2.1. Modern conceptions of nature
2.1. Modern conceptions of nature
In modern thinking, it has been customary to separate human and nature from each other. This model of thinking has been developed in certain historical situations that we will go through briefly in this chapter. Many ideas of the Enlightenment and Romanticism are also common in modern cultures, which makes recognising them also useful in understanding contemporary culture and society. It is important to remember that these models of thinking are never merely abstract – that is, detached from societal and material ways of organising life. For example, in his book Maa-ilma (2014, 41), cultural researcher Mikko Lehtonen reminds us that it has only been possible to understand human and nature as separate from each other since we began to modify and utilise nature through powerful devices and production systems:
“When the connections between humans and nature are fairly limited and direct, perceiving them is not likely to be very difficult. The situation is different when interactions become more industrial and mediated. For a computer programmer living in the heart of a metropolis, it is far easier to see oneself as separate from nature than it is for a farmer or a fisherman. A sound and sane hunter-gatherer can hardly consider themselves independent from nature.”
Environmental philosopher Yrjö Haila has stated that separating human culture from nature leads to a paradoxical situation: the more perfectly humans think they control other nature, the more dependent their culture will become on nature. Where would you draw the line between nature and human? In what ways is the separation of nature and culture visible in your living environment?
Enlightenment and nature
“Connection to nature” is an easy and common-feeling phrase but the thinking behind it has certain historical origins. For a human to connect with nature, human and nature must first be separated from each other. In Western history, this separation was made particularly efficiently in the Age of Enlightenment in the 17th and 18th centuries. The expeditions of Europeans, the Renaissance, the scientific revolution, the rise of humanism, and the Reform had influenced the prevailing world view at the turn of the 17th century. In the 17th century, for instance, the British philosopher Francis Bacon suggested that advancing science could give humans power over nature, in which case the misery and difficulties of life could be decreased. The ideals of the Enlightenment included emphasising rational thinking and the intellectual ability of humans, utilising nature, and developing industry. The Enlightenment’s relationship with nature was instrumental: natural resources were used to develop human culture and acquire wealth. The relationship between human and nature was weighed particularly against questions on property and possession.
Even though “the human” who tried to control and utilise nature was usually presented as universal, the enlightened thinking was indubitably and publicly expressed as Europe-centric. It was thought that the history of humanity will inevitably develop forwards, and the motor of the development is European bourgeois civilisation. The European intelligentsia had already managed to rise above nature, into culture, and its task was to lift other peoples with it. This model of thinking was used to justify governing and exploiting nature and even other people. As Raymond Williams (2004, 65) summarises: “It should be noted that most of the concepts we use to describe this interaction [between human and nature], such as conquest of nature, control of nature, exploitation of nature, are derived from real human practices, from the relations between humans." Mikko Lehtonen (2014, 44) continues: “Nature could be seen as a tool for apprehension and exploitation in a situation where workers, slaves and the citizens of colonies became the targets of apprehension and exploitation.”
During the Enlightenment, an idea was developed (already proposed in ancient times) of how nature and its creatures are, in essence, some kinds of machines that can be comprehensively understood as long as their mechanical operating principles are discovered. Humans were not seen as a part of nature to the extent that human activity could be explained in the same manner. Philosopher Rene Descartes’ attitude towards animals screaming in pain is often presented as an extreme example of this kind of thinking: According to Descartes’ interpretation, the scream of an animal was not an expression of a conscious sensation of pain but a mechanical reaction.
Many principles of the Enlightenment have been considered ethically problematic, even reprehensible, and there are currently various attempts to dismantle the so-called legacy of the Enlightenment. The ideals of the Enlightenment, however, also affected practices and models of thinking that are still commonly respected. For example, natural sciences developed tremendously due to reason and analytic breakdown, and many currently known fields of science began in the Age of Enlightenment. One example of these fields is the theory on the evolution of species. It is ironic indeed for that very theory of evolution to have led to a revolution of thinking in which human has been lowered among other animals from its pedestal: the animal who is able of rational thinking and analysis has started to consider that maybe they do not hold a special position relative to other nature.
