Institute of Biological Engineering

Tenth IBE Annual Meeting

The University of Georgia

Athens, Georgia

March 4-6, 2005

Keynote Address

“Drawing Engineers out of the Machine”

Dr. Robert E. Ulanowicz Professor of Theoretical Ecology Chesapeake Biological Laboratory The University of Maryland

His presentation will frame the theme of the meeting.  He will speak on novel construct of living systems as networks and provide thoughtful remarks on the emerging framework that may guide the exploration of new biology-inspired engineering frontiers. The full paper is available here.

Robert E. Ulanowicz is Professor of Theoretical Ecology with the University of Maryland's Chesapeake Biological Laboratory. He is a 1961 graduate of the Baltimore Polytechnic Institute and received a B.E.S. and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the Johns Hopkins University in 1964 and 1968, respectively. He served as Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering at the Catholic University of America before joining the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory in 1970. He is fluent in German, conversational in Ukrainian and has a reading knowledge of Polish, French and Spanish.

His current interests include network analysis of trophic exchanges in ecosystems, information theory as applied to ecological systems, the thermodynamics of living systems, causality in living systems, and modeling subtropical wetland ecosystems in Florida (ATLSS) and in Belize.

Dr. Ulanowicz is author of critical books in theoretical ecology.  His latest book “Ecology, the Ascendent Perspective” printed by Columbia University Press deals primarily with the causes behind the development of ecosystems and other naturally-organizing systems.

Drawing Engineers out of the Machine

Robert E. Ulanowicz

University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science

Chesapeake Biological Laboratory

Solomons, MD 20688-0038 USA

Abstract

The Cartesian notion of Nature as Machine has dominated science since the Enlightenment. Perhaps nowhere else is this more evident than in engineering. Attempts by biologists to consider emergent organic behaviors have seemingly lost out to more procrustean mechanical scenarios. Lately, however, insights arising out of Complexity Theory, and in particular out of Ecosystem Dynamics, suggest that the axioms that under gird the mechanical treatment of life, are sorely inappropriate to some behaviors of organic systems. A new set of fundamental postulates is required to fully encompass organic behaviors.

This necessary shift in metaphysical perspective creates both serious challenges as well as significant opportunities for the engineer interested in biotic systems. Those seeking to apply mechanical concepts to organic systems must come to terms with the limited control they afford and be fully prepared for possible destructive consequences. On the other hand, those flexible enough to recognize non-mechanical biological phenomena may discover that their quantitative skills at treating whole systems give them considerable advantage in the search to articulate a new, coherent and quantitative narrative of life processes.

Full Length Paper Click here