Environment.
Greetings,
Boris
While I assume German is Boris's mother tongue, and am very reluctant to
disagree with his translation, I think the problem goes much deeper than
merely translating.
The problem is that the term "environment" is an extremely wide term in
English. In particular, it lacks any sense of specificity.
Thus, for example, the term, Environmental Protection Agency
covers all aspects of the exterior world.
Yet an organism is focused on some fraction of that totality;
it prospers and trives in a local territory. Its nutritients
comes from sources which it has immedaite contact.
The biological term "niche" has alot in common with the word "umwelt"
but the term "niche" is loaded with lots and lots of Darwinian garbage
which makes it a loaded term in English.
For my own writings, I have coined the "ecoment", the root "eco"
means "home.
The definition I use is a causal one:
Every organism has necessary and sufficient conditions for triving and
propsering, that is sustaining itself in a "healthy condition"
The surrounding which provide the necessary and sufficient conditions is
an ecoment or a satifactory ecoment.
This definition is closer to "Umwelt" than to "Environment" and has an
added scientific meaning with specific attributes for any individual
organism or species. It is a basic fact of biology / biochemistry that
an organism changes as it moves about various ecoments - this is one of
the fundamental underlying notions which supports the idea of
"adaptibility" or "plasticity" of living systems. One reason for
working on the definition is to ensure recognition that the coupling of
the physical-chemical composition of an organism is linked directly to
the ecoment and not solely to other biological attributes. In other
words, I had to have a word which would be consistent with my
categorical modeling.
So, the tem "ecoment" smoothly satisfies my mathematical needs; you will
have to test out the various definitions for yourself in order to find
out if they work for your purposes.
The old "saw", "If the shoe fits, wear it" is particular important here
- just let your readers know what your definition is.
Jerry LR Chandler