On Taking Care of Mother Earth

Recently, one reader made an impassioned comment on our need to take care of our planet, and another responded:

There is no “Mother Earth”, nor are we required to be “good stewards”, to anyone but our own best interests. 

I appreciate this very clear and concise remark.  In fact, I think that all of human relations comes down to this very point: we either feel a sense of love and duty toward the people around us …. or we don’t. 

A liberal would say that the commenter’s remarks show that he carries with him a profound moral defect.  Conservatives, however, perhaps acolytes of Ayn Rand, would say that self-interest is the only thing that moves a civilization forward, and that people who feel otherwise are whining cry-babies.

I heard a very compelling radio piece on this subject recently that attempted to resolve all this in terms of brain chemistry.  In brief, both liberals and conservatives think themselves superior to the other, based on their perception of themselves and the decisions they’ve made to become the people they are, when in fact, their political philosophies are rooted in the way their brains are wired.  What each one thinks to be self-determined thoughts on the matter of dealings with other people could have been accurately predicted in advance with a brain scan.

I honestly don’t know what makes us who we are.

But I’ll leave you with this, whether this is written by some spiritual personality of Craig Shields, or merely the chemistry inside his modest little brain.  It’s another lesson from science, in this case, anthropology:  From the time our species evolved to the point that one human being encountered another, Homo sapiens made the most progress and survived best when we cooperated, respected one another’s needs, and worked together for a common good, rather than the times we’ve competed, and exercised self-interest in an effort to dominate one another.

Fast-forwarding 30,000 years, as we’ve pushed our civilization to the limits proscribed by the resources given to us on this planet, we’re about to find out that “every man for himself” is a slogan that only accelerates our pace toward the destruction of everything we cherish.