Nature Red...

Mother Nature: Benevolent Gaea or bloodthirsty Kali?

In other words, do you believe there is an inherent justice in nature, "order" if you will, or is it merely a race for survival, a mad scramble to get to the next stage, pass the baton, where anything goes as long as you keep on running?

Or, borrowing the words of Joseph Campbell, do you believe in the Mythology of Peace or the Mythology of War?

We are all descendants of the mythologies of war. Mythologies of peace were all conquered, enslaved, annihilated.

Those who beat their swords into plowshares, will plow for those who didn't.

Same thing with nature.

Logging towns are endangered due to the protections offered to the spotted owl. The livelihoods of thousands, their futures and their childrens' futures are put at risk. It is a case of us against it, and some of our own species would take the defense of it, the spotted owl, in our detriment.

And that precisely is the point of this post.

Does the spotted owl have any superior claim to the right to survive, reproduce, thrive, than a lumberer?

Do the needs of the elusive American Jackelope trump our own?

There are some who will say: " But we are the only animals that kill for fun!" And that is patently false.



There is more than enough footage of animals being cruel to one another, being mean and killing unnecesarily.

And even if it where true, what would this supposed "morality" mean? When a hunting party from a village and a small pride of bachelor lions meet, when a bear breaks into your home enticed by the aroma of cooking, when armies march to kill one another for the possession of a fertile valley... there is no morality in the battlefield. There is no morality in the killing field.

In any case, the defense of the wildlife is a testament of how successful we are at surviving. We are so far ahead of everyone else at the race, that we can spare the time and effort to backtrack a bit to cheer and help other participants. We can stop a bit to help the special-ed kids when they fall flat on their faces. ( I am thinking of pandas here. Hate me all you want, but if they need help to even have sex, not to mention raising their young, maybe they do not deserve to survive.)

Still, we are in the race. We are far ahead, but we have not crossed the finish line.
We cannot see the finish line from where we are.

And maybe there is no finish line.

Keep that in mind. For that means we cannot afford to trip ourselves up in our effort to help the rest of them. Nature does not have favorites, and there is a running mob right behind you, ready to stomp us out of the race if we falter and fall on the path.