There is one clear law that permeates the development of the universe. Whether we examine the evolution of living systems, as a natural step in the evolution of matter; or we examine any process within the universe, such as the history of a planetary system, a connection exists between time and change. Essentially, in the vastness of time, everything changes and nothing is permanent. The Universe we live in is a dynamic system and is constantly changing. The rate of change may be different for different things in the Universe but the basic concept that the whole system is changing with time holds true. This observation led to a law governing natural systems called the Law of Instability. This law is expressed as follows.
Every system that is termed stable imposes upon all phenomena that are associated with it a restricted amount of action. The interactions of some phenomena are optimum; other phenomena within the stable system can occur temporarily because of special transient conditions, other phenomena can never occur. [Hart, G. F. lecture notes, 1961.]
Corollaries of the Law of Instability are:
1.New objects or phenomenon introduced into a system interacts with that system. If the resulting condition is stress, then the phenomenon either disappears (becomes extinct) because it cannot survive under the prevailing conditions, or adapts to the system and in so doing is itself altered. If the resulting condition is unstressed then the phenomenon will flourish. This interaction between the phenomenon and the system is termed the selection pressure of the system upon the phenomenon.
2.If the system changes, then all phenomena that occur within the system are placed under a changed selection pressure and will change if stressed.
Knowledge of this simple law allows a natural scientist to begin to understand the Earth System and the processes of dynamic change, including physical and cultural evolution. This law is a direct consequence of the thermodynamics operating within the Universe as whole, and very applicable to the Earth System.
Science can directly observe the Law of Instability everywhere on our planet. If we take simple elementary phenomena such as the weathering process, we see that weathering is merely the attempt by a rock formed at a specific temperature and pressure to adapt to atmospheric pressures and temperatures.
Photo-series: WEATHERING OF LAVA FLOWS OF DIFFERENT AGES.
Similarly, in neontology [that branch of biology which studies living matter as opposed to paleontology, which is concerned with ancient and fossilized remains] dynamic changes are observed in populations of organisms.
Photo-series: THE BRITISH PEPPER MOTH CHANGING DUE TO VARYING ENVIRONMENTAL SELECTION PRESSURE.
Many of these observed changes are slow, such as a river eroding a landscape; a raindrop dissolving away a soluble rock particle; the development of an open oceanic basin. Some changes take only a few thousand years, such as the silting-up of a lake, or the switching of the Mississippi River Delta. Some changes are catastrophic, such as a volcanic eruption, an earthquake, a hurricane, or the flooding of vegetation with high saline brine by a rogue oil well operator.
Photo-series: A LOUISIANA CYPRESS SWAMP BEFORE AND AFTER CARELESS DRILLING.
Nevertheless, all of the changes are manifestations of the fundamental idea that everything is unstable with time and provide the proof of the dynamic nature of the Universe. In a catastrophic example, such as an earthquake, the situation can be perceived as a changing system [build-up of stress] to which the phenomena or objects [rocks in the upper crust] must adapt. They may do so suddenly. Sometimes the effects are minor [a small crack], sometimes moderate [landslides and faulting], and sometimes of major consequence [the Alaskan Earthquake].
The Law of Instability is associated with the concept that all natural systems can be considered meta-stable. As soon as a stable condition seems to set-in, some change occurs which stresses the system, and everything has to start adapting to the new set of conditions once more. This is true even though the change may be very small. In natural systems stress at the smallest level seems to be constant. All objects, at any particular moment, can be regarded subject to some selection pressure or other. They are in the process of adapting to the system conditions, momentarily appearing to be adapted to the system conditions, or failing to adapt to the system conditions.
An interesting characteristic of the dynamic nature of natural systems is that the changes that take place with time are conditional changes. This means that what happens now is totally or partially dependant, in some way, upon what happened previously. If conditional changes are fairly obvious they are termed trends or sometimes cycles (if they twist back on themselves). For most conditional changes the more general term is a developmental sequence, and numerous developmental sequences are observed in nature. Sometimes the cause is known, in other cases we simply observe a trend and must search for a logical reason for its occurrence. An example of a major developmental sequence is that observed in the paleontological succession of the vertebrates with the evolution of lung-fish into Amphibia and then into Reptilia and finally Mammalia. The mechanism whereby such developmental sequences occur or stop [e.g. extinction of the dinosaurs] may not always be clear but by looking at natural phenomena as sequences we are often able to understand the processes that produce the phenomena. In the vertebrate developmental sequence, for example, we can trace the evolutionary lineage through a series of trends that were a result of adaptations to changes in selection pressure.
It is often difficult to understand trends and cycles in biological systems because the way in which selection pressure acts upon a phenomenon is rarely deterministic. This means that whenever an event occurs it does not follow that a specific and definite response will always occur. If only one response can occur as a result of an event, the process is said to be deterministic. However, in natural systems a number of reactions may be available as a response to a single event, but only one of them will occur as a result of minor variation in the selection pressure. The process then is said to be a probabilistic conditional process. Natural science problems are always approached knowing that the system is not only dynamic but also conditionally probabilistic. Evolution of life on Earth, as it manifests itself to biologists [both neontologists studying living organisms, and paleontologists studying fossilized organisms], is both dynamic and probabilistic.
The dynamic and probabilistic aspects of evolution contribute to the misinformation associated with the nature - nurture debates that cloud the correct understanding of many of the processes acting within the human population. Today this misunderstanding hinders the implementation of changes advantageous to both the social condition and the health of humankind. Being a dynamic and probabilistic system is part of the very essence of humankind and our humanity and something that is an effective part of consciousness.
