ABSTRACT
Anthropological interest in the study of human impacts goes back to the earliest ethnographic descriptions of the subsistence activities of human populations. Human organization for subsistence orders individuals in a society in a way that other aspects of social and cultural life must contend with the requirements of labor organization for obtaining resources from the environment. By the late 1950's not only was cultural ecology flowering as an anthropological pursuit, but so were alternative approaches to the study of human interaction with environment coming to the fore. An evolutionary biology model of an ecosystem must include the study of the non-linear forms of logic within human Cultures, the propositions used to make decisions about Nature, and the level of articulation between those propositions and the management of the environment. Human beings as members of social systems do not interact or impact natural systems directly.
