raymond brouwers
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everything is everything (holistic view)
Holism (from ὅλος holos, a Greek word meaning all, whole, entire, total) is the idea that all the properties of a given system (physical, biological, chemical, social, economic, mental, linguistic, etc.) cannot be determined or explained by its component parts alone. Instead, the system as a whole determines in an important way how the parts behave.
The general principle of holism was concisely summarized by Aristotle in the Metaphysics: "The whole is different from the sum of its parts" (1045a10).
Reductionism is sometimes seen as the opposite of holism. Reductionism in science says that a complex system can be explained by reduction to its fundamental parts. For example, that the processes of biology can be reduced to chemistry and the laws of chemistry explained by physics.
In the latter half of the 20th century, holism led to systems thinking and its derivatives, like the sciences of chaos and complexity. Systems in biology, psychology, or sociology are frequently so complex that their behavior is, or appears, "new" or "emergent": it cannot be deduced from the properties of the elements alone.
Holism has thus been used as a catchword. This contributed to the resistance encountered by the scientific interpretation of holism, which insists that there are ontological reasons that prevent reductive models in principle from providing efficient algorithms for prediction of system behavior in certain classes of systems.
Scientific holism holds that the behavior of a system cannot be perfectly predicted, no matter how much data is available. Natural systems can produce surprisingly unexpected behavior, and it is suspected that behavior of such systems might be computationally irreducible, which means it would not be possible to even approximate the system state without a full simulation of all the events occurring in the system. Key properties of the higher level behavior of certain classes of systems may be mediated by rare "surprises" in the behavior of their elements due to the principle of interconnectivity, thus evading predictions except by brute force simulation. Stephen Wolfram has provided such examples with simple cellular automata, whose behavior is in most cases equally simple, but on rare occasions highly unpredictable.
Complexity theory (also called "science of complexity"), is a contemporary heir of systems thinking. It comprises both computational and holistic, relational approaches towards understanding complex adaptive systems and, especially in the latter, its methods can be seen as the polar opposite to reductive methods. General theories of complexity have been proposed, and numerous complexity institutes and departments have sprung up around the world. The Santa Fe Institute is arguably the most famous of them.
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Tree Nation
Tree Nation in Barcelona & Dosso Niger
Did you know?
1. On Earth there are more than 23,000 different species of trees!
2. Some African Baobab trees can store more than 25,000 gallons {in weight, approximately 100 tons} of water in their trunks. Also, some with age have become hollow and have been used as homes. Some have even been known to shelter up to 30 people!
3. Tree-planting unites communities by providing people the opportunity to work together for the benefit of the local environment.
4. One acre of trees removes 2.6 tons of CO2 per year, thus helping to reduce the "greenhouse effect" by absorbing the CO2.
5. 1 hectare of woodland grown to maturity and looked after forever would absorb the carbon emissions of 100 average family cars driven for one year.
6. Trees lower air temperature by evaporating water in their leaves.
7. By cooling the air and ground around them, the shade from trees helps cool the Earth's temperature.
8. Trees are the longest living and largest living organisms on Earth.
9. In deserts, leaves absorb moisture from the dew and frost of the cool nights and then release it to cool the air during the warm days.
10. One person causes about 10 tons of carbon dioxide to be emitted a year. One tree removes about 1 ton of CO2 in its life-time. Planting 10 trees per person each year will remove each person's carbon debt for the year.
11. Birds and animals use trees for shelter and as a source of food.
12. The forests of Central Africa are home to more than 8,000 different species of plants.
13. More than 5,000 things are made from trees such as houses, furniture, pencils, utensils, fences, books, newspaper, movie tickets even clothing and toothpaste.
14. Three-quarters of the world's people rely on wood as their main source of energy.
15. An area of rainforest the size of a football field is being destroyed each second.
16. Tree roots stabilise the soil and prevent erosion.
17. Trees improve water quality by slowing and filtering rain water as well as protecting aquifers and watersheds.
18. Trees renew our air supply by absorbing carbon dioxide and producing oxygen.
19. The amount of oxygen produced by an acre of trees per year equals the amount consumed by 18 people annually. One tree produces nearly 260 pounds of oxygen each year.
20. Trees keep us breathing our air fresh by absorbing carbon dioxide and producing oxygen: they are our life source!
21. In 50 years one tree recycles more than $37,000 worth of water, provides $31,000 worth of erosion control, $62,000 worth of air pollution control, and produces $37,000 worth of oxygen.
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