Biodiversity as a complex clockwork A biodiversidade como uma engrenagem complexa La biodiversidad como un engranaje complejo

as a complex clockwork We discuss some ideas about the concepts of diversity and biodiversity, explaining the title of this text at the end, and how Heringeriana understands its role as a vehicle for the dissemination of new knowledge in these topics.


Biodiversity as a complex clockwork
The terms biodiversity and diversity are present in daily life. We are constantly confronted with the use of these terms in the media, politics and colloquial conversations, but few really seek to effectively know what they mean. In a world permeated by shallow information, there is a fallacious collective belief that the understanding of concepts will be achieved by simple repetition of terms, without the need to seek the meaning of what is repeated. This is dangerous because it might resonate skewed understandings that lead to the impoverishment of our perception and understanding of the world around us. Moreover, the concern with the correct use of these terms is relevant because, if not clearly understood, the designing of efficient public policies for the protection of such diversity can be greatly impaired, harming society as a whole.
When we type "biodiversity concept" in a internet search engine, we are bombarded with a series of precarious definitions, many of them nothing more than circular reasoning about perceptions brought by the very name "biodiversity", associated with a lot of relevant information, but presented in a cluttered way, not effectively contributing to the clear understanding of the term.

Diversity and espionage
What is the best way to trick the enemy spy?
Imagine that information sensitive to your strategy is being passed on from your headquarters to your field agents. There is always a risk that this information will be intercepted by the enemy, endangering the confidential operation as well as the lives of its agents. It is wrong to imagine that the best way to deceive the enemy is to somehow hide the message. The encrypted code or the safe used, can always be decoded or broken. Even complex systems, such as those used by the Germans in World War II, can be exposed if the decoding mechanism falls into allied hands, as occurred with the famous Enigma Machine.
However, an efficient way to confuse the enemy is simply to saturate their decoding capability. Imagine the enemy is spying on your radio. If you send only one message a day, even if it is extremely encrypted, they will have only one message to try to "break" per day, focusing all their effort, team and dedication on it. Now imagine that you send random signals 24 hours a day, and in just two minutes of the day you transmit some important information diluted in 23 hours and 58 minutes of noise. Your enemy will be confused by the enormity of "messages" and will not know where, amid so many transmitted signals, to look for real information.
One way to deal with this is by using socalled information indexes. You can understand what is written in these lines of text because there is a logic of organization of letters that allows you to convey information. Basically, this information deals with which letters are used (richness of letters used) and how they repeat over words (abundance in which they appear  Figure 1), but unfortunately it has not yet been properly incorporated by most public managers and, even less, by society. This is the understanding of biodiversity that Heringeriana editors apply.

The dynamics of biodiversity
Despite the advances in the understanding of biodiversity, when we look at Figure 1 we have the impression that the complexity of biological diversity is still compartmentalized, being restricted to the "boxes" where each component is closed.
However, all these components are strongly interconnected by ecological interactions and processes that allow the transfer of mass and energy between them. A mutation of a gene that expresses a positively selected characteristic, will interfere in the differential survival of individuals of the species, interfering in the composition of species in a community, which will affect trophic relationships and other interactions, leading to changes in ecosystems and so on. Conversely, changes in landscapes, such as forest removal, will affect the diversity of genes present in this region.
Such transfer of mass and energy informs you that the structure presented in Figure 1 is not static, but functions as a constantly moving gear. It is this movement that generates the emerging properties of ecosystems, among which are the ecosystem services that enable our survival on the planet. Even evolution is part of the constant functioning of the biodiversity machinery.

Other approaches
One of the issues that has been studied recently is the role of phylogenetic diversity, taxonomic diversity, and functional diversity in the organization of biodiversity.
Let us imagine a situation where, in three different areas, we will study mammals of the   Noss (1990)  Estas diferencias en la historia evolutiva y la ecología de los ecosistemas terminan generando procesos interesantes en la estructuración de la biodiversidad, que ha sido el foco de varios estudios sobre la forma en que la vida se manifiesta y actúa en el planeta. Los seres humanos siempre han utilizado elementos de la biodiversidad, influyen e incluso actúan como fuerza selectiva de esta estructura. Actualmente, el aumento en la escala de impacto de esta actividad humana presenta varios desafíos para la conservación de la naturaleza, así como la necesidad de comprender la forma en que la vida humana interactúa con la vida no humana.
De esta forma, en un ágil proceso de revisión por pares, Heringeriana tiene como objetivo la publicación de estudios en acceso abierto, gratuitos, inéditos y avanzados que contribuyan a la comprensión de cómo opera el engranaje de Biodiversidad, enfocándose en aspectos relacionados con la composición, función y estructura de diversos elementos y niveles de complejidad de la organización de la vida en el mundo natural y en el desafío de su conservación.

A Gabriel Vargas Zanatta y Thelma Mendes
Pontes por la traducción al español.