ABSTRACT

Early civilizations living off the land had maintained a symbiotic relationship with the earth’s resources and, therefore, did not alter the environment much. In more recent decades, the introduction of newer technology for exploitation and transformation of natural resources into a usable form, however, has remarkably stressed the man-environment relationship by altering the frequency and magnitude of geomorphic processes manifold. The accelerated process rates disturb the nature of exchange between energy and materials and feedback mechanisms, locally affecting the stability of natural systems that otherwise are simple in function (Tuan, 1971).