Natural environment

1. The natural environment is the set of living and non-living things on Earth which occur in a state substantially not influenced by humans. The term is most often applied to an ecological complex, which includes all of the plants; animals; microorganisms; abiotic factors such as minerals; rocks and magma; water bodies; and atmosphere layers.

2. There are extremely complex interactions between the living organisms and abiotic elements as well as meteorological influences, all of which combine to form rich speciation (видообразование) and biodiversity in most natural systems. Exceptions to this species richness are in extreme conditions of pH, temperature and deep ocean conditions, where only a limited number of biological species are able to survive as a result of specialized adaptations to these difficult environments.

3. A central principle of evolution, natural selection is a non-random (неслучайный) process that generates organisms well adapted to their environment by selectively reproducing beneficial changes in their genotype (their genetic make-up). Selection itself can be based on several factors – including survivability, fertility (плодородие), development speed and mating success among others – and mitigates the potentially harmful effects of random mutations by multiplying instances of those beneficial and eliminating those that are not (ie an organism’s chance of descendents is reduced).

4. In contrast to the natural environment is the built environment. In such areas where man has fundamentally transformed landscapes such as urban settings and agricultural land conversion, the natural environment is greatly modified and diminished (ослаблен, приуменьшен), with a much more simplified human environment largely replacing it. Even events, which seem less extreme, such as hydroelectric dam construction, or solar array construction in the desert, the natural environment is substantially altered.