The Western Relationship With Nature

Nature is the playground for every human. It is essential that we include nature in our lives; it keeps us on our correct path. However, if we dismiss ourselves from nature, we begin to stray from our correct path. We become engulfed in the distractions from the modern world . The only approach to appropriate this quandary is to break our pervicacious ways and return to peaceful serenity known as nature.

Throughout history, humans have had a strong reliance on nature and their environment. As far back as historians can look, people have depended on elements of nature for their survival. In the past few decades, the increased advancement of technology has led to an unfortunate division between humans and nature, and this lack of respect is becoming a flaw in current day society. In Last Child in the Woods, Louv criticizes modern culture by arguing that humans increasing reliance on technology has led to their decreasing connection with nature through the use of relevant anecdotes, rhetorical questions and powerful imagery to appeal to ethos.

‘The sheer popularity’ of stimulating nature or using nature as ad space ‘demands that we acknowledge, even respect, their cultural importance,’ suggests Richtel. Culturally important, yes. But the logical extension of synthetic nature is the irrelevance of ‘true’ nature— the certainty that it’s not even worth looking at. (Louv lines 9-19)

This paper will begin with an exposition of the article, “Radical Environmentalism and Wilderness Preservation: A Third World Critique” written by Ramachendra Guha, a sociologist and historian involved in ecological conflict in the East and the West. In this article, he refers to American environmentalism as “deep ecology”, a modern theory founded by Arne Naess. Guha’s argues that based on a comparison of the concepts of deep ecology and other cultural environmentalisms, deep ecology is strictly rooted in American culture and thus, leads to negative social consequences when it is applied to the Third World. This argument will be achieved by first defining deep ecology and its principles.

In Paul Taylor’s essay, “The Ethics for Respect for Nature,” he argues that… In this paper I will first describe Taylor’s concept of “respect for nature.” I will then explain the part this attitude plays in rationally grounding a biocentric outlook on environmental ethics. Lastly, I will present Rosalind Hursthouse’s criticism of Taylor’s view, and state how Taylor might respond to this criticism.

Humans are born from and return to earth at death; human beings and nature are bound up each other. Yet, the technological modern world has shaped humans to be oblivious of nature and the ethnocentrism has positioned human beings above all other things. Nature has become resources for people and nothing more than that. David Abram, the author of the Ecology of magic, travels into the wild, traditional land in search of the relation between magic and nature; the meaning nature holds in the traditional cultures. Abram intends to communicate his realization of the magical awareness of the countless nonhuman entities and the necessity of the balance between the human communities and the nature to the readers, hoping the Western technologized

Throughout today’s society there are several different cultural perspectives which form theoretical and practical understandings of natural environments, creating various human-nature relationship types. In this essay, I will describe and evaluate different ways of knowing nature and the impact of these views on human-nature relationships. From this, I will then explore my own human-nature relationship and reflect on how my personal experiences, beliefs and values has led me to this view, whilst highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of each and reflecting upon Martin’s (1996) continuum.

Environmental history explores a variety of topics in order to connect nature to humans. In doing so, a new history emerges. As this history unveils itself, it becomes evident that throughout time, humans have taken it upon themselves to improve the nonhuman world for their own gains. Numerous scholars have contemplated this idea, and while they do not all agree on the meaning or the means of improvement upon the land, it remains a constant theme. By exploring the theme of improvement to land, a clear path forms. The idea of improvement in environmental history creates artificial agency for humans, as well as revealing that improvement cannot happen without having an adverse effect on humans.

Nature is not altered by humanity and instead is pure, creating inspiration for people to be original. Nature is “the greatest delight which the fields and woods minister, in the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable” (Nature 221). People who believe in transcendence see the importance

Similar to Cronon’s Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature, Evernden discusses the concept of nature in today’s society and the impacts of mixing meanings of the term nature. Evernden begins by elaborating on the term nature and using the concept of nature to support contrasting ideas. The author continues by philosophically analyzing two questions about nature: What does the word nature mean? What is nature? Evernden then discusses several definitions and understandings of the term nature. A few of the definitions of nature mentioned are as follows: nature meaning kind; nature as a danger; nature as an assertion of relationships. He relates these concepts to the term phusis, and then goes into detail about the Greek origins

She argues that human culture’s universal devaluation of nature and the association within all cultures of women with nature is the clue to the problem. Culture is the tool through which humans are able to ‘transcend the givens of natural existence, bend them to its purposes, control them in its interests’ and it is this ‘human ability to act upon and regulate, rather than passively move with and be moved by’ nature which Ortner considers evidence that humankind regards itself as inherently superior to our natural surroundings. She admits that this opposition is not equally clear in all societies but maintains that the universal presence of ritual practices is evidence of human awareness of our ability to manipulate the natural world. Further, woman is in all cultures viewed as closer to nature than man, Ortner postulates, due to her physiology, the social roles she is confined to as a result of her physiology and the psyche she develops through living her social role.

The people nowadays also abuse on what nature can provide to them. People are influenced by the western Culture, Man is more powerful and can have dominion over nature and that nature as they see become merely an instrument to satisfy human needs and wants. This kind of thinking or we can say attitude towards nature is called the “Anthropocentric Attitude”. Man reduce the value of nature as it is and it’s important because nature has made all things specifically for the sake of man and that the value of non-human things in nature is merely instrumental. An opposite thinking would be the Eastern Culture, for they value nature very well and they treat nature being one with them. This thinking or attitude is known as “Ecocentric

In life we are all confronted with the idea of nature along with society. Although both have their pros and cons they work together to give us freedom and order among individuals.

In American Literature many authors write about nature and how nature affects man's lives. In life, nature is an important part of people. Many people live, work, or partake in revelry in nature. Nature has received attention from authors spanning several centuries. Their attitudes vary over time and also reflect the different outlooks of the authors who chose to discuss this important historical movement. A further examination of this movement, reveals prevalence of nature's influence on man and how it affects their lives.

Nature as w e know it means different things to different people. To an economist, natural is often seen as a resource to be transformed and put in readiness for human use. An alternative view is that humans are stewards who should care for natural things as well as making use of nature’s bounty. Another view is that nature of animism, which sees nature as a living thing, something to be respected and not controlled. Some native American’s view the earth as a sacred place could be called animist. Another alternative view is that the entire planet earth is a self correcting system based on a symbiotic relationship between the earth and the living beings(Peacock,