Discuss: Ecological Inheritance

Yet again we find that everything is more complicated than we thought. J. B. S. Haldane (geneticist, 1892-1964) put it this way: “Now my own suspicion is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose.”

Facinating and intrigueing. Professor EO Wilsons teatise on biophillia becomes even more relevant. The interelationship of of life and the environment is enescapeable.

very interesting story and very well explained by Sandra S. Darwin of course is the epitome of Man’s ability to overthrow his acquired environmental education and beliefs, as it happened in his very life with the Beagle Journey. I note here that Carl G. Jung added a lot to this with his studies and his ongoing relationship with the natural world and “primitive” peoples he joined during his long and amazing life. I also think mankind is still way behind in the mysterious evolutionary process: we still have a hard time in accepting wild laws, rights of nature and the fact we are absolutely NOT at the centre of the universe. Interelationship is the key: otherwise we’re doomed to eternal blindess.

What dynamite this is. But does anyone think that those who doubt the ecological perspective would be swayed?  Our blindness, like all perceptual phenomena, depends on the assumptions we cling to—or that cling to us like suction cups. We can’t even see evidence that doesn’t fit our assumptions. How are we going to get a knife-blade under the edge to break the suction?

I read of a recent study that explained why populations of Native Americans typically have higher rates of alcoholism: their bodies produce less of an enzyme that assists in the metabolism of alcohol.  Without this enzyme, that Europeans generally have, alcohol stays in their system much longer.  Thus, it takes less alcohol for Native Americans to become intoxicated and stay drunk longer.  Reading this article, I wonder if our chromosomes are not so different, and Europeans being exposed to alcohol for several millennia, simply adapted to alcohol in their diet by activating the genes that produce more of this enzyme?

The vindication of Lamarck, whose theory of evolution preceded Darwin’s, and which posited that aquired traits were inheritable.

What the author failed to note is the most radical ramification of this epigentic understanding: that there is nothing but a conceptual separation between organism and environment. All evolves together. The totality of the “living” and “non-living” world are one evolving entity - GAIA - in which we each are but cells.

If we were to truly comprehend this truth, then not only are we not the center of the universe, we are not even individuals. We are but part of a much larger whole in which the greatest illusion is the individuated ego.

As a North American indigenous person, I recall the ecological philosophy of our tribal nation which encompasses the concepts: “we are the land” and ” look after the earth in the best manner and the earth will return the care to you.”  These concepts may be expressed simply but many millenia of observation and experience have led our people to apply these concepts in our relationships with the natural world.
It is heart-breaking that the dominant culture is only just beginning to study these relationships after they have already made their life- threatening changes and assaults on the natural world.

Unlike some other respondents, I do not find the natural world queer at all, but rather orderly, logical,and so remarkable in its capacity to be, among other things, sustainable and self-repairing.  This is what would be expected from an orderly and logical Creator who absolutely must be behind it all.  No process within our natural world holds a whisper of an answer to how our unimaginably complex yet wonderfully functioning world came to be. It needs to be from an intelligence from another dimension.
And as to whether a human being with our perceived individuated ego is any different from a meteorite fragment, I find that to be a mind game from nowhere.
Perhaps someone can direct us all to a chat room where meteorite fragments are discussing their existence.