Earth Dance

EARTHDANCE:
Living Systems in Evolution

Elisabet Sahtouris

Copyright © 1999 by Elisabet Sahtouris

To my planet and its people

Dancing is surely the most basic and relevant of all forms of
expression. Nothing else can so effectively give outward form to an
inner experience. Poetry and music exist in time. Painting and
architecture are a part of space But only the dance lives atonce in
both space and time In it the creator and the thing created, the artist
and the expression, are one. Each participant is completely in the
other. There could be no better metaphor for an understanding of
the...cosmos.
We begin to realize that our universe is in a sense brought into being
by the participation of those involved in it. It is a dance, for
participation is its organizingprinciple. This is the important new
concept of quantum mechanics. It takes the place in our
understanding of the old notion of observation, of watching without
getting involved. Quantum theory says it can’t be done. That
spectators can sit in their rigid row as long as they like, but there will
never be a performance unless at least one of them takes part And
conversely, that it needs onlyone participant, because that one is the
essence of all people and the quintessence of the cosmos.
-Lyall Watson, Gifts of Unknown Things

Thank you.
Special thanks to Jim Lovelock and Lynn Margulis for the original
inspiration to write this book and for their encouragement over the
years, also to Teddy Goldsmith for creating the Gaia Seminars in
Cornwall. My deep appreciation to DaveRatcliffe and Rebecca Lord
for putting the book on the Web while it was out of print, and to
Bruce Bigenho for his tireless efforts with the second edition. My
gratitude extends as well to Nancy Larson for the original cover
photo and to my son, Philip LaVere, for the cover design. Lastly, but
certainly not least, I thank with a smile my sometimes enigmatic but
wonderful editor at Praeger,Jeremy Geelan, for his great enthusiasm
and effort to get EarthDance out there!

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FOREWORD BY JAMES E. LOVELOCK
A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
A TWICE-TOLD TALE
COSMIC BEGINNINGS
THE YOUNG EARTH
PROBLEMS FOR EARTHLIFE
THE DANCE OF LIFE
A GREAT LEAP
EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION
FROM PROTISTS TOPOLYPS
FROM POLYPS TO POSSUMS
FROM POSSUMS TO PEOPLE
THE BIG BRAIN EXPERIMENT
WHAT THE PLAY IS ALL ABOUT
WORLDVIEWS FROM THE PLEISTOCENE TO PLATO
WORLDVIEWS FROM PLATO TO THE PRESENT
LESS THAN PERFECT, MORE THAN MACHINE
THE BODY OF HUMANITY
A MATTER OF MATURATION
ECOLOGICAL ETHICS
THE INDIGENOUS WAY
SUSTAINABLE SOCIETY
COSMIC CONTINUATION
BIBLIOGRAPHY

Foreword

The Gaiahypothesis, now accorded the status of Gaia theory, is maturing with experience
and the tests of time, not unlike the humans of this book. It is spurring a great deal of
scientific research into the geophysiology of our living planet. It is also spurring philosophic
conceptions of what it means to our species to be part of a living planet. Some of these
conceptions stay carefully within the acceptedlimits of science; others have a religious bent.
Most, especially environmentalist conceptions, advocate for humanity, being primarily
concerned with human survival. A few, taking a clue from my partner Lynn Margulis and
myself, advocate for the planet and the much maligned microbes with which the Gaian
system originated and which continue to do its basic work.
Elisabet Sahtouris’ conceptionintegrates scientific Gaian evolution with the human search to
connect with our roots, inspiring us to learn from billions of years of Gaian experience in the
self-organization of workable living systems. It is well balanced between advocacy for the
planet and advocacy for humans, placing the onus on humans to recognize the lack of
maturity involved in believing we can manage the planet, and to...