Industrial Society Destroys Mind and Environment

Sentience is not directly the issue, but it is required in order to construct these unnatural things.

 

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Uh-huh.

Lol.

So the by-product (including willful constructs, like say... beaver dams or sky-rises) of something natural (like humans or beavers) is unnatural because.... ?

It seems to me because you choose to define it as such. While I agree the the colloquial usage is often of utility, when discussing it in terms of "the big picture" it think the notion is generally useless.

"Unnatural" implies a defiance of nature which is ultimately, impossible.

 

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Wes.. are you being purposely obtuse ?
Who the hell thinks nuclear power plants are natural ? :bugeye:

 

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Actually there are natural nuclear reactors. http://www.ocrwm.doe.gov/factsheets/doeymp0010.shtml

 

I do, because I don't deify our species. Please explain in what manner they can defy nature.

Admittedly, it hurt my brain at first to think in such a way... but to maintain the term "natural" as I see it, I had to accept it. Not that anyone else does. It's just that humans, thought, emotion, etc... is necessarily part of nature or couldn't exist. As such, the by-products follow suit. Basically, if it IS... it MUST BE natural as in "of nature itself". The thing is "natural" often is used as "normal" or "typical", which is the way you seem to be using it.

The thing is, "nature itself" does not conform to expectation. If one insists so, one is bound to denial of anything contradictory to their expectation. So "normal" or "typical" have no meaning in terms of nature itself. We model it and hope our models are correct. When we find something that defies them, we change our models. Nature itself would seem indifferent to our insufficient capacity to model it.

Which IMO - renders this thread's topic utterly moot.

To claim "industrial society" (perfectly natural evolution of abstract beings) DESTROYS mind and environment presumes mind and environment conform to some unspecified criteria, and that mind or environment can be destroyed.

Environment and mind simply are or aren't. What's for sure is that they will change, and that eventually minds seem to die.

Environment can't be destroyed. It will change over time, period. Abstract beings can manipulate that change. The argument is about what actions have what impact, and if the benefit of an action outweighs the cost.

I suppose I could destroy a mind, but most likely not because of "industrial society".

I might accept that "corporations destroy minds", not in a literal sense, but figuratively. Certainly not "industrial society" though. Industry is the life-blood of humanity and it's, at least IMO - utterly ridiculous to make retarded claims like that of the OP.

It seems indicative of an emotional, dogmatic reaction to a fad issue. It's rather whiny and infinitely naive to boot.

There are serious, legitimate issues to be considered in the context of "maintaining an environment that supports life"... but cart blanch rejection of industrial society is sophomoric at best. Sounds to me like "factory jobs suck and I hate your mom because of it" or some equally "blame everyone else" self-involved idiocy.

 

And no, I'm not being deliberately obtuse.

I'm trying to understand, and expressing that which I think I do for your perusal.

Well that and it's nice to banter about with smart people. Hell maybe we'll even enhance our respective understandings of this that or the other. I feel like I do at least a smidge by simply thinking it through far enough to write stuff.

 

Wes, could you please give your definition of natural and unnatural ? Apologies if you already did somewhere.
It's obvious that we're using different definitions.

 

Natural: That which is of nature.

Unnatural: That which is not of nature.

Nature: What actually is, regardless of and including opinion.

 

So yes, it's perfectly natural that you would disagree.

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So, ....you're saying that "natural" is anything and everything in the Universe, right? Even man-made things are "natural" to you, right?

Like, for example, a buffalo herd with wallow on the ground until they actually form a large hole in the ground ...it's called a "wallow" ...and it's perfectly natural, right? So humans build a 50-story skyscraper, and by the same logic used in the buffalo wallow, the skyscraper is "natural", right?

Is there anything that's "un-natural" on Earth?

Baron Max

 

Baron you can take over, I give up

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Termites build huge termite mounds (proportionately larger than anything weve ever built), and we consider them natural. But then again these mounds are made with unrefined materials, so maybe "natural" is anything that occurs in nature without mans intervention?

Certainly weve witnessed mans power to change nature from its "natural" path, however I understand Wes' notion that man is a part of nature, so must be everything he creates. You cannot create anything with "unnatural" parts so to speak.

 

Did you see my definition ?

Sure you can. Ever played with Lego as a kid ?

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I dont understand why sentient beings are given such precedence in your definition. The difference between man and termite is complexity, not concept.

Tell me why is man unnatural? Surely if we are not a part of nature, we must be above it or below it.

 

Er.. reread your own post earlier. You're saying pretty much the same thing, my definition is just more general.
Sentience is required to purposely build artificial constructions, such as Playstations, cars, cellphones, sidewalks, etc.

 

Depends on how you're using the word. If you're using it as I explained earlier in the colloquial sense "normal", "expected", well then there are lots of "unnatural things". If you're using it in the strict sense of the word, no - all that is, is natural and must be even if it seems that it isn't. If it seems that it isn't, your perspective is wrong - at least as I see it.

So yes, a skyscraper is a perfectly natural extension of evolving, thinking beings.

 

panzy.

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And by just standard word construction I'd say you're simply wrong.

Un- something means "not of that thing". You randomly introduce sentience as somehow seeding the "un", which contradicts your agreement that sentience is naturally occuring.

 

Natural and unnatural are imprecise words with multiple and varient meanings.

Natural generally seems to mean with a minimum of human alteration or as might be taken from non human made sources. Whereas unnatural (aka artificial) generally implies a high degree of human intervention.

But I'm sure Baron will happily twist any offered definition for its maximum impairment of the conversation.

Its worth noting that natural doesn't imply safe or wholesome, some of the most virilant poisons and diseases come from natural sources, nor is unnatural necessarily unsafe or unwholesome.

Also many things, like nuclear reactors, can occur in nature as well...
http://www.ocrwm.doe.gov/factsheets/doeymp0010.shtml

 

Let's imagine there was not any human being in existence. According to our perspective, everything exist should be natural. OK but what if we want to understand this nature more deeply? (Yes, we are not existing anymore, but our ghosts are doing the classification). The striking difference between living nature and non-living nature would still emerge: DNA looks like an "artificial" element within non-living nature; atoms, stones or forces do not have a heritage style self organisations, but living creatures have.

We humans are somehow different. If we follow the tradition and call ourselves "nothing but a part of nature", we still need to appreciate our difference from the rest of natural entities. When we follow the similar logic (living-nature; non-living-nature), we could call ourselves "thinking-nature" or "knowledge oriented nature" etc. For this, we have different agendas than the rest of non-human (alive or not) nature follow depending on their positions as agents or as part of a greater cycle.

It does not make any sense if nature itself is producing a nuclear reactor. Because it does not know that, and it can not re-produce, neither can improve this reactor at will: When conditions appears, the process may or may not repeat, no one is deciding on it. However we can re-create things, modify the conditions according to our projects. We use nature, as much as we create and use artificial things.