Reflecting back on my past conceptions of science, I cannot help but be overcome by a strong sense of guilt. Through my various science courses, I often championed the discipline as one that I could rely on solely because of its inherent objectivity. Science gave me truth, observable phenomena, and concrete answers.
Reflecting back on my past conceptions of nature, I also cannot help but feel an immense sense of guilt. I have always found solace and peace while outside. The further I retreat from civilization and immerse myself into a forest of towering trees and crisp air, my head begins to clear.
I carried a fondness for the two prior to this course, but have recently come to realize that my appreciation of nature and science has been dangerously compartmentalized. Despite how personal a connection I feel towards nature, I have always approached my studies of natural science with the exact “cool detachment” that David Abram so strongly warns against. It is not that I find the observable qualities of nature impersonal, but rather, I find them too personal.
I always thought that because I felt an innately intimate connection to nature that these intimate ties had to be severed when nature became the subject of my studies. To consider nature in its spiritual sense was to lose any and all academic integrity, and thus, natural science had to be approached with an almost impersonal indifference. After reading Evelyn Keller’s piece, “Reflections on Gender and Science,” discussing dynamic objectivity, I recognized how counterproductive such severance is. Keller articulates the concept of dynamic objectivity as a form of knowledge that “grants the world independent integrity but relies on our connectivity to that world.” With the help of Keller, I have come to realize how imperative this connection between nature and science truly is.
Science has the ability to be extremely intimidating. With issues such as climate change, the instinct may very well be to rely on the comfort of objective fact as a means to address it. Although I do harbor some doubt that the scientific community will be immediately accepting of a proposal to recognize the intrinsic, and arguably, spiritual, importance of nature, I believe it is imperative to make such a recognition. To address the Anthropocene in its entirety, we must internalize our inherent connection to the Earth and couple such a connection with our scientific endeavors.
Image from http://www.iaacblog.com/programs/human-nature-vs-evolution/