Is Odum's Ecological Thought Holism?

Although E. P. Odum is generally credited as being one of the most influential holistic ecologists of the 2Oth century, his ideas regarding the philosophy of ecology are in fact conflicted. Paradoxically, Odum's ecological philosophy combines both holism and the opposing belief system of reductionism. On the one hand, his beliefs are ontologically and epistemologically holistic, as demonstrated by his definition that the ecosystem is regarded as a functional whole and the nature of emergence is recognized in all levels of ecosystem. However, Odem shows a clear use of reductionist methods when creating ecological models, whereby he regards an ecosystem as a physical and cybernetic system where ecological networks are simplified into energy pathways. While Odem is, for the most part, holistic from an ontological point of view, and both holistic and reductionist from an epistemological point of view, his methods are rooted firmly in reductionist beliefs. In other words, his ontological holism is in direct opposi