Romanticism and nature
To counter the enlightened thinking and industrialising culture, a way of thinking known as Romanticism developed in the 18th and 19th centuries. Romanticism was a countercultural movement in which nature's qualities and effects on humans were idealised: nature offered people health, vitality and beauty. The creation of “connection to nature” can be traced back to the Enlightenment, but in Romanticism it becomes a positive and idealised relationship, one that needs special cherishing: when the connection to nature was no longer apparent in the industrialising society, its conscious development came to be seen as important.
Especially English and Central European Romantics expressed strong criticism against the commercialisation and industrialisation of society. Commercialisation and industrialisation were seen as destroying or oppressing that which is natural and good – both in the human mind and in the environment. For example, factory work, overemphasis on rational design, growth of cities and local culture giving way to mass culture and communication were considered destructive phenomena Romantics emphasised the significance of emotions, intuition and creative imagination in strengthening the connection with nature, and significant Romantic thinkers were often poets.
William Wordworth: "Nutting"
Nutting
by William Wordworth
— It seems a day
(I speak of one from many singled out)
One of those heavenly days that cannot die;
When, in the eagerness of boyish hope,
I left our cottage-threshold, sallying forth
With a huge wallet o'er my shoulders slung,
A nutting-crook in hand; and turned my steps
Tow'rd some far-distant wood, a Figure quaint,
Tricked out in proud disguise of cast-off weeds
Which for that service had been husbanded,
By exhortation of my frugal Dame—
Motley accoutrement, of power to smile
At thorns, and brakes, and brambles,—and, in truth,
More ragged than need was! O'er pathless rocks,
Through beds of matted fern, and tangled thickets,
Forcing my way, I came to one dear nook
Unvisited, where not a broken bough
Drooped with its withered leaves, ungracious sign
Of devastation; but the hazels rose
Tall and erect, with tempting clusters hung,
A virgin scene!—A little while I stood,
Breathing with such suppression of the heart
As joy delights in; and, with wise restraint
Voluptuous, fearless of a rival, eyed
The banquet;—or beneath the trees I sate
Among the flowers, and with the flowers I played;
A temper known to those, who, after long
And weary expectation, have been blest
With sudden happiness beyond all hope.
Perhaps it was a bower beneath whose leaves
The violets of five seasons re-appear
And fade, unseen by any human eye;
Where fairy water-breaks do murmur on
For ever; and I saw the sparkling foam,
And—with my cheek on one of those green stones
That, fleeced with moss, under the shady trees,
Lay round me, scattered like a flock of sheep—
I heard the murmur, and the murmuring sound,
In that sweet mood when pleasure loves to pay
Tribute to ease; and, of its joy secure,
The heart luxuriates with indifferent things,
Wasting its kindliness on stocks and stones,
And on the vacant air. Then up I rose,
And dragged to earth both branch and bough, with crash
And merciless ravage: and the shady nook
Of hazels, and the green and mossy bower,
Deformed and sullied, patiently gave up
Their quiet being: and, unless I now
Confound my present feelings with the past;
Ere from the mutilated bower I turned
Exulting, rich beyond the wealth of kings,
I felt a sense of pain when I beheld
The silent trees, and saw the intruding sky.—
Then, dearest Maiden, move along these shades
In gentleness of heart; with gentle hand
Touch—for there is a spirit in the woods.
(Originally published in Lyrical Ballads I, 1798)
“Nutting” is a poem, where Wordsworth follows the ballad tradition and tells a melancholy, educational story about the richness of nature and of the destruction caused by human activity. In the poem, a young wanderer first admires the surroundings of a hazel wood, plays in it without demands, but then ends up stripping it of all its harvest-providing branches. The poem idealises both nature and emotional experience and presents a cautionary example of activity that exploits nature. What feelings does the poem stir in you?
In the so-called New World, i.e., particularly in the colonised areas of North America and Australia, Romantic thinking on nature developed its own features. In New World Romanticism, the admiration of wild nature bordering civilisation and the related “lonesome wanderer” character were emphasised. American and Australian Romantics saw the connection with nature as a way to free themselves from the shackles of culture and civilisation. Perhaps the most famous example of Amercan Romanticism is Henry David Thoreau's Walden (Life in the Woods) (1854). In the work, Thoreau describes a two-year period, during which he shifts away from a life in his hometown and builds a small cabin on the bank of a small pond called ‘Walden’. Thoreau’s gesture and thinking has been viewed as an anti-civilisation search for truth and authenticity.
