Gaia hypothesis packs hall

For those fascinated by the idea of dancing plasmotia and bacteria skyscrapers that shape the face of the earth, a lecture held Thursday on the Gaia hypothesis would have satisfied such curiosities. The Landscape Architecture Department's third annual Ian McHarg lecture, entitled "Design with Gaia," covered such new-fangled ideas in Meyerson Hall before a full auditorium. The lecture was presented by Lynn Margulis, a geosciences professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. James Corner, chairman of the Landscape Architecture Department, opened the presentation with a few words in memory of Ian McHarg, founder of Penn's Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning Department. The popular McHarg passed away earlier this month at the age of 80. Margulis then lectured on the Gaia hypothesis, invented by British scientist James Lovelock. She described it as, "the idea that the earth's environment is regulated by living organisms who are not just adapting to, but actively making their environment." To prove the earth's surface is alive, Margulis compared it to the inhospitable environments of its neighbors -- Mars and Venus. Using the metaphor of a machine, she said, "earth sustains the reactive mixture of gases that would go into an engine and explode -- Venus and Mars have the destructive gases that would come out." Microorganisms that photosynthesize by taking carbon dioxide out of the air and turning it into oxygen make our world a hospitable place, according to Margulis. "The planet is very self-regulating," Corner said of the Gaia hypothesis. "Even if we blew ourselves up tomorrow, the earth would find a way to regenerate and go on." Margulis reinforced this idea by showing a video of microbes in action, stressing the genius of these microbes that allows unstoppable survival. She added that the vast majority of bacteria are helpful, but people do not realize this because they are preoccupied by the few harmful ones. In her closing statement, Margulis talked about what these microbes would say long after humans are gone -- "I got along before I met you, and I'll get along without you now." Paul Johansen, a visiting scholar at Penn in biostatistics appreciated the lecture, calling it "all encompassing." "Whether you agree with these ideas or try to refute them, you first have to integrate them all in a convincing way like Margulis does," he said.