There's no doubt about it; in this modern world, humans are connected like never before. In the late 90's to early 2000's, the internet was considered a luxury item, its connection often glitchy and dependent upon strange robotic screeching noises and whether or not your mum had finally decided to get off the phone (Gen Z will never know the struggle). Go back a generation further than that, and there was absolutely no internet whatsoever. Yet somehow, in the span of the last 30-40 years, we've become reliant on this new entity, requiring access to it 24 hours a day and even conducting the majority of our social interactions on it. It's as unbelievable as it is ground-breaking.
Yet somewhere in between Flash games and Deliveroo, we forgot the one connection that really mattered: our connection with Gaia. Sure, a quick web search will reveal thousands of articles telling you how to better incorporate nature into your life, but there's more to a meaningful connection with Gaia than just sitting and admiring a tree on your lunch break. We've forgotten how to live off, and alongside, our land.
To get to the root of this problem, let's go back 400,000 to 40,000 years ago. In Europe, Neanderthals roam the plains, along with the Denisovians to the east and Homo sapiens (who would eventually migrate north of their African origins) to the south. The world, for the most part, is a bare wilderness, populated by all kinds of prehistoric creatures. Analysis of Neanderthal remains have suggested that 'Neanderthal populations were adaptable, living in cold steppe environments in England and Siberia about 60,000 years ago, and in warm temperate woodlands in Spain and Italy about 120,000 years ago.'₁ Despite the word 'Neanderthal' often being used as an insult for a stupid person today, Neanderthals themselves were actually incredibly smart, making jewellery, art, and flint axes. 'Healed and unhealed bone damage found on Neanderthals themselves suggest they killed large animals at close range - a risky strategy that would have required considerable skill, strength and bravery,'₂ says Professor Chris Stringer of The Natural History Museum. Not only that, but 'food remains preserved in the calculus (hardened tartar) around their teeth show that the Neanderthal diet also included various plants, either collected directly or from eating the stomach contents of their plant-eating prey. Neanderthals also ate fungi. In Gibraltar, they consumed mussels, young seals and perhaps also dolphin, though that meat may have been sourced from scavenged carcasses.'₃
So, if food acquisition requires that much exertion in a hostile environment, you're only going to hunt when you're hungry. Not only that, but you're not going to hunt another separate animal for the skins and bones required for clothing and building. Instead, you're going to use every part of the one animal for a multitude of different uses; nothing is wasted. It's the ultimate masterclass in sustainability. And it is sustainable: though a few animals may have been killed in any one hunt, only taking what was required gave populations of prey time to recover and rejuvenate. Not only is it sustainable, it's almost animalistic in its approach... and at the end of the day, isn't that all that humans are? One could argue that we are simply an advanced species of ape, with our large brains that are capable of language and other certain cognitive skills being the only thing that separates us from the other primates.
Indeed, it is this pattern of life (predator and prey) that Gaia is designed for. However, where our ancestors slaughtered one animal for all its components, we slaughter one for the meat, another for the leather and another for the dog food. Theoretically, this is triple the consumption rate of our ancestors.
One of the major issues behind The Great Disconnect is that we've lost the connection between our resources and their origin. We don't see resources as deriving from the land; they just appear, at whim and will, and then they are just as easily disposed of when they are no longer pleasing to us. The truth is, however, that every resource - whether it be pens, toilet cleaner or a mobile phone - has Earth's resources contained within it. Whether it has been put through a factory or chemical processes is irrelevant; at some point, naturally-derived elements will have been involved in the creation of the product.
Therein lies the crux of the matter: because we don't see where our resources come from, because we don't have to hunt and gather them like our Neanderthal ancestors did, we don't see ourselves as part of the natural world (Gaia). Instead, we see ourselves as part of a mechanical supply-and-demand chain (consumerism). We have disconnected from Gaia because she is not compatible with our manmade, modern networks. The cycle of nature has been replaced by the cycle of upgrading. Not only that, but we created a system that so closely resembles Gaia in structure - with wires for roots and screens for leaves - that we have been bestowed with a sense of authority that, for the most part, we ought not to have. In March 2019, a report from the UN Environmental Assembly stated that 'Rapid growth in extraction of materials is the chief culprit in climate change and biodiversity loss – a challenge that will only worsen unless the world urgently undertakes a systemic reform of resource use.'₄ Not only that, but a report by Global Footprint Network featured in the WWF Living Planet Report 2022 states that humans use as many ecological resources as if we lived on 1.75 Earths. Unsurprisingly, food is the biggest contributor to Humanity's Ecological Footprint (closely followed by housing and personal transportation) with North America, Australia, Belgium, Belize, Estonia, Mongolia and the United Arab Emirates being some of the highest consumers, with a national Ecological Footprint of more than 6.7 global hectares per person. Our planet's biocapacity currently stands at 1.6 global hectares per person, and so, in these high-consuming countries, their residents' demand on nature for food, fibre, urban areas and carbon sequestration is approximately four times more than what's available on this planet per person.₅
Make no mistake; some technological advancements are incredible, exemplary and welcome. Yet we live under the misguided view that our network, that has been running for just under half a century, somehow supersedes Gaia's, that has been keeping things on track for hundreds of millions of years.
So how do we re-establish a meaningful connection with Gaia? It's unlikely that even the most zealous of the technophobes would want to go back to prehistoric times. The answer is relatively simple: we need to see ourselves as part of nature, not separate from it. We need to reflect upon the natural world and our place in it. We need to realise that Gaia is the key fundamental of all life on Earth. We need to intentionally and consciously recognise Gaia's presence in our everyday lives, and understand that it is Her that runs everything, not our email inboxes (despite what your boss would have you believe).
By reflecting on our place within the natural world, we begin to appreciate all that Gaia does for us. We connect back into the network of fauna and flora that defines the planet we live on, and the calm and peace that arises from such a connection is more thrilling than any Candy Crush game could ever be.
There is one place we could look to for inspiration: Indigenous Peoples. In the WWF Living Planet Report 2022, Andrea Reid of the Nisga'a Nation and the Centre of Indigenous Fisheries at the University of British Columbia states that 'Indigenous approaches to conservation regularly place reciprocal people-place relationships at the centre of cultural and care practices. These approaches hinge on systems of Indigenous knowledge which include scientific and ecological understandings that are carried across generations through language, story, ceremony, practice and law... these include Etuaptmumk, or two-eyed seeing – that is, learning to see from one eye with the strengths of Indigenous knowledge and ways of knowing, and from the other eye with the strengths of mainstream knowledge and ways of knowing, and to use both these eyes together for the benefit of all.'₆, ₚ₅₃ - ₚ₅₄ Fostering a healthier relationship with Gaia, it seems, will require not just smarter choices, but also smarter collaborations and a willingness to listen to those who lead a more traditional lifestyle - a difficult task when the technological networks we have made often reward ignorance more than intelligence.
Ultimately, we don't need to go back to our prehistoric ancestors, as in tune with Gaia as they were, but we have to allow space and time for reflection and learning; an often-impossible task in our fast-paced, constantly-consuming existences. If we can learn to set some of that lifestyle aside however, the potential for ecological harmony would increase dramatically. The sad truth is that we can connect to nature, but nature cannot connect to us, and, unfortunately, that is one thing we cannot fix by turning it off and back on again.
Comentários