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Final Paper | Falak Vasa
Issues in VCS | Kristi McGuire
December 13th, 2015
Nature, ‘nature’ and human
“Putting something called Nature on a pedestal and admiring it from afar
does for the environment what patriarchy does for the figure of Woman. It is a
paradoxical act of sadistic admiration.”1 From the moment reason dawned upon
humankind, we became observers of the world. Causality shaped human thought
and evolution, propelling our race to the present age in which our authority as the
prime species is unchallenged. Such tools, always imperceptibly fueled by a will to
survive and propagate have seemingly pushed us away from our humble ancestral
beginnings. Such a rising intelligence has given birth to emotional, political, cultural
and ideological systems that have allowed for constant expansion of the human
species. While these systems become more and more convoluted along with the
problems within them, it is worthwhile to take a step back and ask ourselves what it
means to be human, what an anthropocentric view of the world adds or redacts
from the human experience and as the greatest users of ‘nature’, why do we admire
and attempt to conserve it so?
“Whence will all these come? Where are they now? Where is the abundant
womb of that nothing which is pregnant with worlds and which still conceals them,
1
Morton, Timothy. Ecology without Nature: Rethinking Environmental Aesthetics. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard UP, 2007. Print.
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the coming generations?’2 To know who we are, we must know where we have come
from. Despite coming from nothing and returning to nothing, we continue to exist
between birth and death. This continual existence is owed to ‘world will’, a force
that drives all individuals of a species to strive to survive. Many would argue that
the purpose of a human life in the present age is more. Yet, intellect does not allow
us to escape from this reality. Instead, we are distracted by our own intellect and
sucked into the convoluted structures of human society, still struggling to survive.
The intellect, in many ways, serves as a simulacrum3—pretending to create systems
that seem so embedded in reality that the very identification of these systems as
pretense is impossible. From emotional systems of attachment to capitalist systems
of government, everything boils down to being simulacra that hide themselves as
truth, but are driven by ‘world will’. Perhaps this is the only feature we share with
every other species – a will to survive. If this is the prime force that drives all life,
are anthropogenic systems distractions or facilitators?
Anthropogenic systems of emotions, politics, culture and so on behave as
both distractions and facilitators of survival. Such systems emphasize a struggle for
control over our species. With universal systems that are prone to fallacies, the
‘world will’ that drives us leaves room for us to evolve and further complicate these
systems in order to allow for a continual expansion of the species and deepening of
the simulacra. If the prime cause for all ecological and climatic problems is
2
Schopenhauer, Arthur. The World as Will and Representation: In Two Volumes; Volume II, p. 477.
New York: Dover Publ., 1966. Print.
3
"Simulacra and Simulations." Baudrillard. Web. 17 Dec. 2015.
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overpopulation, what is it that prevents us from self-destructing majority of our race
for the survival of the genetic material of the few? Systems of emotion and ethics
interfere in a way that always allows ‘world will’ to triumph. These systems of
emotion and ethics however, also serve as distractions at the same time. They serve
to fool our intellect and distract us from the simplicity and ethereal nature of our
existence.
