Learning about organism diversity and about mankind in the Museum

Column

The exhibits in the 2nd Exhibition Room show the path that living things followed in the course of evolution. The 3rd Exhibition Room displays the different insects that inhabit each part of the world, and shows diversity through displays of individualized habitats of organisms which live in a shared area. The 4th Exhibition Room presents today’s dinner full of vegetables, crops, and fruits that have been selected from many plants which have undergone such evolutions. Finally, the 5th Exhibition Room displays the mutual influences that these organisms have on each other, and influences that human activities such as city-building and agricultural and forestry work have on living things.

Humans are also members of an ecosystem. There is a relationship between organisms living in paddy fields or waterways. Water circulates from mountains to the ocean, evolutionary passages are completed over a long period of time, movements on a global scale, and various circulation loops exist either in units of short or long periods of time, or in units of small or large magnitudes. In current times, are human beings incorporated in the mechanism that supports this loop? And how do human activities affect this circulation? Human activities have global impacts. How should we live our lives and maintain the earth so that our children or grandchildren can enjoy nature and diverse organisms?

We hope that the Museum can provide you with some hints when considering these things.

For those who want more information on the Museum

Explanatory materials and books are sold in the museum shop. However, these are only available in Japanese. There are also many publications regarding each individual exhibit. Please ask the shop attendants or staff if you require any of these references.