ABSTRACT
The extensive use of wilderness as a scientific resource has barely begun. Economics and specific objectives are probably the least valid scientific arguments for saving plants and animals and entire ecosystems. Despite the extensive land abuse, or perhaps because of it, scientists and educators since World War II have become increasingly interested in natural areas of all sizes, where diversity prevails, for scientific research. Preserving natural areas has shown how millions of living creatures struggle for water, sunlight, soil nourishment, and space. George Washington Carver, the scientist, found that a weed was something good, even by practical human standards. Modern science has produced herbicides and pesticides, atomic power, and biological warfare and is working on the brave new world of a completely controlled environment. Monocultural farming is doubtless the prime example of interference with the systems on which the carrying capacity of the planet is dependent, ignoring the details of natural integration.
