A contextual quantum-based formalism for ecosystems

Population ecology is mainly based on nonlinear equations of the Lotka–Volterra type, which provide mathematical models for describing the dynamics of interacting species. However, for many interacting populations, these equations entail complex dynamical behavior and unpredictability, generating such difficulties and problematical situations as illustrated by the “paradox of the plankton” and the “paradox of enrichment”, for instance. A careful analysis shows that an ecosystem is a fundamentally contextual system, hence any formalism describing such systems should incorporate contextuality from the very beginning. But existing approaches are based on classical physics and probability theory, and introduce contextuality as an external effect, so that they cannot generally explain the main peculiarities of ecosystems. Basing ourselves on a contextual formalism elaborated to study microscopic systems in quantum mechanics and including appropriate nonlinear equations, we construct a generalization of the Lotka–Volterra equations for contextual systems, apply these equations to discuss some paradoxical situations encountered in ecology, and propound alternative solutions to those currently existing in the literature.