The Gaian Mind: Toward a Way of Living with Earth, by Martin Ogle, July 18, 2010

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The Gaian Mind: Toward a Way of Living with Earth

by Martin Ogle, Naturalist, July 18, 2010

        Good morning. I’m grateful for this opportunity to share some thoughts with you about an aspect of the 7th UU principle - Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. That is, that our human mind is part of the ecology of our planet. Or, stated more completely . . . The human mind and everything that sprung from it – our symbols, metaphors, stories, beliefs, behavior and culture – have themselves sprung from and are a seamless continuum of the living surface of planet Earth.

        This morning, I’d like to support and build from this central premise, suggesting that it is potentially foundational to creating a sustainable human society.

        I approach this task in the same spirit as Elisabet Sahtouris introduced her book entitled “Gaia: The Human Journey from Chaos to Cosmos” (republished as “Earth Dance; Living Systems in Evolution”). She introduced it as “a work of philosophy in the original sense of a search for wisdom, for practical guidance in human affairs through understanding the natural order of the cosmos to which we belong.”

        I came across the subject of Gaia Theory more than 20 years ago, and consider it the best description of how Earth’s living system works and how our minds factor in. So, let me briefly introduce this concept. According to James Lovelock, the inventor and author of “Gaia Theory” per se, “Gaia is the Earth seen as a single physiological system, an entity that is alive at least to the extent that, like other living organisms, its chemistry and temperature are self-regulated at a state favourable for life.”

        You see, we’re coming to realize that our planet is not – as that TV show implies – “The 3rd Rock From the Sun!” We are not positioned at just the right distance from the sun to keep from freezing or frying. It turns out, the living surface of our planet has moderated the temperature as our Sun has heated up over eons, resulting in a planet much cooler than the average of 520 degrees that we’d expect by extrapolating by the distance from the sun compared to lifeless Mars and Venus!

        One way life moderates Earth’s temperature is by gradually removing the now-infamous carbon dioxide greenhouse blanket from the atmosphere allowing Earth to stay cool even as the Sun heated up. This process is affected by the interactions of essentially every process on Earth – photosynthesis, breathing, forest fires, decomposition, human activities, deposition of rock, and more. Just as your body reacts as a whole to outside temperature changes, so, too, does Earth. And, it’s a good thing, because we and life as we know it could not exist otherwise.

        Although James Lovelock compiled the idea of Gaia into cohesive, scientific form, it is certainly not new! In 1925, in fact, a biology professor at Johns Hopkins University, Alfred Lotka, wrote “It is not so much the organism or the species that evolves but the entire system, species and environment, the two are inseparable.” Wow! 85 years ago, scientific thinking about Earth as a single system was well developed. But that’s nothing . . . most of our ancestors believed that Earth is alive in some sense and that we are a part of it. In fact, the name “Gaia” was suggested to Lovelock by William Golding (author of “Lord of the Flies”) who said it would honor the fact that Western science was rediscovering what Western civilization had long known through its mythology – that Earth was alive. Gaia, you see, is the Ancient Greek Goddess of Earth.

        But, to understand Earth as one, living system, can anything be left out? To me, the answer is a most emphatic NO! We cannot leave anything out, most especially our own human mind and everything that springs from it. If one accepts the concept of evolution, then our minds evolved from this living Earth as surely as aardvarks and their minds! In fact, on Earth today, the human mind is a force of almost geological scale, so to leave it out would actually be quite bizarre!

        Looking anywhere, from the oceans to seemingly untouched forests, to urban landscapes where we live in Northern Virginia, we see that the face of our living planet is transformed by human minds!

        But . . . why does this matter? Well, in my estimation, seeing our minds as a seamless continuum of Earth is at the heart of charting a course for sustainable human life. Let me offer 3 areas we can consider with a “Gaian mind” to might help us find ways to live sustainably and well: 1) how we see our role in Nature; 2) the pace of life; and 3) the work we do to create a sustainable society.

        We are the world!

        One of the most fascinating, yet unfortunate and ultimately damaging modern perspectives may be that we are apart from rather than a part of Nature.

        Its rather like a skit by that British comedy group, Monty Python, in which a great wrestler ended up meeting himself in the finals! He carefully stalked himself around the ring until “wham!” the announcer cried out “Oh, oh . . . he’s got himself in a double overhead nostril!” And then the match was over!

