Summary
In 1968, Lovelock proposed that the Earth's biosphere, atmosphere, oceans, and soils form a single living organism, which he called Gaia after the Greek Earth goddess. This entity constitutes a feedback system which supposedly seeks an optimal physical and chemical environment for life on Earth. Most scientists accept a weaker version of the hypothesis, that life has had a tremendous impact on the physical environment. They reject the strong version on the basis that planetary self-regulation would need foresight and planning by living organisms, which is incompatible with natural selection. Lovelock subsequently proposed a simple computer model, called Daisyworld, which shows that, under certain conditions, feedback systems without foresight can stabilize external inputs. The main value of the Gaia hypothesis lies in its holistic perspective, which is needed to avoid environmentally undesirable, cumulative effects of small decisions.
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Baerlocher, F. The Gaia hypothesis: A fruitful fallacy?. Experientia 46, 232–238 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01951752
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01951752