Diversity, stability and maturity in natural ecosystems

Diversity, stability and maturity, like niche and competitive exclusion, have been at the centre of much discussion. By covering a wide spectrum of meanings these terms have been useful in stimulating—and also in muddling—thinking. It now seems that most of the discussions on relationships between stability and diversity lead nowhere, particularly because it is difficult, perhaps impossible, to find direct causal relationships between them, and to explain stability in terms of diversity or vice-versa. This is because both concepts, as they are used, refer to external or peripheral properties of the ecosystem, and any empirical relation between them is a consequence of their common dependence on more fundamental properties of the ecosystem.