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Book Review

THE WEB OF LIFE

As the bestselling author ofThe Tao of Physicsand The Turning Point, physicist Fritjof Capra

has made a name for himself mapping the breakdown of mechanistic science and the emergenceof new models and metaphors for understanding the physical universe. In The Web of Life, Capra

looks at the shift from linear thinking to systems thinking in science, showing how recent

advances in a wide range of fields, from evolutionary biology and chaos theory to quantum

physics and computer science, signal an emergent paradigm that differs radically from theclockwork model of classical science. He compares this shift to the Copernican revolution

suggesting that the new perception of reality has profound implications not only for science and

philosophy but also for business, politics, health care, education, and everyday life. "The new

paradigm may be called a holistic worldview," he writes, "seeing the world as an integratedwhole rather than a dissociated collection of parts. It may also be called an ecological view, if the

term ecological' is used in a much broader and deeper sense than usual. Deep ecolo gical

awareness recognizes the fundamental interdependence of all phenomena and the fact that, asindividuals and societies, we are all embedded in (and ultimately dependent on) the cyclical

processes of nature.

Capra begins with a discussion of the cultural context in which this scientific revolution is

unfolding. As a culture, he says, we are discovering that we cannot understand the major

problems of our time in isolation. They are systemic problems; they are by nature interconnectedand interdependent. Population growth is tied to poverty, for example, and the extinction of plant

and animal species is inextricably linked to third world debt. "Ultimately these problems must be

seen as just different facets of one single crisis, which is largely a crisis of perception. It derives

from the fact that most of us, and especially our large social institutions, subscribe to the

concepts of an outdated worldview, a perception of reality inadequate for dealing with ouroverpopulated, globally interconnected world.

Against this backdrop, he traces the rise of systems thinking the sort of thinking that

emphasizes the whole rather than the parts. While classical science insists that the behavior of a

complex system can be best analyzed in terms of the properties of the parts, systems thinkingreverses the equation by showing that the properties of the parts are not intrinsic but can be

understood only within the context of the larger whole. In this sense, systems thinking means

thinking in context. "Ultimatelyas quantum physics [has] showed so dramaticallythere areno parts at all. What we call a part is merely a pattern in an inseparable web of relationships."

The main characteristics of systems thinking emerged simultaneously in several disciplinesduring the first half of the 20th century, Capra explains. It was pioneered by biologists whostressed that living organisms are best understood as integrated wholes. It was further enriched

by Gestalt psychology and the new science of ecology. And it had perhaps the most dramatic

effects in quantum physics which showed that at the subatomic level there are no parts at all, thatwhat we call a part is merely a pattern in an inseparable web of relationships.

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The rise of a new scientific paradigm owes much to the pioneering work of the early systems

theorists, but two recent developments have been decisive in this transition: the discovery of the

new mathematics of complexity and the formulation of the concept of self-organization. Whilethe systems approaches developed during the first half of the 20th century did not result in a

formal mathematical theory, Capra says, they created a certain way of thinking, a new language,

new concepts, and an intellectual climate that set the stage for what was to follow.

In the 1970s, thanks in large part to new computer technologies that allowed scientists to model

dynamic living systems (which revealed surprising patterns beneath the seemingly chaoticbehavior of nonlinear structures), the outlines of a coherent theory of living systems, coupled

with the proper mathematical language, finally began to emerge. Capra reviews the work of a

wide range of scientists who have been instrumental to this shift, including from Nobel Prize-

winning chemist Ilya Prigogine, Chilean neuroscientist Humberto Maturana, fractalmathematician Benoit Mandelbrot, microbiologist Lynn Margulis, and geochemist James

Lovelock.

The second half of The Web of Lifeis given to formulating a coherent conceptual framework forunderstanding the new theories and breakthroughs in science. Capra believes that the key to a

comprehensive theory of living systems lies in the synthesis of two approaches that have been incompetition since the dawn of scientific thought: the study of pattern (or form, order, quality)

and the study of structure (or substance, matter, quantity). The structure approach attempts to

understand the properties that make up the object of study, while the pattern approach seeks to

understand the relationships between its constituent parts.

When these two approaches are combined with the central insight of living systems theory

that of the ceaseless flux of matter it offers a radically new way of conceiving reality,according to Capra. Pattern, structure, and process are three different but inseparable

perspectives of the phenomenon of life. In effect, this means that to understand any livingsystem, one must answer three questions: what is its structure? What is its pattern oforganization? And what is the process of life? In Capra's view, this new approach overcomes two

conceptual problems that have plagued science for centuries. First, the interdependence of

pattern and structure overcomes the traditional division between the organic and the inorganic,between the living and the nonliving. And second, the interdependence of process and structure

overcomes the Cartesian split between mind and matter.

Capra concludes the book with some reflections on "ecological literacy." From his perspective,

the emerging paradigm in science has profound ecological consequences. An understanding of

reality based on the essential interdependence and interconnectedness at the heart of things

restores our human connection to the entire web of life. "The theory of living systems discussedin this book provides a conceptual framework for the link between ecological communities and

human communities," he says. "Both are living systems that exhibit the same basic principles of

organization. They are networks that are organizationally closed, but open to the flows of energy

and resources; their structures are determined by their histories of structural changes; they areintelligent because of the cognitive dimensions inherent in the processes of life. We need to

revitalize our communities including out educational communities, business communities,

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and political communities so that the principles of ecology become manifest in them as

principles of education, management, and politics."