Clements and the concept of clímax
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.11606/issn.2178-6224v15i2p225-255Keywords:
History of ecology, Frederic Edward Clements, Climax, Complex organism, Dynamic ecologyAbstract
The American botanist Frederic Edward Clements (1874-1945), left contributions to ecology during the first four decades of the 20th century. He proposed concepts such as ecological succession and climax. The present paper aims to discuss the path that led Clements to the concept of climax between 1904 and 1936. Besides that, to clarify how the scientific community received this contribution at the time. This research led to the conclusion that the term climax, or even its connotation, did not appear immediately in Clements' publications (1904; 1905). They have only appeared in 1916 (Clements, 1916) and are closely related to other Clements' concepts such as association and complex organism, present in his previous works (Clements, 1904; Clements, 1905). Clement's started from inquiries on vegetation as well as laboratory work. We did not detect any significant changes concerning the concept of climax between 1916 and 1936. There was only the addition of more details and refinement of the previous explanations. The scientific community of the time mainly criticized the restriction of the climax to climatic aspects and the idea of a complex organism used in a nom metaphorical way.
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Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico
Grant numbers Processo: 130184/2018-7
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