Tuesday, August 4, 2009: 1:30 PM-5:00 PM
Blrm B, Albuquerque Convention Center
SYMP 8 - Human Macroecology: Understanding Human-Environment Interactions Across Scales
Many important ecological phenomena, such as patterns of distribution, abundance, and diversity, emerge only at the spatial scale of continents or the temporal scale of decades or longer. This symposium focuses on the interactions between humans and their environment across diverse spatial and temporal scales, an approach we call human macroecology. These interactions often involve the acquisition, transformation, and allocation of resources to individuals and the resulting affects on resource distributions and ecosystem services. Through a series of talks that build on one another, the symposium will highlight the structure and ecological implications of this essentially metabolic function of human societies. Until recently, much of human ecology was left to social scientists, but recent work highlights the importance of a rigorous, theoretically-based perspective centered in the environmental sciences but drawing from a range of disciplines. Our goals are: (1) to define human macroecology through a progression of compelling examples that build on one another; (2) to bring together and synthesize empirical findings from diverse disciplines; and (3) to show how this work bridges history disciplinary divides to offer new perspectives on human-environment interactions, including sustainability science. Each talk meets a specific objective, together building a compelling vision of the cross-scale ecology of humanity and a powerful framework for interpreting and extending that research. Burger will discuss how a focus on environmental energy linked pioneering work in human macroecology, which focused on foraging patterns and range sizes in relation to ecological variables, such as primary productivity. By acquiring, transforming, and allocating resources to group members and through their nested, self-similar structure, human societies have metabolic properties (Hamilton). The resulting pressure has consistent effects on natural resource distributions (Stiner, Jennings), effects that feed back to affect access to nature’s services (Jennings, Daily) and ecosystem processes at multiple scales (Grimm). To accommodate increasingly concentrated human populations and supply them with resources, urban infrastructure and distribution networks scale in characteristic ways (Moses). Quantifying a range of urban scaling relations suggests a theory of urban growth and resource use, with key implications for sustainable development (Bettencourt). Over time, the collapse, endurance, and evolution of human societies is an intimate function of our social solutions to common ecological constraints (Tainter). Understanding macroscopic patterns of human ecology is paramount to achieving a sustainable future (Brown).
Organizer:	William R. Burnside, University of New Mexico
Co-organizer:	James H. Brown, University of New Mexico
Moderator:	William R. Burnside, University of New Mexico
Endorsement:	ESA Human Ecology Section, ESA Theoretical Ecology Section, AAAS Southwestern and Rocky Mountain Division
1:30 PM	SYMP 8-1		A macroscopic view of human ecology Oskar Burger, University of New Mexico, William Roy Burnside, University of New Mexico
1:45 PM	SYMP 8-2		Scaling energy use in human systems from hunter-gatherers to nation states Marcus J. Hamilton, University of New Mexico
2:05 PM	SYMP 8-3		Changes in the ‘connectedness’ and resilience of Paleolithic societies in Mediterranean ecosystems Mary Stiner, University of Arizona
2:25 PM	SYMP 8-4		Emerging macroecological patterns for human infectious diseases Jean-Francois Guégan, UMR 2724 IRD-CNRS-University of Montpellier, and French High School of Public Health, Franck Prugnolle, UMR 2724 IRD-CNRS-University of Montpellier, Frédéric Thomas, UMR 2724 CNRS-IRD-University of Montpellier, and University of Montréal
2:45 PM	SYMP 8-5		Modeling nature's services at multiple scales Peter Kareiva, The Nature Conservancy
3:05 PM	SYMP 8-6		Ecosystem processes associated with human settlements at local, regional, and continental scales Nancy B. Grimm, Arizona State University
3:25 PM	SYMP 8-7		Scaling of infrastructure and resource distribution networks in the urban environment Melanie Moses, University of New Mexico
3:45 PM	SYMP 8-8		Urbanization and sustainability: Quantifying the burden of human development on the Earth’s natural environment Luis M.A. Bettencourt, Los Alamos National Laboratory
4:05 PM	SYMP 8-9		Human resource use: Timing and implications for sustainability Joseph A. Tainter, Utah State University
4:25 PM	SYMP 8-10		Concluding thoughts and discussion James H. Brown, University of New Mexico

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See more of The 94th ESA Annual Meeting (August 2 -- 7, 2009)