Knowing that our human existence is a complicated mixture of systems and
structures that ultimately serve the species and its chances of survival, the
anthropocentric view of the world is becoming increasingly important as our
dominance continues to rise. Before we attempt to answer whether such a view is
the most valid one, the question arises of whether a non-anthropocentric or nonhuman perspective of the world even exists. To say that non-human life forms do
not have a perspective of the world would be an egotistical and anthropocentric
claim to make in the first place. Due to the direct lack of access to these perspectives,
their existence cannot be verified. Much like Schrodinger’s cat, these perspectives
remain and cease to remain simultaneously. However, despite these limitations, a
human perspective reveals only enough to suggest a stream of consciousness that
runs through the world, with its own language and manifestations. Thus, if we are
willing to concede that such a realm could exist amongst us while being unknown to
us, perhaps with even more complicated systems than our own, then the hierarchy
of importance of perspectives is called into question. The nonhuman also becomes a
place of longing, neither existing nor ceasing to exist – a utopia.4
4
Jan Verwoert, “Exhaustion and Exuberance” (2013)
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The privileging of nonhuman perspectives over an anthropocentric one, as
exemplified by the object-oriented ontology movement (OOO)5, may not divorce us
from our human nature but acknowledges and validates nonhuman agents, thereby
also acknowledging that a hierarchy of power and control exists, dominated by
mankind. When modern research into plants, the wondrous and mysterious aliens
that stand amongst us, reveals the sophistication of certain movements, perception,
communication and systems for survival within them, it not only brings into
limelight the highly advanced evolutionary stages they exhibit but also forces us to
re-evaluate our assessment as self-declared rulers of the world. If success of a
species is judged by the longevity of its existence, plants outrank us and disturb the
hierarchy. When a venus flytrap exhibits the intelligence to only swallow perfectlysized prey, sensing the size of the prey through the duration between stimulation of
two individual hairs a certain distance apart6, or when an entire forest
communicates and protects itself in the moment of a pest invasion, the act highlights
a certain sentience, consciousness, language and system that begs for a reevaluation of an anthropocentric view of the world.
Before we consider non-human perspectives of the world, we must first
understand what ‘nature’ is taken to be and what it truly is. Often, a romanticized
version of Nature (with a capital ‘N’) is presented to us to be observed and admired.
Romanticized Nature is a utopia that is required to exist in order to counter our
5
Here Comes Everything: The Promise of Object-Oriented Ontology. Web.
6
"Venus Flytrap Catches Flies." (http://www.discovery.com/tv-shows/life/videos/venus-flytrap-
catches-flies/) Discovery.
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dystopic society and complete the dialectic. The human race is so far away from
where our ancestors began that such an alienation of our history is required in
order to prevent it from becoming a distraction. This, in itself, is the cause of a
majority of conservational practices as well as nature documentaries about faraway
lands, isolated and untouched by the hand of man. Such a perspective is devastating,
for to be unable to see ourselves as part of ‘nature’ is to invalidate every
evolutionary accomplishment and triumph of the human race. Thus, if humans are
as much a part of nature as a spider, human products and activity are also as much a
part of nature as a spider’s web and its activity. The question arises, what remains of
‘nature’, or of Nature? Nature and ‘nature’ are left to be empty signifiers, the
meaning of which is constructed and retained only in our minds.7 Nature does not
exist; neither does ‘nature’.
Now, if all human activity is ‘natural’ and Jay-Z’s ‘Empire State of Mind’ is as
good a soundtrack to a Nature documentary as a soundscape of the forest, why do
we attempt to conserve the ecosystems around us and why do we empathize with
the nonhuman? If survival is our goal and all our actions are justified due to their
‘naturalness’, why is an anthropocentric, systematic exploitation of the earth’s
resources increasingly becoming an ethical issue? Although we require certain
species and ecosystems to survive for our own survival, why must we attempt to
conserve everything? Here lies another barrier that ‘world will’ must overcome:
ethics. “Live your life as though every act were to become a universal law.”8 Yet, we
7
"Ferdinand De Saussure." Indogermanische Forschungen 31.S1 (1912). Web.
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Kant, Immanuel, and James W. Ellington. Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals.
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have reached an age that calls for a change in the universal laws themselves.
Validating the systematic exploitation of the nonhuman for the benefit of the human
seems like the next evolutionary step that we must take. It must be noted, however,
that the acknowledgement of the validity of nonhuman perspectives is extremely
crucial as the first step, whereafter we must deny these very perspectives in an
acceptance of ‘natural’ laws and of ourselves not as caretakers of others but of
ourselves.
