Fig. 1

Schematic distinguishing between (a) recovery (engineering resilience) and (b) ecological resilience. Panels on the left show subject (humans, ecosystems) trajectories before (full black arrow), during (gray arrow), and after disturbances (black broken arrow). Panels on the right express these dynamics with ball-in-cup heuristics commonly used in ecology. In the case of recovery/engineering resilience, the ball rolls back to its equilibrium position after a disturbance. In the case of ecological resilience, the ball rolls over the cup’s brink and falls into a new cup. This cup represents an alternative stable system regime from which recovery to the previous regime is impossible. This is symbolized with the ball not rolling back to the previous cup