What if Nature Made the Rules?

You’re probably not old enough to remember, but a commercial in the 70s reminds me of this episode. In the commercial, a woman who represented Earth informed the viewer,

“‘It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.”

I don’t know if this ad made an impression on me, but my adult self agrees with it.

I don’t think we consult Mother Nature often enough. It might be my Evolutionary Ecology background showing, but I tend to think of things in terms of evolutionary history. In many ways, I use Nature as a reference in most of my life.

I have done several episodes honoring the beauty of evolution.

Episode 44, ‘Unnatural Selection’ suggests that humans have altered the typical course of evolution using things like technology and machines.

https://chrisburcher.com/2021/03/26/kew-episode-44-unnatural-selection/

In my 100th episode, ‘The Evolution Paradox’ I discuss how strange it seems that humans resist change despite being entirely driven by adaptation to a changing environment. Quite literally, the only thing we can depend on is that things change.

https://chrisburcher.com/2022/06/03/life-is-supposed-to-change-its-up-to-you-kew-episode-100-the-evolution-paradox/

Truly, most of my thinking assumes that the evolutionary model and history tells us a lot about success.

Fitness, according to Darwin, is essentially biological success. The things that persist on Earth are ‘fit’ for the environment. Fitness is good. Extinction is bad.

Here I am going a step further to suggest that we treat Mother Nature as our ally. Our therapist. Our counselor. Why would we not consult this wisdom when making decisions about our future?

This consultation is toward what I am calling ‘Natural Law’, though this term has been used before and isn’t quite suitable here.

I’m simply suggesting that we look to history to think about the future.

Kind of like how meteorology and predicting weather is more ‘hindcasting’, or looking to the past, than it is ‘forecasting’.

Instead, humans often assume we know better than Mother Nature because we are so evolved and intelligent. We create technology that helps our bodies live longer while our minds rot. We burn fossil fuels that help us fly around the planet while we destroy the systems the planet relies on for life. We’re good, but we’re not that smart.

This sort of unnatural selection is dangerously arrogant and, arguably, is leading to our demise.

The most obvious example of this erroneous and arrogant thinking is Capitalism, and I discuss this in detail in Episode 37, ‘The Currency of Life’.

https://chrisburcher.com/2021/01/08/kew-episode-37-currency-of-life/

Humans think we can do better than Mother Nature. And maybe we can, but we certainly shouldn’t implement these strategies without consulting her first.

Our ancestors knew this. We just forgot.

Episode 145 podcast:

https://www.buzzsprout.com/530563/13707626

YouTube:

https://youtu.be/Zk9Xz5qMQ2k