Parasites and Monarchs

[Neil Jones]

On Friday 08 April 2005 19:47, Hugh McGuinness wrote:
> RG wrote:  "At this point someone always chimes in that "humans" are the
> problem because we are bringing about _unnatural_ changes.  This is the
> silliest thing anyone can say because it renders humans as not being a
> part of nature - puts us outside nature = natural process.  We are just
> as natural as any other organism and we can do things that shift the
> ecological balance just like anything else - from volcanoes to rain
> forests to meteors to milk. "
>
>
> The word "natural" loses its meaning if humans are included in nature,
> at least in the sense of nature being discussed in this thread. We
> distinguish between natural and synthetic (human-made) objects,
> problems, consequences because it is a very useful distinction for
> understanding the state of the environment of the planet. We now have
> incontrovertible proof that humans have increased the rate of
> extinction, put a hole in ozone, introduced novel chemicals that have
> wrought ecological havoc (e.g. thinning of egg shells by DDT to name one
> of myriad examples), depleted fish stocks and altered marine and
> limnological ecology, set rivers on fire, etc. If humans are a part of
> nature then these problems cease to exist as problems that require
> solution: "whatever humans do is just a part of nature and therefore
> okay."  This kind of thinking is naive at best or part of a right-wing
> agenda to continue with the economic policies that brought us these
> problems in the first place.

Of course. You have hit the nail on the head. But the funny thing is that it 
isn't only  the American right-wing that does this else where it is a 
property of Communist thinking. Over there in the UK the Revolutionary 
Communist Party has been saying this stuff for years. Perhaps this will 
offend some. Hopefully it will make some think about the extreme views they 
hold.

The simple point is that politics is more of a circle and whether we surrender 
our freedoms and security to the elite of the politburo or the elite of 
industrial greed there is very little difference.
--
Neil Jones- Neil at nwjones.demon.co.uk http://www.butterflyguy.com/



 
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