Artificial Natural "Give It Back"

Give It Back 

Artificial/ Natural

It is a struggle to categorise things or events into natural or artificial. One of the reasons that it is such a struggle is that it is, in itself, an artificial question. For tens of thousands of years our continual interactions with ecosystems have shaped human experience to the extent that we are no longer able to easily distinguish between what is natural and what is unnatural (artificial). The relevant question is not “artificial or natural”, but what is “of man” and what is “of nature”.

For example, when people look at a pleasant pastoral scene of honest labourers working in a field to bring in the harvest, they may think “how natural”, when in fact the opposite is true. Agriculture (probably the human activity we deem most natural) has almost completely wiped out the millions of hectares of broad oak forest that covered Europe. This isn’t a scene of natural harmony any more than the rotten cooling towers of Drax power station (singularly our largest emitter of carbon dioxide).

They are both distinctly “of man” and not “of nature” no matter how much more “natural” one scene may appear and how much more “artificial” the other appears.

Why is this distinction worthwhile pointing out?

It is a critical distinction because many people think that a return to some idyllic pre-industrial setting will save the human race from the trauma of global warming, but while this idea may be romantic, it may also be deluded.

Industry and urbanisation (“artificial” and evil) are usually singled out as the great contributors to the impending problems of the planet. While this is true, the greater truth is that agriculture (so called “natural” and good) is equally a significant threat to the planet. We imagine that factories, roads and houses blight the U.K. when agriculture in fact covers 70% of the country compared with only 14% for urban and suburban areas. That coverage leaves very little room for forest and woodland (12%)to act as either carbon sink or wildlife habitat.

We urgently need to return both urban and rural land to managed wilderness to help absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and to reduce the pressure on habitat that threatens wildlife everywhere. This means that we must live more densely (urban as opposed to suburban) and that agriculture needs to be more efficient (more food per hectare) and more effective (more crops for people and less feed for livestock) so that we can start the long overdue process of giving back land to nature for reforestation and the reintroduction of threatened species.

Most of all we need to think clearly about the changes needed to improve this planet and not fall for emotive and arbitrary distinctions between what is artificial and what is natural, as it hasn’t been a relevant question for some time.

Humankind stepped beyond natural thousands of years ago.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/graphics/2007/11/14/eapower114.jpg
www.hayinart.com/2004_10.html
Statistics from D.E.F.R.A.