The Anthropocene is a proposed epoch in time defined by the global impact
on ecosystems that is made by human activities. Yet, it is far too easy and typical of
the human race to define what is unknown with science and fact. Myth replaces the
unknown and fact, the myth.9 Thus, the fact still hides something. It hides the
limitations placed on us by the anthropogenic systems we created ourselves. The
proposal of the Anthropocene is bold, an acceptance of the massive impact of human
beings on earth. In many ways, it represents the second second stage of Plato’s
‘Allegory of the Cave’.10 The prisoners in the cave observing the shadows of objects
become observers of ‘nature’ from a distance. The removal of a prisoner from the
cave and into the second stage of the allegory, in front of a fire that creates the
shadows represents a painful realization of tangible ‘nature’ and a scientific
understanding of the anthropogenic impact on ‘nature’ (shadows created by
objects). However, our race is yet to make the third and final step into the sun in
order to see the thing-in-itself and realize its own identity and purpose.
9
Adorno and Horkheimer, “The Concept of Enlightenment,”
Plato, G. M. A. Grube, and C. D. C. Reeve. Republic.
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The validation of an action requires its universal acceptance. Certain radical
actions that subvert societal norms and gain such acceptance pave the way to an
evolutionary step forward. However, when the temporality of evolution needs to be
altered in a highly complicated world with a multitude of perspectives, the action
itself must be more real than reality—a parafiction.11 Technological advancements,
social media in particular, are a prime example of how our race is being shaped by a
generated reality meant to feel more real than reality itself. Such a parafiction is
required as well to alter the anthropocentric view of the world, validating selfish
acts against ‘nature’ for the betterment of the human race. Thus, in order to alter
reality, the unreal must be invoked.
“Being a person means never being sure that you are one.”12 Being human
and not being ashamed of it, keeping in mind our apparently unethical treatments of
‘nature’, is more radical an act than it seems. It opens up the possibility for unlimited
expansion and immortality, along with a way of living that is free of obligations to
anything but ourselves. However, such a step also requires wisdom that helps raise
awareness of our own fallacies as a species. Thus, the acknowledgement and validity
of nonhuman voices is equally important in order to prevent a chaotic exploitation
that results in the destruction of one and all. In the age of the Anthropocene and in
the face of climatic and ecological changes never seen before, questions of
personhood are becoming increasingly important. Yet, these questions cannot be
addressed until we abandon the age-old romantic views of a utopian Nature that
ceases to exist at the first instance of human intervention; acknowledge, validate
11
Carrie Lambert-Beatty, “Make-Believe: Parafiction and Plausibility,”
12
Morton, Timothy. The Ecological Thought
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and later deny all nonhuman perspectives and undertake a radical acceptance of
personhood that establishes an altered set of universal laws, allowing
anthropogenic systems to continue to thrive and the human race to dominate. “It's
ironic that we can imagine the collapse of the Antarctic ice shelves more readily
than we can the collapse of the banking system.”13
13
Morton, Timothy. Ecology without Nature
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Works Cited
"The Anthropocene | Welcome." Welcome to the Anthropocene. Web. 17 Dec. 2015.
"Ferdinand De Saussure." Indogermanische Forschungen 31.S1 (1912). Web.
Here Comes Everything: The Promise of Object-Oriented Ontology. Web.
"Make Believe: Parafiction and Plausibility." Make Believe: Parafiction and Plausibility. Web.
17 Dec. 2015.
Morton, Timothy. Ecology without Nature: Rethinking Environmental Aesthetics. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard UP, 2007. Print.
Plato, G. M. A. Grube, and C. D. C. Reeve. Republic. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub., 1992. Print.
Schopenhauer, Arthur. The World as Will and Representation: In Two Volumes; Volume II.
New York: Dover Publ., 1966. Print.
"Venus Flytrap Catches Flies." Discovery. Web. 17 Dec. 2015.
Adorno and Horkheimer, The Concept of Enlightenment
Kant, Immanuel, and James W. Ellington. Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals.
Jan Verwoert, Exhaustion and Exuberance. 2013.
"Simulacra and Simulations." Baudrillard. Web. 17 Dec. 2015.