The environment, in short, is the universe. The term can be honed in on and defined more specifically for various specific examples, but ultimately each smaller environment connects to every other until the entire universe, known and unknown, is one large environment constantly exchanging matter and regulating itself with each part affecting every other part in a massive Butterfly Effect.
"Environment" can mean many things- the area surrounding a living thing, the space or presence in which we exist, an interconnected ecological web of chemical reactions and life cycles. In one sense, my environment right now is simply my bedroom and this moment in time. It consists of the composition of the atmosphere within these walls, the objects in the room, the sound vibrations from next door, and all the stacked up history of this room and my life that come together to bring this arrangement of things in this way and create the reason why I am sitting here on a laptop typing about the environment, knowing what I know and having the thoughts about it that I do. However, at every second the crack in my window creates a flow of atmosphere in and out that is surely changing something in the room, and at any minute I am going to get hungry for lunch and leave the room, opening the door to the world, and the delicate definition of my environment will be thrown all to Hell.
I could pick a million different environments and define them in this way- including the one of planet Earth. But I believe my point is made. The environment both affects and is created by everything that is going on and changing in the universe. I conceive of it as a single cohesive unit that is constantly in flux within itself, and it exists in space and time and perhaps more.
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