Editing Homeostasis (section)

==Biosphere==
In the [[Gaia hypothesis]], [[James Lovelock]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lovelock |first1=James | title=Healing Gaia: Practical Medicine for the Planet|url=https://archive.org/details/healinggaiaprac00love |url-access=registration |location=New York |publisher=Harmony Books |date=1991|isbn= 978-0-517-57848-3}}</ref> stated that the entire mass of living matter on Earth (or any planet with life) functions as a vast homeostatic [[superorganism]] that actively modifies its planetary environment to produce the environmental conditions necessary for its own survival. In this view, the entire planet maintains several homeostasis (the primary one being temperature homeostasis). Whether this sort of system is present on Earth is open to debate. However, some relatively simple homeostatic mechanisms are generally accepted. For example, it is sometimes claimed that when atmospheric carbon dioxide levels rise, certain plants may be able to grow better and thus act to remove more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. However, warming has exacerbated droughts, making water the actual [[limiting factor]] on land. When sunlight is plentiful and the atmospheric temperature climbs, it has been claimed that the [[phytoplankton]] of the ocean surface waters, acting as global sunshine, and therefore heat sensors, may thrive and produce more [[dimethyl sulfide]] (DMS). The DMS molecules act as [[cloud condensation nuclei]], which produce more clouds, and thus increase the atmospheric [[albedo]], and this feeds back to lower the temperature of the atmosphere. However, rising sea temperature has stratified the oceans, separating warm, sunlit waters from cool, nutrient-rich waters. Thus, nutrients have become the limiting factor, and plankton levels have actually fallen over the past 50 years, not risen. As scientists discover more about Earth, vast numbers of positive and negative feedback loops are being discovered, that, together, maintain a metastable condition, sometimes within a very broad range of environmental conditions.