Profound, indeed. However, when you speak of "man" and the alteration of nature, it must be recognized that certain "men" are more at fault than others and I shall let that tub stand on its own.
Your appreciation for natures tumult and violence resonates deeply with me as I, earlier in life, wished to be a meteorologist, but was discouraged from doing so. Perhaps for the better in the final analysis.
I do agree "certain" men are more at fault, and actually a very small "certain" men who did and still do try to control the resources and enlist, blackmail, or otherwise force others to summit to those few "certain" men who own the resources that make the rest (are most of the rest of men) to be enslaved to have adequate resources to even survive.
*Interesting concept, Ken. Some I agree, some I don't. We are experiencing a probably disastrous climate change caused primarily by human activity. I do not think excrement has anything whatsoever to do with it. All living organisms excrete waste products - except viruses and a lot of my fellow scientists do not accept viruses as "living". What Homo sapiens has done to disrupt Earth's normal cyclic existence is to 1) create too much carbon dioxide. 2) misuse nuclear fusion to the detriment of our own species and millions of other species too (which we never consider because of our narcissistic rationale) 3) create chemicals and chemical waste detrimental to the Earth. 4)allowed, indeed encouraged, politicians and industrial corporations to ignore the warning signs since at least the 1970's and for fifty or more years continued our contamination of the Earth.
I do not think nature is "punishing us". But then I am an atheist and do not believe a god, whether it be nature or a "guiding" force exists. Therefor we are punishing ourselves for and by doing whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted, and never considered the effect of our actions. If Homo sapiens doesn't survive we have no one to blame but our selves. The cockroaches and bacteria who will survive don't give a damn. Somehow, I think (opinion not fact) some Homo sapiens will survive. I hope they have learned from the selfishness of us during the past 100,000 years and are more aware of and kinder to our planet than we have been. I wish them well.
of course every life form excretes, the point is of course that the design or chance or whatever term you choose has other lifeforms that digest the poop and that the earth always seems to create a natural balance. All life survives in a harmonious relationship. It's not necessarily "godly" it is I think, teleological because that is what the elements and molecules do--combine and change. So when we concentrate too much waste, it will unbalance the design. I don't see it as a "planned" design, but nevertheless a design in that that is just the way it is. I don't think it is designed, but a design. The problem is that man often wants to be the designer and designers somehow unseat the design. Words don't really do justice to what I'm trying to say, so I like isness or just that things are just the way they are and one of the way things are---not just on earth, but apparently universally is some kind of need for things to be balanced but different. Not even all black holes are the the same---I don't know the reason, but probably if they were all of the same size or strength everything would be swallowed into them eventually and many thought that not too long ago, now we believe they give new life to new star systems, but then again, at first they thought they "spit out new stars" millions of light years, now they've discovered new stars being formed practically on the back doorstep of black holes. So the only design I know is that for some reason there needs to be differences to be balances and so designing is out of the question because a designer upsets the weirdly explainable (to me) of what seems to be a need of the innards of molecules (getting to be discovered smaller and smaller infinitesimally fractions as if there is no end to how small and also seemingly how expansively big the universe is.
And human beings have often tried to be designers that upset this need for a diversified balance that can only be the very nature of the smallest building blocks. Some suggest they could be different, there could be other universes that aren't like ours and certainly I'm not capable of saying other designs are impossible--in fact, judging from ours I would expect they would be different in design.
So I guess I do not think of myself as an atheist. But I don't think I am either pantheistic or panetheistic. I would simply consider myself to be in awe of what is and the way it is.So I respect nature.
Nature will punish us not in a literal sense of course but nevertheless the more we try to control nature to be the way we want it to be the more we upset the natural balance that is change and diversity the the greater likelihood of a catastrophic change that might see as if it punishing us, or fighting back against us. In reality it is adjusting to the catastrophic effects of humanity's impact.
Anyway, next Monday I am shifting gears to possible ways mankind can adopt without needing to return to hunter-gatherer cultures and I do believe there are many paths open.
I agree on almost all your thoughts, excerpt punishment. We are the punishers, not nature. In our greed and egoism, we try to form everything to our exclusive benefit, giving no consideration to planet Earth or any other living organism on it.
