"Gaia Hypothesis"

[Stephen Goranson]

Quoting Fred Shapiro <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>:

> "Gaia hypothesis" seems not to be in OED.  Below is the earliest I have
> found:
>
> 1974 Lynn Margulis & J. E. Lovelock in _Icarus_ Apr. 471  We review some
> recent information about the terrestrial atmosphere in the light of the
> "Gaia hypothesis" (Lovelock, 1972; Lovelock and Margulis, 1973).
>
> [The citations above refer to Lovelock, J. E. (1972). Gaia as seen through
> the atmosphere. _Atmos. Environ._ 6, 579-80; and Lovelock, J. E. and
> Margulis, L. (1973). Atmospheric homeostasis by and for the biosphere: the
> gaia hypothesis. _Tellus_.  The second article is described in the 1974
> paper as being "In press."  I have not confirmed that the term "Gaia
> hypothesis" appears in the first article, nor whether the second article,
> which apparently was not published until 1974, predated the occurrence
> above.]


The article in Tellus: A Bimonthly Journal of Geophysics appeared in
vol. 26 no.
1 (1974) 2-10. Manuscript received May 8, revised version August 20, 1973. On
page 2: "The notion of the biophere as an active adaptive control system able
to maintain the Earth in homeostasis we are calling the 'Gaia' hypothesis,
Lovelock (1972)"--same reference as above.

Stephen Goranson
http://www.duke.edu/~goranson