Conservation Biology Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK Department of Botany, University of Cape Town, Private Bag, Rondebosch 7701, South Africa.
Ecol Lett. 2005 Nov;8(11):1218-34. doi: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2005.00814.x.
Two major international initiatives - the Convention on Biological Diversity's target to reduce the rate of biodiversity loss by 2010, and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment - raise the profile of ecological data on the changing state of nature and its implications for human well-being. This paper is intended to provide a broad overview of current knowledge of these issues. Information on changes in the status of species, size of populations, and extent and condition of habitats is patchy, with little data available for many of the taxa, regions and habitats of greatest importance to the delivery of ecosystem services. However, what we do know strongly suggests that, while exceptions exist, the changes currently underway are for the most part negative, anthropogenic in origin, ominously large and accelerating. The impacts of these changes on human society are idiosyncratic and patchily understood, but for the most part also appear to be negative and substantial. Forecasting future changes is limited by our poor understanding of the cascading impacts of change within communities, of threshold effects, of interactions between the drivers of change, and of linkages between the state of nature and human well-being. In assessing future science needs, we not only see a strong role for ecological data and theory, but also believe that much closer collaboration with social and earth system scientists is essential if ecology is to have a strong bearing on policy makers.
两项重大的国际倡议——《生物多样性公约》关于到 2010 年降低生物多样性丧失速度的目标，以及千年生态系统评估——提高了关于生态数据的知名度，这些数据显示了自然界变化的状况及其对人类福祉的影响。本文旨在提供对这些问题的广泛了解。关于物种状况变化、种群规模、栖息地范围和状况的信息是零散的，对于许多对生态系统服务的提供至关重要的分类群、区域和栖息地，几乎没有数据。然而，我们所知道的强烈表明，尽管存在例外，但目前正在发生的变化在大多数情况下是负面的、人为的、规模巨大且正在加速。这些变化对人类社会的影响是特殊的和零散的，但在大多数情况下，也似乎是负面的和实质性的。由于我们对社区内变化的级联影响、阈值效应、变化驱动因素之间的相互作用以及自然状态与人类福祉之间的联系了解甚少，因此预测未来的变化受到限制。在评估未来的科学需求时，我们不仅看到生态数据和理论的强大作用，而且还认为，如果生态学要对决策者产生重大影响，就必须与社会和地球系统科学家进行更密切的合作。