        Over the course of the past several hundred years, Western culture has become mentally estranged from Nature as a whole, and we have become like that confused wrestler. By thinking of ourselves as apart from Nature – and even fighting against her – we have assigned ourselves the unavoidable fate of self-defeat, I’m afraid. We’ve got ourselves in a double overhead nostril and things don’t look good!

        To escape this self-imposed stranglehold, perhaps we can catch ourselves when we we use the phrases such as “man-made” vs. “Natural” or “conquering Nature.” It’s hard to imagine exactly what language can or will replace these phrases, but, for the time being, it’s worth calling conscious attention to the ways we separate ourselves mentally from the rest of life.

        We might also remember that we are born with marvelous adaptations and instincts about how to live in the world, not the least of which is joyful curiosity! We need to nurture and preserve such instincts in ourselves and in our children rather than systematically squelching them, thereby creating what Michael Cohen refers to as “prejudice against Nature.” To Cohen, founder of the Audubon Expedition Institute, revalidating the power and value of our instinctive curiosity about life goes hand in hand with imagining new ways of living that are compatible with it.

        The eminent Harvard biologist, E.O. Wilson, believes that our brains are actually hardwired for “biophilia” - the love of life and living systems. So, let’s become “Biophiliacs” and relink our minds with Nature!

         “The World is not in a hurry.”

        One way our minds are quite out of kilter with Nature as a whole is in our time scale. More than any other animal, humans can be in a rush, and therefore are prone to being in a rush. And, recent social morays and technological inventions are propelling us into “hyperdrive.”

         In his 1962 book, “The Decline of Pleasure,” Walter Kerr, once a film critic for the New York Times, traced our then-already-rushed lives to the notions of utilitarianism and efficiency. These arose in business and industry in the 1800s and then permeated our culture. He believed that by becoming slaves to a mindset of always needing to be doing something productive, we gave up our innate human capacity to let our minds play. Thus, we lost – at the individual level – the ability and time for contemplation, and – at the group level – the tendencies for storytelling and free narrative. Kerr maintained that Nature and human nature, both, are not driven by efficiency and utility to anywhere near the level we have come to feel as normal. He believed that we are also “inefficient,” “sloppy” and “loose” – terms he did not intend as pejorative, but as descriptive of our true character.

        Since 1962, things have only sped up more, of course. In a recent editorial entitled “Our gadgets, ourselves; What the Internet is doing to our Brains” (Washington Post Wed., June 9, 2010 pg A21), Ruth Marcus reviewed Nicholas Carr’s book, “The Shallows,” in which he observed that “What the Net seems to be doing is chipping away at my capacity for concentration and contemplation.” Marcus also wondered what the internet might be doing to our hearts – our ability to have empathy for fellow human beings.

        Speed, utilitarianism, and correlated growth-based consumption have severe impacts on our lives, our communities and Earth’s living systems. We should examine the origins of these tendencies and how to temper them. At least tens of thousands of years ago, Human beings evolved an acute awareness of time – even to the level of being able to foresee our own death. This, coupled with symbolic thought and language gave us the ability and imperative to plan, adapt and spread our range like no other creature. But, recently, the increased rates of growth and consumption have placed us in great peril – they are changing the very living system upon which we depend. Much of this growth and consumption is generated in the U.S where, for instance, the energy we use for air conditioning, alone, surpasses the total energy consumption for all of Africa!* We’re staying cool, but are often so hurried and harried we can’t enjoy life.

        So, what should we do?. Well, we wouldn’t want to forget the age-old admonition that we pare down our possessions and attachments to them. The biblical directive to the rich – which we most certainly are – to give away all we own may be an oversimplification, but for spiritual and practical reasons, we should find ways to live well – as individuals and communities – with far less. Central to this is giving thanks for all we do have. Janine Benyus, author of the book, “Biomimicry,” has said that the human ability to give thanks is the natural antidote to greed!

         Perhaps, too, we can turn off or put our electronic gadgets out of sight and mind as much as possible; dare I even suggest getting rid of some altogether? In a very “Gaian analogy,” some have compared the electronic media to a planetary nervous system. This may be a good analogy, but it appears that this nervous system is often in a state of seizure . Is it possible to transcend this and create planetary mental health?

