An ecological web (ecoweb) is an interconnected network of diverse living beings (including humans) and abiotic (non-living) components (e.g., water, minerals, air, rocks) that have evolved together over time in a particular niche of our planet and are thus mutually beneficial to and dependent on each other.^[1]

What Is Ecosymbiosis?

In an ecoweb, all components are interconnected, meaning that changes in any one component causes a change in the other components; such changes are mediated through Adaptation Feedback Loops.^[1] Thus, living organisms within a particular ecoweb evolve and adapt with respect to each other, maintaining the interconnectedness and interdependence of the ecoweb (ecosymbiosis). Evolutionary processes generally work over very long timescales, ranging from centuries to millions and/or billions of years.

In a healthy ecoweb, there is an astounding diversity of living beings (including humans), each attuned and able to respond adaptively to different feedback loops within the system, whether it is a shortage of rainfall, extreme temperatures, or disease. Thus, a healthy ecoweb, as a whole, comprising all its interdependent and interconnected livings beings and abiotic (non-living) components, has adaptive resilience. In other words, the resilience of a healthy ecoweb is a result of ecosymbiosis, hence the concept of ecosymbiotic resilience.

Biodiversity: Repository of Ecosymbiotic Creativity

The process of evolution operating on living organisms within the thousands of unique geographical niches (i.e., defined by a unique set of abiotic components) on our planet has resulted in an astounding variety of different types (species) of living organisms (estimates range from 3 to 100 million). This amazing diversity of species is called biodiversity^[2].

Biodiversity is the remarkable creative response of life to the enormous array of abiotic conditions on our planet, including water levels, temperature, elevation, and mineral content (of soil and water). Life evolved from single-celled organisms within warm water bodies, over 3 billion years ago, to the vast plethora of single-celled and multicellular organisms that now inhabit almost every geographical/ environmental niche on our planet, creating unique and thriving ecowebs almost everywhere. 

Each ecoweb flourishes because of the continuous interplay and interconnectedness between all of the unique living organisms that have adapted to each ecoweb. Thus, the biodiversity of an ecoweb, which is much greater than the sum total of all of the different biological processes carried out by millions of different types of proteins in thousands of different species (including bacteria, fungi, algae, fish, insects, amphibians, plants, birds, and mammals), can be thought of as the repository of all the ecosymbiotic creativity of these living beings connected to each other and the abiotic components of their ecoweb.

Ecosymbiotic Resilience: Creative and Adaptive Survival and Restoration in Response to Adversity  

What is the basis of ecosymbiotic resilience (adaptive resilience) and why is it important? 

Ecowebs are not static, as they are subject to constantly changing conditions. Some of these conditions change relatively predictably in a cyclical manner, e.g., with the seasons. Organisms adapted to a particular ecoweb can easily thrive in such cyclically changing conditions by cyclically altering their biological processes. 

However, some changes in condition are neither cyclical nor predictable, like severe droughts and floods, excesses in temperature, or the introduction of certain pathogens. Due to the enormous repository of ecosymbiotic creativity inherent in the biodiversity of an ecoweb, the ecoweb as a whole can adapt to such unpredictable changes in conditions through small adaptive changes in all, or nearly all, of the ecosymbiotic organisms (through Adaptation Feeback Loops^[1]). This is adaptive resilience or ecosymbiotic resilience.

For example, if there is excessive rain in a particular ecoweb, plant A may grow a more extensive root system to soak up some of the water to prevent insect B from drowning. A decreased population of insect B may enable microorganism C to increase production of nutrient D, which might help plant A grow its root system more quickly. If, in this simplified ecoweb, plant A or microorganism C did not exist, insect B would drown and perhaps the entire ecoweb would be irreversibly affected.  

Ecosymbiotic resilience depends on the existence of biodiversity. Thus, if most of the biodiversity of an ecoweb is destroyed (in effect, greatly diminishing the creative and adaptive capacity of the ecoweb), such as through a cataclysmic event like an asteroid impact or human extractivist activity, an ecoweb loses its resilience and eventually ceases to exist (in its original biodiverse form). 

[1] K. Mitra, Ecological Webs (Ecowebs): Collaborative Creativity Through Adaptation Feedback Loops, Ecosymbionts all Regenerate Together (EaRTh): DOI-EaRTh092025-006 (3 Sep., 2025).

[2] K. Mitra, FiveBecomings: Countering Ecocide and Jīvacide Through a Non-Human-Centric Approach, Ecosymbionts all Regenerate Together (EaRTh): DOI-EaRTh092025-001 (1 Sep., 2025).