A World Within Our World: Human Interaction With Nature (Or Lack Thereof)
For thousands of years, humans have tried to make sense of the world we occupy. During ancient times, humans lived in close contact with their habitats and created entities such as the ancient Greek gods in order to make sense of the wild environments around them. We have ancient texts such as the List of Ziusudra and The Epic of Gilgamesh which provide records of our deep connection with the earth and its billions of creatures — humans being only one such creature. However, over time and with the invention of civilized societies, our methods have changed. Humanity as a whole has become increasingly separate from and treated as superior to nature due to the development of technology and global civilization.
As far back as 2700 BC, humans recognized that nature was both a common enemy and a place to call home. The List of Ziusudra is a text written nearly five thousand years ago by King Ziusudra, having been the sole survivor of a flood that destroyed his home in ancient Mesopotamia. In it, he offers advice and contextualizes it with natural metaphors that reference the force of the flood that he has experienced. He asks to “share… the advice that those wise ones tried to offer… just as you’d grasp an ox to cross a mighty river, align yourself with a powerful man to lead you to success”. He concludes by saying that “fate, dear friends, is like a wet bank. It is always going to make you slip” (List of Ziusudra, translated by Joshua Barnes). It is important to remember the time period in which this was first inscribed. Ziusudra’s use of natural metaphors to express core aspects of human nature is ancient and still stands true today. He described these traits of humanity in the context of his society. His audience had experienced using an ox to cross the river or slipping on the wet riverbank, and he was aware of this fact. Ultimately, the river is what caused Mesopotamia to drown, but it allowed Ziusudra to recognize the power of nature and for him to pass on this knowledge to today’s humans.
Ancient Greece developed around 1,500 years after Ziusudra’s lifetime, and Greek society placed massive emphasis on using mythology to make sense of their world. Edith Hamilton’s 1942 classic Mythology text describes this by stating that “the myths… lead us back to a time when the world was young and people had a connection with the Earth… unlike anything we ourselves can feel” (Hamilton, page 1). Greek mythology is composed of thousands of gods and characters and stories, each representing a lesson or an aspect of the world as it relates to human nature. For example, they did not know what caused the sun to rise and set each day, so Apollo was established as the god of the sun. He appears in countless myths in order for the Greeks to understand, for themselves, how the world worked, as well as how to stay safe in such a world. Hamilton notes that “horrors lurked in the primeval forest, not nymphs and naiads” (page 2). People found solace in praying to their gods and performing rituals to ensure their safety because that was all they knew to do.
These myths and stories do hold up today as being true to human nature, but humans do not put such an emphasis on nature in storytelling as we once did. Today, we are heavily focused on science, reason, and technology. We have electricity and water delivered to our homes on command. We build cars and planes and ships to take us anywhere on the globe. Our world moves faster than anyone can reasonably comprehend, so it is no surprise that we have neglected the habitat we occupy. Robert A. Schultz is a former philosophy and ethics professor at several major universities. His 2013 book Technology Versus Ecology: Human Superiority and the Ongoing Conflict with Nature highlights the “underlying attitude” that modern society teaches. He states that “it is not only that human beings are better than other animals. Rather, human beings are entirely distinct from other animals and the rest of nature… We humans are not part of nature… We are also in charge of nature” (Schultz, page 3). One example he gives is the notion of population control. If there are too many deer in an area, it begins to impact the plant life that humans rely upon. Humans may choose to kill some of the deer themselves, or introduce more coyotes into the environment and let nature take its course. This is dangerously close to the idea of playing God, but the development of science and technology enables us to do so, and do so relatively quickly and safely.
Some may argue that it is our responsibility as the dominant species to control things like animal populations, regardless of whether or not it benefits us. We have the technology to monitor our planet and ensure our safety. Some believe this may allow us to actually become closer to nature through our observation. However, the developed areas of our planet are so overrun with concrete and pristine landscaping that nothing wild is allowed to slip through. People have lost touch with nature because we no longer need it to make sense of the world the way the ancient Greeks and so many millions before them did. We have created our own world that is completely separate from the space it occupies in the universe.
Works Cited
Hamilton, Edith. “Introduction to Classical Mythology.” Mythology, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, MA, 2013, pp. 1–11. The introduction segment of Edith Hamilton’s Mythology discusses how the Ancient Greeks used mythology and gods to make sense of the natural world around them.
Lenton, Timothy M., et al. “Climate tipping points — too risky to bet against.” Nature, vol. 575, no. 7784, Nov. 2019, pp. 592+. Gale OneFile: Environmental Studies and Policy, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A620055138/PPES?u=mlin_n_montcol&sid=bookmark-PPES&xid=a55c45a6. Accessed 28 Mar. 2023. This article talks about scientific experiments which point toward the urgency and necessity of human action against the climate crisis. It discusses the “tipping points” that humans must quickly respond to before the damage to the planet becomes irreversible.
Schultz, Robert A. Technology Versus Ecology: Human Superiority And The Ongoing Conflict With Nature. Information Science Reference, 2013. Robert Schultz’s book talks in immense detail about the development of global human society and its impact on human relationships with nature.
Ziusudra, List of Ziusudra. Translated by Joshua Barnes. This ancient text was written around 2700 BCE in the aftermath of a massive flood that killed all but one person, King Ziusudra, in what is today known as Mesopotamia. The introduction to the text discusses how the natural disaster impacted the area and the society which inhabited it. The prologue to the List of Ziusudra itself uses natural metaphors to offer advice in the aftermath of the tragedy. Ziusudra treats nature as something to adapt to or cohabitate with rather than something to conquer or dominate.
