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Show 242. problem until next chapter. For now I wish to investigate his interest in the biotic community, or ecosystem, as it is now called. What did he find in this web of life that could form the basis of a new set of human values? How did he attempt to integrate the more obdurate theories of the Darwinists with his own mystical mountain joy, his own pantheistic leanings, and his trust in Nature? This was a necessary task because ecology has been, since its nineteenth century origin, a Darwinian science, where the relations between organisms and environment have been perceived in terms of the evolution of those relations. I have been pursuing Muir's studies as if they were purely geological, but from the beginning he was also observing a geographical Nature. Linnaeus, Humboldt, Lyell: the writers on botany, geography, and geology who were powerful influences on Darwin, also figured heavily in Muir's education. Further, Muir was engaged in a Sierran study like that which Merriam would conduct ten years later in Arizona, geography perceived from an ecological rather than taxonomic model. Muir observed the communities of life in the Sierra, and sometimes noticed the interpenetration between alpine and lowland plants. He thought about the microclimates of Yosemite Valley, where it was often winter on the south wall and summer on the north wall. Once he had immersed himself in glacial history, he was prepared to imagine the flow of life into the Sierra as a succession, where lake became meadow and meadow became forest. He began to think of each species as a part of the changing |