Hello anyone reading this.
Prepare yourself for a train. A train of thought.
A stream. A stream of consciousness.
To preface, I am both enamored with and confused by (confused as to whether or not it is the 'right' solution) the whole cradle to cradle idea… I agree with downsizing…
For me (in case this hasn't been obvious) it's all about some kind of fundamental truths and human nature. I am possibly operating out of the mind set that there is some kind of greater power, shhhh don't tell anyone. It just seems like everything fits together so neatly. Sure, it may simply be the case that this wonderful Earth system came about after a huge number of different random variations, and this is the only way it all goes together. Also there is the issue that the only reason I perceive things being put together in the 'right way' is because I, as a human, am able to comfortably exist in it. I guess in some ways assuming that things are correct is assuming that the Earth was made for people. Just because Venus doesn't have any aware beings that we know of, is it less? I'm just musing here, but humans are undoubtedly a part of the Earth (unless there is some sort of alien situation that I am unaware of… ooh but that would make for an interesting story), so we're a part of the Earth, as is evolution, we have evolved to have this beautiful, complex brain and have created so many things with it to make our lives 'easier' and 'better.' It seems that our brains, which are natural (whatever that means) would encourage us to function in a way that works with the environment from whence we have arisen. From this it seems perhaps something has gone wrong with our brains, everything was made to fit perfectly together, the infinite possibilities came together and produced this, but one of the outcomes it turns out was faulty… and it's us… I am inclined to think that common sense and morals should lead us to operate in a way that works with nature.
Earlier in the semester I got this crazy idea that I told myself I wouldn't share for fear of ridicule but I throw caution to the wind. I should preface this with the note that all of my surmising rests on less than well informed grounds.
Alors.
Basically it seems to me that all of the major world religions - Judaism, Catholicism, Islam, Buddhism, Hindu (and any others I'm missing)- rest on the same moral grounds. We could collect a lot of the moral codes from these religions and we would see some very strong parallels (again, I haven't actually done thing myself). I wonder if we had truly stuck to these moral codes what the world would look like, I am inclined to believe that we would be living in a more environmentally friendly place. Erik Assadourian said that he believed we need some kind of environmental religion, I don't know if this is where he was coming from, or if he was more acknowledging the fact that people require some kind of religion to follow for social reasons, or what exactly. I really must read more of his thoughts on this. Anyway, the point is all of these world religions arose independently (kind of), and they all acknowledge similar things, as did the Ancient Greeks… I can't really speak for their Mythology though, there was some funky stuff going on there… Native Americans have some interesting ideas as well. So all of this for me seems 'natural' to some extent….
The catalyst for all of this were two phone conversations- A few weeks ago I spoke with one of my best friends on the phone and she expressed the idea that humanity is small, and the Earth is large, and nothing we can do can really harm the Earth. This view greatly distressed me. A few weeks later I spoke to my mother and she expressed a similar view point. "The Earth has been through all of this before, ice ages, warming, meteorites, and it is always fine, it always adjusts." I felt a kind of depression creeping up, then I probed deeper and I realized that we were approaching the situation differently. What my mother (and I assume my friend) meant was that the Earth would be fine through global warming, people and animals might go extinct but the planet would still be there, basically until the Sun dies. Fair point. This seems to come down to definitions, as things so often do with me. What is the Earth? What are we fighting for when we fight for the planet? The Earth has always been the Earth right? Even before people existed. We're fighting for the inhabitants of the Earth, we're fighting for morals, we're fighting for a happier planet in terms of the living beings and systems supported by this chuck of molten magma and rock we're floating around on. We're fighting for fairness.
Balance is important, intuition is important, acting on what you know to be right and just is good, and getting all tangled up in detail and then never acting on anything isn't good, but it is important to take a step back and make sure everything is lined up right. I can't say that I've really figured out that everything is lined up correctly but at the very least I've analyzed things a bit more.
And on that very unfinished, unpolished note I leave you my friends.
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