Thoreu
Thoreau: Life in the woods
The only house I had been the owner of before, if I except a boat, was a tent, which I used occasionally when making excursions in the summer, and this is still rolled up in my garret; but the boat, after passing from hand to hand, has gone down the stream of time. With this more substantial shelter about me, I had made some progress toward settling in the world. This frame, so slightly clad, was a sort of crystallization around me, and reacted on the builder. It was suggestive somewhat of as a picture in outlines. I did not need to go outdoors to take the air, for the atmosphere within had lost none of its freshness. It was not so much within-doors as behind a door where I sat, even in the rainiest weather. The Harivansa say, “An abode without birds is like a meat without seasoning.” Such was not my abode, for I found myself suddenly neighbor to the birds; not by having imprisoned one, but having caged myself near them. I was not only nearer to some of those which commonly frequent the garden and the orchard, but to those wilder and more thrilling songsters of the forest which never, or rarely, serenade a villager,—the wood thrush, the veery, the scarlet tanager, the field sparrow, the whip-poor-will, and many others.
(Walden and Other Writings of Henry David Thoreau. Edited with an introduction by Brooks Atkinson. New York: The Modern Library, 1937. 76 - 77. Walden originally published in 1854.)
Thoreau describes in detail the building of his cabin and how it serves as the centre of his sphere of life. He emphasises the cabin's simplicity and levity and the fact that, despite the building, he is in direct contact with the surrounding forest nature, and in this case, especially birds. The distance from other people is also important – in solitude, Thoreau may focus on experiencing non-human nature. Thoreau’s character has served as an important example for many writers who idealise simple life in a natural retreat.
Romantic thinking is characterised by a pursuit of a harmonic, emotional and creative connection with nature. An essential part of it is a certain norm that defines human nature: in Romantic thinking, a person should be psychologically and physically undamaged, healthy and balanced. Any kind of “unhealthy” behaviour and estrangement from nature may be seen as unnatural and therefore wicked.
Romantic conceptions, while presented as apolitical, are in fact heavily political and may include ethical problems. When emphasising inherent, natural and established belonging to a certain place, i.e., ‘roots’, they may support the politically conservative view that each population and group of people “belong” to a certain area. Romantic conceptions have been used as tools for exclusion for nationalist purposes and purposes that increase inequality: they have been used to help discriminate and dehumanise groups of people deemed “unnatural”, such as people who have been racialised as non-white as well as LGBTQI+ populations, and to justify hostility towards foreigners. The fuel for German National Socialism of the 1930s was also Romantic regionalism.
However, Romantic conceptions can also be found in many reformist movements in which, for example, institutions such as nuclear family and private ownership have been opposed: for example, English anarcho-socialist William Morris presented a utopia idealising small-scale farming, craftsmanship, sensual pleasure and permissive upbringing in his novel News From Nowhere (1895). The Hippie movement of the 1960s also drew on Romanticism. Therefore, it cannot be said that Romantic thinking is a straightforward part of a certain political ideology. It is more like a way of thinking that can be adopted by many kinds of people and used for diverse purposes. The same can be said of the Enlightenment that was discussed earlier.
The Romantic conception of nature still thrives in modern nature thinking. The criticism towards industrialism expressed by the Romantics is considered the basis of the modern environmental movement. Until the 1980s, the Romantic conception of nature was an indisputable part of the environmental movement's ideology: the refreshing and mystic power of nature was protected as much as endangered species were. In 1980s, however, this conception of nature was challenged: particularly in leftist circles, it was seen as a regressive, bourgeois and even escapist approach that could not adequately answer the political and high technology challenges of the time, such as the Cold War, nuclear power, and the power of media, and it wasn’t compatible with a growing understanding of nature as inherently mutable. In the countercriticism that began in the 1990s, there were attempts to combine Romantic ideas with modern ecology's views on the balance of ecosystems. The debate on the contributions of the Romantic conception of nature still continues.
In modern society, the Romantic conception of nature has also often been harnessed to the needs of market economy, for example, in advertising that appeals to the ideals of natural beauty. The ideas of nature connection, greenness, and wildness may also be used to sell products and services whose production methods may be harmful to nature. This is called greenwashing (see also chapter 1.2).