        Maybe Walter Kerr’s ideas are useful today. We could replace some of the time spent on “purpose-driven” and resource-intensive activities with time just to let our minds play and contemplate. We could establish life-rhythms full of the gifts of gab and storytelling? These and other “slow life skills” will not impoverish us, but instead open up a whole new world to be sensed and celebrated!

        As James Taylor sings, “The Secret of Life is enjoying the passage of time. Any fool can do it, there ain’t nothing to it. Nobody knows how we got to the top of the hill, but since we’re on our way down, we might as well enjoy the ride . .”

        “Our work – all of it – affects the world”

        If we combine our first two perspectives – being a part of Nature and trying to operate in a slower time frame – we can start to sense paths towards sustainability.

        My friend, Larry Robertson, also an Arlingtonian, just wrote a book called “A Deliberate Pause,” subtitled “Entrepreneurship and its moment in Human Progress.” He sees Entrepreneurship not as some business model for making a fast buck, but as the creative spirit that human beings bring to making the world a better place. One of the people he interviewed for his book, Nobel Peace Prize Winner Muhammad Yunus, believes that Entrepreneurship is “in every human being and in everything human.”

         For this creative spirit to emerge, Larry suggests that we have to take “deliberate pauses” – that is, we need to slow down to see patterns in the world around us so we can determine what is needed to make the world a better place.

        I agree completely, and think that the biggest gains will come when we blend this notion of entrepreneurship with the view that our minds are a part of Earth’s ecology. That’s why I have taken, recently, to using terms like “Entrepreneurial Earth.” It is a great descriptor – as apt as “Blue Planet” or “Spaceship Earth” – that captures one of Earth’s important essences. And, this term, “Entrepreneurial Earth” goes to the heart of what is needed to ensure the well-being of future generations.

        Increasingly, we see and acknowledge a host of problems confronting us - global warming, oil slicks the size of the oil state and potentially catastrophic failures in agriculture. But how do we best address these and other realities? We can protest, petition for legislation, and campaign to stop this or that. I've done my share of these activities, and they are needed and good. But, to the extent that these are the predominant ways we confront our problems, we almost certainly doom ourselves to failure. If nothing else, this work is just plain exhausting. We need to envision and implement new ways of living our lives, individually and collectively – a whole new economy.

        To best accomplish this, let’s start by slowing down, sensing ourselves as part of this planet and then putting our most creative ideas to work. And let’s judge those ideas by their compatibility with Human Nature and Nature as a whole.

        Let’s envision more systems like “Zipcar,” invented by Robin Chase, one of the people Larry interviewed in his book. Let’s employ the best business managers to help local renewable energy companies and other sustainability efforts succeed! Let’s invent games that keep us warm during the winter and cool off during the summer without using the entire energy budget of Africa! Let’s spend our time gardening, dancing, birdwatching, hiking, or whatever floats our boat and do them close to home! Let’s think like Buckminster Fuller, who was one of the biggest techno-geeks who ever lived, but spent his life envisioning an economy with far less consumption. Let’s be ingenious about designing a steady-state economy. There is much to do to engage and use our Gaian minds – all of it potentially full of joy, discovery and fun.

        A final perspective: With the assumption that humans evolved from life on Earth, a most remarkable perspective is ours! After much evolution of our brains, behavior, and culture – in short, of our minds – we humans were able to devise and build many and varied technologies made from materials procured from the Earth. Recent among these have been spaceships and cameras. So, if you think about it, when we first went into outer space and took a picture back at our planet, it most literally was Earth becoming self-aware! We are the self-awareness of this blue, entrepreneurial planet!

        Growing into this awareness of ourselves, as the awareness of the Earth could awaken us to the “search for wisdom, for practical guidance in human affairs through understanding the natural order of the cosmos to which we belong.”

        And, when one considers that the word “religion” comes from the Latin “re” for “again” and “ligio” for “link,” then discovering that we are, and learning how best to be “Gaia’s mind” may be one of the most “religious” of undertakings. Can we so relink? We shall see.

* Statistic on energy used for air conditioning from “Losing our Cool” by Stan Cox