permaculture

["Lee Flier" <lflier@mindspring.com>]

Toby wrote:

>Maybe it is only with human intervention that systems can be kept on the
the
>"ideal" constantly complexifying path, as in permaculture, where we cut
back
>brush, add new plants, move mulch from one site to another, etc, to keep
>things growing nicely.


This is a very undervalued idea among environmentalists, who tend to think
of humans as always without exception being destructive to "nature", which
they define roughly as "what an ecosystem would be if humans left it alone."
What they seem to miss is that so-called "pristine nature" has been tampered
with by humans for thousands of years, and that this in fact helped to make
it as healthy as it was.  That humans have a place in an ecosystem and can
actually contribute to its welfare is an idea foreign to most in our
culture, but we need to re-kindle that idea.

--Lee

***********************************
Lee A. Flier
lflier@mindspring.com
Atlanta, Georgia, USA
http://lflier.home.mindspring.com