NatureGate® R& D
and business program – a general description and a proposal for Sweden
by
Prof. Mauri Ĺhlberg (
photographer Jouko Lehmuskallio
Handout
for the presentation in The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (Kungliga
Vetenskapsakademien), The Swedish National Committee for Biology (Svenska
Nationalkommittén för Biologi).
A general description of NatureGate® R& D and
business program
NatutureGate®
R& D and business program was created in January 2006. It is based on 16
years of systematic work by Eija and Jouko Lehmuskallio. Practically all of the
flowering plants and biotopes of Norden and
The basic
structure NatureGate® and the chain of reasoning are presented in the Table 1
and Fig. 1.
|
(1) the starting
point |
(2) the next level |
(3) the more
advanced level |
|
photographs
and videos of flowering plants, and
vascular plants in general, later on all organisms. The easy-to-use,
fast, patented soft ware for plant species identification. |
ecosystems and their
services for the whole humankind |
sustainable development, UN Decade
of Education for Sustainable development (2005 –
2014) |
|
refers to |
refers to |
refers to |
|
concrete objects |
both concrete and abstract
objects, real
ecosystems, the biggest is biosphere itself,
can be represented by systems models, more abstract than individual species and specimens |
very abstract objects and reasoning
of very complex issues and problems of the real world. Involves plenty of
high quality learning, thinking, and acting for sustainability |
|
encourage studying,
investigations, and inquiries of them in nature, outdoors, e.g. taking digital photographs and uploading
them to NatureGate® server. |
encourage studying, investigations, and inquiries of them in nature, outdoors,
e.g. taking digital photographs and
creating conceptual models, and dynamic models |
encourage both individual and collaborative
knowledge building and acting to promote sustainable development |
Table 1.
Some of the main content elements of NatureGate® R&D server on three
levels.
The core of
NatureGate® server (Figure 1) will be
(1)
exceptionally
good professional photographs and videos of plants and biotopes, scientifically
accurate and aesthetically enjoyable and motivating
(2)
easy-to-use,
fast, patented soft ware for identification of plants, and other organisms,
later on.
(3)
promotion
of biodiversity research and education. In the first EU e-conference on biodiversity
research and education, one of the conclusions was that biodiversity research
and education could be probably best promoted by a network of biodiversity
servers, like NatureGate® (Young, Ĺhlberg,, Niemelä, Parr, Pauleit & Watt
(Editors). 2006.).
NatureGate®’s proposal for Sweden
One of the
reasons for this presentation of NatureGate®
is to discuss about the possibility of launching it for use in
Carl Linnaeus
was one of the founders of The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (Kungliga
Vetenskapsakademien) in 1739. We have learnt that the goals of The Swedish
National Committee for Biology (Svenska Nationalkommittén för Biologi) include:
• to
strengthen the position of biology in society (school, the public and industry)
• to act as
advisory authority for universities and other branches of the educational
system.
Schools and
universities probably would not have money to buy NatureGate® services. They
have to be free of charge as the services of Google. There are promises that it
will be financially self-supporting in long term, in the same way as Google®
is. Google has shown amazing development from 2000 to 2006 (Battelle 2005, Vise
& Malseed 2005). It has become from humble beginning to one of the biggest
and most valuable companies in the world. Google and its rivals have transformed
both business and the whole culture by the web search-activities that they
created. The idea of NatureGate® is like “NatureGoogle”, a free service, which
however creates plenty of added values and business opportunities for
everybody, both individuals, societies, and organizations, for the whole
humankind. Every main country has its own node of Google. NatureGate® has
similar business plan, vision and strategy.
NatureGate®
would promote also many kinds of industries, and sustainable business in
general. There are nowadays millions of people having interest, time and money
to travel and take digital photographs of plants and other organisms. It is the
starting point. If later on, also garden plants would be included, then again
millions people more would be invited to use NatureGate®. If birds or
butterflies would be included, then again millions of new users would benefit
of the service. All their uploaded photographs could be used for biological
research and research on biology learning and education.
NatureGate®
would provide life long biodiversity learning and education for everybody.
Everybody would also have an opportunity to learn both more, and more deeply
about, and for sustainable development, good environment and good life.
There is a Swedish
program, ArtDatabanken, which could easily cooperate with NatureGate®. They are
complementary, not competing programs.
Figure
1.Main elements of NatureGate® R&D and business program in
References
- Battelle, J.
2005. The search. How Google and its rivals rewrote the rules of business
and transformed our culture.
- Vise, D. &
Malseed, M. 2005. The Google story.
- Young, J.,
Ĺhlberg, M., Niemelä, N., Parr, T., Pauleit, S., & Watt, A.D.
(Editors). 2006. Actions for the 2010 biodiversity target in
- Ĺhlberg, M.,
Lehmuskallio, E. and Lehmuskallio, J. 2006. NatureGate®, concept
mapping and CmapTools: Creating global networks of servers for improved
learning about, in and for nature, ecosystems, biodiversity, and sustainable
development. In Canas, A. & Novak, J. (Eds.) Concept Maps: Theory,
Methodology, Technology. Proceedings of the Second International
Conference on Concept Mapping.
http://cmc.ihmc.us/cmc2006Papers/cmc2006-p230.pdf#search=%22NatureGate%22