Nature in modern and post-modern thinking
The dialogue between the principles of the Enlightenment and Romance has continued in Western cultures in the 20th and 21st centuries. Nature is utilised in technical and rational ways but also idealised and protected. In modern times, however, we have also started to understand nature in a way that bypasses the juxtaposition created by the Enlightenment and Romance: nature is now perceived more and more through systems thinking. We familiarised ourselves with systems thinking in course 2.
The most essential modern reform is therefore that the systems of nature are generally understood as changing and following their own laws of evolving. This understanding has been affected by natural scientific theories on the evolution of species and ecological relations. Nature is in a constant change, partly directed by natural selection.
This understanding is also a part of a cultural transformation in which the idea of an unchanging and harmonious nature has been strongly questioned. For example, environmental historian William Cronon has already noted in 1995 that if nature is assumed to remain balanced forever, it is difficult to notice and accept changes in it – even those that are caused by humans and cause destructive changes to ecosystems.
“Nature” is in fact a concept invented by humans, and it doesn't necessarily reflect everything that is happening in the living world – especially when it is contrasted with “human” or “culture”. This contrast has been criticised in the humanities and the social sciences for over two decades. In his book ‘End of Nature’ (1989), environmental scientist Bill McKibben already suggested that it might be good to give up using the concept of nature altogether except when referring to biology, the circle of life, or ecosystems. Nature has been viewed as a vague and artificial concept. It is, however, ingrained in Western languages and cultures to the extent that it is difficult to replace. One suggestion is philosopher David Abram’s ‘more-than-human’, which has also been translated to different languages.
The division between nature and culture is also partially problematic, especially in a time when the activity of humans affects natural environments in every corner of the world. There have been attempts to surpass the aforementioned division with the concept of natureculture that has been used by, for example, philosophers Bruno Latour and Donna Haraway. The concept foregrounds the intertwining of nature and culture both in matter and in meaning.
Constructing a wild nature
Disney's role in constructing wild nature
The perception of wild nature as noble and admirable has developed side by side with urbanisation and modernisation, as have the aspirations to protect untouched nature. A descriptive and influential example is True-Life Adventures, a series of documents released by the Disney companies between 1948 and 1960, which aimed at portraying wild nature where humans are not present. However, the impression of wild nature was created by certain technical production rules and methods: the humans and equipment that were present during shooting were cropped out of the pictures, and the voice over narration did not allude to their presence or influence in any way either. With the help of narration, editing, and emotion-provoking music, the animals were given stories in which they went through situations that are familiar to American middle class, such as dating and making a living. At the same time, these stories promoted values, such as progressivism and distinct gender roles, that were considered important in post-World War II America. Stories and the means through which they were told, such as music, were often based on Disney’s popular animated movies such as Bambi (1942) and Dumbo (1940). Despite their constructed nature and the humanising of animals, True-Life Adventures documents were presented as truthful and authentic portrayals of nature.
Disney movies created a narrative model that most nature documents produced for the general public have followed all the way to the 21st century. “Traditionally, nature documentaries have portrayed nature without temporal and historical context, as autonomic and without human presence and effects – untouched. Nature has been understood in a dualistic sense, as the counterpart to culture and humanity.” (Koskinen 2020, 34.) This model of “wild nature” can also be seen in many new nature documentaries that portray Finnish nature. As per film scholar Kristiina Koskinen, depicting nature without humans leads to at least three kinds of challenges: nature is positioned outside the viewer's or reader’s everyday sphere of life; wild nature is depicted as unchanging in a way that does not correspond to physical environments’ inclination for change; and humans’ connection to wild nature is depicted as a “journey into the wild and back”, i.e., as something differing from everyday life. During the sustainability crisis, the idea of wild nature appears unsustainable:
“Understanding real nature as a space without us denies a conception of a human who would at least have a theoretical chance to adapt to their environment as a species among others. Such an image is not only in many ways a heavy burden to bear, but also impossible for our physical existence and extremely difficult to delimit. This can prove to be particularly dangerous in a time when nature without human influence is virtually non-existent and finding a sustainable way of living grows increasingly difficult.” (Koskinen 2020, 35.)
Therefore, the conceptual separation of nature and human has had its part in reinforcing the concept that the cultural and everyday activities of humans do not cause disruption in the functioning of nature. However, in the time of global environmental change and the Anthropocene, it must be admitted that untouched nature does not technically exist, and that the activity of human communities is limited by planetary environment.
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