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Wondering recently in London how to present this enormous subject to an enlightened but very mixed audience, I strolled out into St James’s and then through Green and Hyde Parks. The grass was still short and the trees were bare, but here and there fine clumps of daffodils and flashes of crocuses were in full bloom, and the ‘lakes’ were alive with all manner of waterfowl. In quiet corners I met more blackbirds than one generally sees in a long walk in the country—not to mention the hordes of pigeons and sparrows. Some early-flowering Prunus trees added a delicate tinge of pink. The entire prospect was delightful in early spring, though almost entirely artificial: not at all typical of the biosphere, but an impressive display of what man has created—and can do even better—when the will, knowledge, and money, are available. Given these last three prerequisites, it is also a portent of what we may expect to see more and more of in future, as human population burgeons and great cities multiply, extend, and ultimately coalesce.

Ecologists who have attempted in recent years to look into the crystal ball to find out what is likely to be the biosphere-to-come, will surely, sooner or later, have reached the conclusion that the future depends almost entirely on how man handles the biosphere within the coming decades. Such forecasting also involves a series of problems, such as the following: (a) How can we circumscribe our vision to make it operational? Should a specific date be set, for instance the year 2000? Or should there be a continuous or periodic appraisal over a definite period of time, as obviously we cannot foresee indefinitely into the future? (b) How far and how reliably can present trends be projected into the future? In this connection an evaluation should be made of the extent to which current trends will generate reactions by mankind, and there- by deflect some of the curves which we have drawn on the basis of past experiences. Some of these problems were admirably illustrated in a recent paper by Peccei (1971), who included part of the accompanying diagram (Fig. 1). This diagram, resulting from the use of computer simulation models, is one example of what has been obtained by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology team working under the direc- tion of Professor Jay W. Forrester and aiming at studying the dynamic behaviour of interacting systems and how they would react to certain policy changes (C. L. Wilson, 1971).