Environment – What Is It Really?
The environment refers to everything existing within the Earth’s biosphere or its environment. The natural environment or the entire natural world encompasses all living things and nonliving things occurring naturally, which means outside of human influence. The word is most commonly used in reference to the Earth or specific portions of the Earth. It can also be used in reference to the forces and conditions that govern the earth and all of its living creatures. The environment in which a person lives is referred to as the physical environment.
It is believed by many scientists that the earth has an environment, which is governed by the biological factors. These factors include climate, photochemical cycles, and chemical cycles and variations. The environment also includes the concentration of species within a given environment. The concentration refers to how many different types of living things are found in a certain environment and the concentration of the species in said environment affects the overall environment.
The environment can be classified according to three different categories. One category of the environment includes biotic factors. Biotic factors include those factors that affect the survival and the rate of evolution of living things. Non-biotic factors include those factors that only change the environment slightly, for example; precipitation, sunlight, or wind. Another major type of environment includes physical and biological environments.
A physical environment is one that is composed of space, land, and water. This may also include a resource that is used directly by living things such as air, land, and land based temperature and salinity. A biological environment is one that is composed of living things and their byproducts. The physical environment is one that influences the success of any ecosystem.
Biotic and physical environment together refer to the ability of the environment to sustain life. When any one of these elements are missing, the environment will not be able to sustain life. The biotic or the living thing-solution is the determining factor on whether or not an environment is in need of repair. The physical environment is usually influenced by human activities. Human activities like deforestation, mining, overfishing, and others affect the environment. A person who is concerned about his or her environment should always attempt to preserve the environment.
On the other hand, the non-biotic environment is not influenced by any human activity, and it can be called the ‘wild’ environment. An environment is described as ‘natural’ when a living thing interferes with its surroundings. The scientific community today uses the word environment to describe any kind of living thing except for the term biological environment.