The natural fallacy

The Natural Fallacy

We’re supposed to return to nature: organic, wholesome (lucrative, no less).

This essay states that as much as we pretend to be in a distended state of humanity, remote from nature, as a species we are still far from shedding our origins.

When we engross ourselves in genocide, waste of natural resources and the destruction of our environment, we’re said to be out of touch with nature. Surely the means by which we perform these are not very natural. Through the development of technology, rationalized organizational methods of individual behavior and an abundant flow of information, surely we have radically heightened the impact of the mere 7 billion persons we are. Compare the weight of our common digestion with that of some species of insects, and you will notice how little impact we would make without these multipliers.

However, though our means and methods of impact have changed, relatively little has been altered to our goals. Like any species, and ordained to do so by our holy scriptures, we multiply and take as we see fit. Not unlike ants or fungi and the ridiculous lemming, we multiply until we can no more and our habitat will be unable to support us. For lack of a stronger predator, the only thing to keep us in check, will the unavoidable extermination of our habitat. And a balance will be attained. That is nature, strictu sensu.

But in many ways, man has developed an array of capacities that transcend these natural patterns. The possibility to step back and look, ruminate about the state of affairs and make a decision based upon that. The possibility of not taking, even when it is up for grabs, specifically to spare, help, or encourage another. These judgmental and moral capacities surely have weak precedents in other, more developed species. They do not make us any more special than the fact that we possess them. But they are there and have developed to a level significant enough to provide us with strong alternative choices to the natural ones.

When persons refuse to take at the expense of others, try to use less to maintain a balance they consider worth refraining for, as for instance in the environmental context, those are strong indicators that men, as individuals transcend the limited instinctive possibilities nature had on offer. We have gained riches far greater than the ones we are burning at breakneck speed as a species.

For, at the communal level, these capacities are far from developed. It is individuals, sometimes small groups that, increasingly, have tried to take a step back and consider our actions. The anti-slavery movement is a fine example. Or the environmental explosion. Significant steps in a different way of dealing, in an alteration of our actions as indivuduals as well as species.

At this superlevel, very little has been achieved however, as we still bask in the natural paradigm, with no end in sight. When our financial superstructure, which, whether you like it or not, forms the backbone of our collective society, is on the brink of collapse… we adapt to it. As a species, we try to ‘make do’. We shift some of our patterns of behavior, try to diminish the worst excesses and move on, leaving the structure itself in place. When our way of production and consumption threatens to destroy our environment… we adapt to it. Instead of taking a step back and rethinking consumption, we try to alter our processing of it to minimize damage. When the distribution and reward mechanisms of our society leave millions without food, as others collapse under their weight or the stress their bank accounts engender… we adapt to that as well. Ignored are individual voices that cry murder (for it is) and clamour for a more ethical mode of distribution.

A major problem with more artificial modes of decision-making, is that we are not used to them. They do not fit our paradigm as a living beings. We are no robots, and any non-enforced mechanic society would never engender much enthusiasm in us, who refuse to be fenced in. Unless we slowly let information technology define us, I see no future in projects to create men anew. They have been tried and failed miserably, if only because they were led by very limited men.

So how do we ‘escape’ from these problematic structures? If an escape is possible, it would still have to carry the weight of a significant majority of people, which is hard to come by on any issue. What is certain is that mankind would do well to create more space for reflection on its actions and their consequences. To envision different possibilities for the future and to engender enthusiasm for them. We have left the threat of a nuclear holocaust behind us, but if we keep living by the laws of nature, we will die by them, and whether we consciously decide on a vision for the future and strive to attain it, or live and die by the sword we wield… a balance will be achieved in the end.