-wide investigation of the biosphere—the 'mantle' of living communities which inhabit the geosphere. Between them the scientists of the IGY and those of the IBP aimed at a comprehensive global understanding of the pro¬ cesses and forces responsible for the properties of our complex planetary shell, in one case in geophysical, in the other in biological terms. But the conception of the IBP as a sequel to the IGY was only one factor, though a significant one, in its genesis. There were other influences at work. The rise of molecular biology in the 50's and 60's, the spectacular unravelling of the genetic code and the elucidation of cellular and subcellular processes (out¬ standingly those of the immune system) posed a strong challenge both in academic status and in financial support to the long established macrobiological sciences and their concern with whole organisms and communities. The major response to this challenge took the form of an upsurge of activity in ecology—and the IBP became the most prominent expression of this response. But it was in reality the changing condition of the biosphere itself which brought ecological science to the fore in the mid 60's and onwards. Today, it is universally acknowledged that our biosphere has entered a dangerous phase as a direct result of the domination, by numbers and activity, of the human species itself. The whole biosphere is undergoing profound changes at a pace more rapid than ever before, affecting the balance between its constituent plant and animal species, and the human species, and threatening in one way or another the well-being, indeed the existence, of all of them. Man's ever-growing exploitation of natural resources is unbalanced and is leading to mismanagement and irreversible depletion of resources as well as to pollution on an increasing scale. The realisation of this critical situation is now commonplace, but its resolution demands much greater ecological under¬ standing if ecological control is to be secured. Because IBP anticipated this awareness, many of its activities have relevance to the environmental problem now universally recognised. Indeed, in 1968, at its 2nd Assembly, IBP took the first practical steps towards the setting up of a world-wide pollution monitoring network on a scientific basis, a task it 'transferred' to the agencies later set up by ICSU and by the United Nations. Ecological understanding was in fact what the IBP set out in 1964 to achieve, on a world scale, by encompassing the study of both undisturbed or 'natural' ecosystems and those subject to man's intervention. The aim was basically to elucidate, for a global variety of ecosystems, the processes at work which maintain their organic productivity, which alone makes possible the life of the com¬ munities dependent upon them. The IBP was much more than an exercise in 'pure' ecological investigation. The basic research was to a large extent firmly related to the stated objective of gaining new ecological knowledge in the interests of 'productivity and human welfare'. It is with this historical framework of IBP in mind, its concern with global ecological problems both fundamental and practical, that we should examine the involvement of human biology within the programme. 1