BE/CNH: Comparative Stability and Resiliency of Ecosystems: Five Centuries of Human Interactions with the Environment on the Eastern Shore of Virginia

耦合的自然-人类生态系统现在镶嵌在地球的陆地表面上。很少有土地在某种程度上不是人类居住者的结果。考虑到现代社会改变大气和海洋的能力，即使是偏远和无人居住的地貌也在一定程度上受到人类活动的影响。但这种人类活动会影响自然-人类系统的稳定性吗？自然-人类系统对变化的抵抗力是什么？它的弹性是什么(在受到干扰后恢复到原始状态的可能性)？虽然人们通常认为这些问题的答案肯定是肯定的，但这个项目将通过先进的社会环境系统分析对这个问题进行定量和定性的评估。这项提议将描述、量化和模拟弗吉尼亚州东海岸过去500年来自然-人类耦合动力学的频谱，首先是美洲原住民，然后是欧洲和非洲殖民者及其后裔与他们的环境相互作用。这项跨学科研究旨在提高对单一地点、不同空间和时间尺度以及不同社会和环境压力下紧密耦合的自然-人类系统的复杂动力学的理解。这些努力的最终结果将是开发综合的人-生态系统模型，该模型将通过历史、考古、生态和地球化学数据进行参数化、校准和验证，以模拟特定历史时期的自然-人类系统，这些历史时期代表了人类人口模式、土地利用实践和技术能力的变化：史前(1550-1610)、殖民地(1650-1700)、晚期种植园(1800-1850)、商业/工业(1850-1950)和现代/保护(1950-现在)。为了理解和比较一系列景观和海景尺度的生态系统的动态响应，我们将研究三个有效的假设：(1)具有更多技术社会的系统能够更好地抵御环境扰动的变化。(2)具有更多技术社会的系统对环境扰动的弹性更强。(3)技术社会本身就是驱动系统未来地位的关键环境扰动。将使用主成分分析和其他定量程序来评估系统在这些时间段内和之间的稳定性、恢复力和对变化的抵抗力，并确定在这些时间段内对抵抗力、恢复力和稳定性最关键的系统组件。该项目的反智力贡献包括确定自然对人类施加的限制，以解释人类社会所采取的适应姿态的范围，评估更大的自然-人类系统在广泛的时间范围内对人类社会活动的反应，以及通过检查同一地点内独特的人口、土地利用和技术制度。该项目的预期更广泛的影响包括增加对弗吉尼亚州东海岸自然-人类动态的了解，以及世界各地无数其他有人居住的陆地-水界面。该项目将确定对系统阻力、弹性和稳定性至关重要的变量，从而为切萨皮克湾分水岭和世界各地类似地区的决策提供信息。该项目还将为K-12学生、本科生和研究生以及普通公众提供教育和培训机会。该项目得到了2003财年环境中生物复杂性特别竞赛的一个奖项的支持，该竞赛的重点是耦合的自然和人类系统的动力学。

Coupled natural-human ecosystems now tessellate the terrestrial surface of the Earth. There is little land that is not to some degree a consequence of its human inhabitants. Given the capacity of modern societies to alter both the atmosphere and ocean, even remote and unpopulated landscapes are to some degree altered by human activity. But does this human activity affect the stability of the natural-human system? What is the natural-human system's resistance to change? What is its resilience (the likelihood of returning to its original state after being disturbed)? While people often assume that the answer to these questions must be in the affirmative, this project will assess the question quantitatively and qualitatively through advanced socio-environmental systems analysis. This proposal will characterize, quantify, and model the spectrum of coupled natural-human dynamics on the Eastern Shore of Virginia over the past 500 years as, first, Native Americans and, later, European and African colonists and their descendents interacted with their environment. This interdisciplinary study is designed to improve understanding of the complex dynamics of a tightly coupled natural-human system in a single locale, but at varying spatial and temporal scales and under differing social and environmental pressures. These efforts will culminate in the development of integrated human-ecosystem models, which will be parameterized, calibrated, and validated by historical, archaeological, ecological, and geochemical data to simulate natural-human systems during specific historical periods that represent changes in human demographic patterns, land-use practices, and technological capabilities: Protohistoric (1550-1610); Colonial (1650-1700); Late Plantation (1800-1850); Commercial/Industrial (1850-1950); and Modern/Conservation (1950-present). Three working hypotheses will be investigated to understand and compare a range of landscape- and seascape-scale ecosystems in terms of their dynamic responses: (1) Systems with more technological societies are better able to resist change from environmental perturbation. (2) Systems with more technological societies are more resilient to environmental perturbation. (3) Technological societies are themselves the critical environmental perturbation that drives the future status of the system. Principal component analysis and other quantitative procedures will be employed to assess system stability, resiliency, and resistance to change during and between these time periods and to identify those system components within time periods that are most critical to resistance, resilience, and stability.Anticipated intellectual contributions of this project include identifying constraints imposed by nature on humans in order to explain the range of adaptive poses assumed by human societies, assessing the response of the greater natural-human system to the activities of human societies over a broad range of time periods and through examination of distinctive demographic, land use, and technological regimes within the same locale. Anticipated broader impacts of this project include increase knowledge about natural-human dynamics on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, in particular, and countless other inhabited land-water interfaces throughout the world in general. The project will identify variables critical to system resistance, resilience, and stability, thereby informing policymaking in the Chesapeake Bay watershed and similar locales throughout the world. The project also will provide education and training opportunities for K-12 students, undergraduate and graduate students, and the general public. This project is supported by an award resulting from the FY 2003 special competition in Biocomplexity in the Environment focusing on the Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems.