Every Fall, I receive in the mail some calendars from environmental organizations that want to coax me into making a donation. The calendars represent marvelous examples of nature photography, bringing me beautiful close-up images of wildlife, and panoramic images of landscapes. Although I enjoy the colorful photographs, in the back of my mind I am aware of a drawback in their representations of Nature. And therein lies a complex paradox about the natural world and our human relation to it.
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John Ruskin
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The key to understanding the paradox is remembering that I enjoy beautiful pictures of Nature, whereas things in Nature are not always beautiful. This insight was laid out by the 19th-century art critic John Ruskin when he criticized a minister who had depicted a landscape as being only light and freshness. Ruskin pointed out things that had been left out of that depiction, by adding:
"Beside the rock, in the hollow under the thicket, the carcase [
carcass]
of a ewe, drowned in the last flood, lies nearly bare to the bone.... At the turn of the brook, I see a man fishing with a boy and a dog -- a picturesque and pretty group enough certainly, if they had not been there all day starving. I know them, and I know the dog's ribs also, which are nearly as bare as the dead ewe's...."
A bit of reflection can, without too much difficulty, lead to the recognition that not all things we see in Nature are aesthetically beautiful. It is more difficult to recognize and accept those things in Nature that we can feel a moral distaste for. Such as a tiger chomping its teeth on the body of a beautiful antelope that is not yet dead. (You will never see a close-up of that on one of those wildlife calendars.)
It has been easy for humankind to be repulsed by such predation, labeling it "bad." Our modern science of ecology teaches us, however, that predators play critical roles in the internal, balancing dynamic of ecosystems. And over eight centuries ago, the theologian Thomas Aquinas cautioned his readers against imposing a too simple absolute moral grid upon other forms of life, writing:
"The wolf, though in its own kind a good of nature, is nevertheless evil to the sheep."
It might seem that the matter is resolved at this point. It might seem that I have to just abandon my revulsion at the ugliness I see in the non-human realm of Nature. True, I should be concerned about that needy man and boy who Ruskin pointed out to me. But shouldn't I just set aside my feelings when I see distasteful things in the non-human world, such as the ewe Ruskin described? It might seem so, but I think that would be misguided. It could result in a hardening of my own heart. My sensitivity is part of what makes me a living being -- similar to the way the poor ewe had its own forms of sensitivity.
The paradox is that I need to see in Nature a wider beauty that incorporates things that
should be disturbing to me in a certain way. So, ironically, even as I try to remember that Nature was not designed for my own aesthetic or moral pleasure, I say to those environmental organizations, "Don't stop sending those beautiful wonder-filled calendars!"
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Are there things in Nature you experience as being ugly or unpleasant?
(The Ruskin quote is cited in McGrath, Alister E. A Fine-Tuned Universe:
The Quest for God in Science and Theology. © 2009. p. 81.)
(The Aquinas quote is from his A Compendium of Theology [1269-1273], I, 142.)
3 comments:
I found these thoughts fascinating. I had never thought that much about my own feelings about the beautiful things and the ugly things I see in nature. I do love nature, and so I just have tended to think of all of it as beautiful as a whole. The quotation by Ruskin made me think harder.
As a biologist who loves and finds intellectual fascination in all aspects of nature, this article helped bring my 'bipolar' attitude toward nature into focus. Are there things in Nature that I experience as being unpleasant or ugly? Unpleasant... definitely 'yes'. But ugly... definitely 'no'. Even an insect masquerading as a messy bird dropping, a wolf killing a deer to feed to its young pups so they can thrive, and a beetle to whom a fresh warm cow turd is 'Home, sweet home" are all beautiful facets of the web of life.
This paradox certainly rings true. I have found myself routing for a bat trying to escape a snake, internally cheering when then bat got free. I have also seen and pitied bony-ribbed lions on the savanna, their hunting disrupted by eager tourists like myself.
I think part of our distaste for these things comes from our physical and emotional divorce from nature. Some of this starts as children - there are very books such as "Everybody's Somebody's Lunch" by Cherie Mason that teach about the true circle of life.
Even as adults, when our experiences of nature come primarily from gorgeous paintings of the romantic period, exquisite processed photos on calendars, and strategically managed "natural" areas (all of which I love) we have an inherently unbalanced understanding of the world. For me, learning about real ecological experiments has changed the way I look at predators, scavengers, and decomposes. Although I still feel sad when I see the furry evidence of some nighttime scuffle in my yard, I now realize that these predators are crucial in maintaining the stability and diversity of life.
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