One Nature to rule them all — Letter #2
Dear Francisco,
What a feeling… Apart from utility bills, car insurance and supermarket fliers I have to admit I haven’t received a letter like yours in AGES!
How are you?
I’m doing fine, thank you. I also hope your loved ones are well in these uncommon times.
Well, it always feels kind of nuts and confusing when we write about things we think. I guess it’s only… Natural. So, don’t worry too much about it, it’s actually a very good theme. After all, what is “unnatural” if all the things we know of exist?
I remember thinking once about this natural/unnatural dichotomy, when I was wondering about the so-called synthetics in cosmetics, pharma and fashion industries. In other words, those things “they” make up in labs and put in the things we all use. Of course, these synthetics are all based in natural products, but I guess people don’t like “natural” things to be too much transformed… Even if they turn into these extra-comfy shoes to trail among Nature or these fresh lemon juices we take by the beach on a hot summer day. But why do you think this happens? Why do we tend to dislike so much industrial processes? Is it because of historical reasons, since we have to admit that there are a lot of stories involving dangerous chemicals in foods, textiles, etc.? Or do we simply dislike what we — humans — create? And if so, is it perfectionism or lack of species-wide self-esteem? Or worse! Do we all know our nature so well that we tend to believe that everything our humankind invents has some perverted intention underneath?
But this Nature theme is of utmost interest and very trending. And this happens because we clearly have a problem with Nature: like you said, we are innovators and we always end up trying to improve things, pushing the boundaries of the previous civilizations… Unfortunately, in my opinion, I think we must have crossed some red lines somewhere in the process. We disconnected from Nature. Don’t you think? It feels like we’re constantly drifting away from the environment where we grew up. And even that we’re ruining it… And then, some of us feel pity of this behavior and we build these beautiful gardens in the middle of our cities. But then we can’t step on the grass, because we can damage it… What?! So, we build cities on top of Nature, then we allow it to grow a little bit in the middle of our buildings for our own joy, a few people take care of it (like Nature was in need of a tutor…) and the others can’t enjoy it…
But, hey… Here I am… Considering that everything we build on top of Nature is… Unnatural. It wasn’t on purpose, I swear!
Looking forward to hearing back from you.
Take care,
Ricardo
Read Francisco’s response here.
