Talking to Your Teddy Bear — A Comment Concerning Green Infantilism

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I have left this comment here.

tom0mason, I agree with you — especially with the last paragraph of your above comment.

We human beings are incapable of experiencing a pure juxtaposition of man here and nature there, as if in the presence of two personalities or parties capable of holding rights.

There is only one way for us to experience nature: through OUR perception of her. This implies that for man nature is always his relationship with nature. We cannot damage nature or do nature good. All we can do is affect our relationship with nature in ways hat WE deem positive or negative.

Nature isn't a moral agent and she is incapable of arguing with us or anyone else. This being so, the best option for mankind to deal with nature is to shape our relationship with her to OUR own best advantage.

Humankind has been very good at this for millions of years, turning its biggest enemy — nature — into its servant.

This is because the resources offered by nature may be limited, but human ingenuity is not. It does not decline with use, rather to the contrary. The network of human experience and intelligence is growing all the time, allowing our species to come up with new and ever improved ways of harnessing nature to make us safe and comfortable.

History clearly shows that humans are extraordinarily good stewards of (a benign relationship between man and) nature, and have never been more successful at this stewardship than today.

This is what we ought to be proud of, opposing the perverse reversal of the truth by green zealots who try to reframe our ideals under the central tenet of a new religious dogma according to which man is born with a sinful disposition to do harm to nature (Gaia).

At the risk of repeating myself: I refuse to use phrasings like "man is hurting nature" or "man is healing nature". They are based on infantile anthropomorphism (like a discussion with your teddy bear). All we can speak of is the relationship of man with nature as man perceives it. And of this relationship I claim it has been managed fantastically well, especially since man has learned (a) to escape the Malthusian trap and (b) harness fossil fuels.