Profound, indeed. However, when you speak of "man" and the alteration of nature, it must be recognized that certain "men" are more at fault than others and I shall let that tub stand on its own.
Your appreciation for natures tumult and violence resonates deeply with me as I, earlier in life, wished to be a meteorologist, but was discouraged from doing so. Perhaps for the better in the final analysis.
https://medium.com/@kenyattasgal/the-winds-of-change-mr-steins-lesson-for-the-united-states-c578a82e946c
I do agree "certain" men are more at fault, and actually a very small "certain" men who did and still do try to control the resources and enlist, blackmail, or otherwise force others to summit to those few "certain" men who own the resources that make the rest (are most of the rest of men) to be enslaved to have adequate resources to even survive.
*Interesting concept, Ken. Some I agree, some I don't. We are experiencing a probably disastrous climate change caused primarily by human activity. I do not think excrement has anything whatsoever to do with it. All living organisms excrete waste products - except viruses and a lot of my fellow scientists do not accept viruses as "living". What Homo sapiens has done to disrupt Earth's normal cyclic existence is to 1) create too much carbon dioxide. 2) misuse nuclear fusion to the detriment of our own species and millions of other species too (which we never consider because of our narcissistic rationale) 3) create chemicals and chemical waste detrimental to the Earth. 4)allowed, indeed encouraged, politicians and industrial corporations to ignore the warning signs since at least the 1970's and for fifty or more years continued our contamination of the Earth.
I do not think nature is "punishing us". But then I am an atheist and do not believe a god, whether it be nature or a "guiding" force exists. Therefor we are punishing ourselves for and by doing whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted, and never considered the effect of our actions. If Homo sapiens doesn't survive we have no one to blame but our selves. The cockroaches and bacteria who will survive don't give a damn. Somehow, I think (opinion not fact) some Homo sapiens will survive. I hope they have learned from the selfishness of us during the past 100,000 years and are more aware of and kinder to our planet than we have been. I wish them well.
of course every life form excretes, the point is of course that the design or chance or whatever term you choose has other lifeforms that digest the poop and that the earth always seems to create a natural balance. All life survives in a harmonious relationship. It's not necessarily "godly" it is I think, teleological because that is what the elements and molecules do--combine and change. So when we concentrate too much waste, it will unbalance the design. I don't see it as a "planned" design, but nevertheless a design in that that is just the way it is. I don't think it is designed, but a design. The problem is that man often wants to be the designer and designers somehow unseat the design. Words don't really do justice to what I'm trying to say, so I like isness or just that things are just the way they are and one of the way things are---not just on earth, but apparently universally is some kind of need for things to be balanced but different. Not even all black holes are the the same---I don't know the reason, but probably if they were all of the same size or strength everything would be swallowed into them eventually and many thought that not too long ago, now we believe they give new life to new star systems, but then again, at first they thought they "spit out new stars" millions of light years, now they've discovered new stars being formed practically on the back doorstep of black holes. So the only design I know is that for some reason there needs to be differences to be balances and so designing is out of the question because a designer upsets the weirdly explainable (to me) of what seems to be a need of the innards of molecules (getting to be discovered smaller and smaller infinitesimally fractions as if there is no end to how small and also seemingly how expansively big the universe is.
And human beings have often tried to be designers that upset this need for a diversified balance that can only be the very nature of the smallest building blocks. Some suggest they could be different, there could be other universes that aren't like ours and certainly I'm not capable of saying other designs are impossible--in fact, judging from ours I would expect they would be different in design.
So I guess I do not think of myself as an atheist. But I don't think I am either pantheistic or panetheistic. I would simply consider myself to be in awe of what is and the way it is.So I respect nature.
Nature will punish us not in a literal sense of course but nevertheless the more we try to control nature to be the way we want it to be the more we upset the natural balance that is change and diversity the the greater likelihood of a catastrophic change that might see as if it punishing us, or fighting back against us. In reality it is adjusting to the catastrophic effects of humanity's impact.
Anyway, next Monday I am shifting gears to possible ways mankind can adopt without needing to return to hunter-gatherer cultures and I do believe there are many paths open.
I agree on almost all your thoughts, excerpt punishment. We are the punishers, not nature. In our greed and egoism, we try to form everything to our exclusive benefit, giving no consideration to planet Earth or any other living organism on it.