writ I
the Horse
Every child comes into this world with that one instinctual passion to be absolutely enthralled with something without having any sort of previous background or explanation as to why they feel the way they do. For my brother it was trains; it would be living hell for my parents if they were driving with my brother as a passenger and just so happened to cross paths with a moving train. As he spotted the train out the window, his eyes would widen and he would let out an enthusiastic squeal as he pronounced “CHOO CHOO!”. As my parents continued on their way they prepared themselves for the screams and cries of agony as my brother watched his absolute favorite thing in the world slip out of his view; my dad would then pronounce “LOOK AUSTIN ITS MICKEY!”, and the screams would immediately cease as my brother searched for the elusive Mickey Mouse. In my case, I had a more natural affinity towards the majestic manifestation within the flesh and bones which we call the horse; nonetheless my enthrallment was just as passionate as my brothers. As any girl, I had wild fantasies of horses which I would constantly express through writing, drawing, and talking about them anytime I had the chance. Lucky enough for me, my dreams manifested into realities as my dad hesitantly enrolled me into the money pit of riding lessons and horse shows. Needless to say this companionship between myself and horses eventually lead to the full understanding of these majestic creatures, yet to this day I still cannot adequately describe the potent feelings and emotions evoked through my connection with these creatures. The only way I could even come close to thoroughly describing this connection would be through describing my similar, indescribable relationship with nature, or even through the inconceivable feelings of love. It bothers our analytical minds when we cannot explain something, but perhaps the only way you can understand these powerful connections, is through the experience itself.
In an editorial published through the New York times, “The Horse, Familiar and Unfamiliar”, an unnamed author describes a personal experience and contemplation of “The Horse”; an exhibition displayed by the American Museum of Natural history. To begin, the author opens with the statement: “Perhaps the most interesting thing about “The Horse” — a new exhibition at the American Museum of Natural History — is how remote its subject seems, how completely the horse has faded from the everyday life of ordinary people.” I cannot help but read this statement and tie it to our current relationship with the natural world; let me elaborate. Humans literally sprang forth from this Earth, literally born from the rock and water that comprises our home. We are much like an infant, completely dependent on our mother for sustenance and nourishment if we are ever to flourish and grow. Looking at how the horse resembles this role of nature, human society would not be where it is today, without the horse. This might sound ridiculous to someone that doesn’t understand a connection between man and horse, however you are connected to the horse in ways you can’t even imagine… They fed you as they plowed your fields, carried you on their backs as they ran into the face of war, and protected you as they galloped away from unseen danger. Horses in our past could largely be seen as the backbone of mass cultivation, the mammalian vehicle that allowed us to travel great lengths transporting people, items, and ideas. The horse did things that we could not do alone. Returning to this parallel between nature, we do things which could not be done without nature; however we have come to forget its presence. Much like the horse has faded in importance to human society, nature has faded in the realization of it’s importance to human society.
Continuing on, the author proceeds to say: “It becomes clear that we are human by virtue of horses and that horses are what they are by virtue of us.” As described in the previous paragraph, horses allowed us to climb up the evolutionary scale literally by being our backbone; we would be just another animal if we hadn’t harnessed the power of horses… we would be just another animal if we hadn’t cultivated the power of nature. However, it goes a lot deeper than that. You could say our human life is much like a horseback ride, humans being the rider and nature being the horse. Why this powerful creature, that could do just fine without you, allows you to sit upon her back without dismounting you, is poetry in and of itself. This horseback ride is such a beautiful representation of the symbiotic relationship between man and nature. However, as time went on, we forgot who gave us the honor of mounting her; we let our obscured vision of being higher or more noble than the horse get to our heads, not realizing we would not have this elevated view without sitting upon her back. As the horse felt you yank upon her face and spur her delicate flanks, she proceeded to buck you off, only to be beat into submission until you realized you don’t look so noble with such an ill looking horse. As you can see, the relationship with the horse could very much be seen as an allusion to our relationship with nature.
As an avid horse person, I know the frustration of trying to convey my love for horses. The riding of a horse is one of the most humbling, awe inspiring, and unifying experiences one can have on the planet Earth. People that have yet to establish a relationship with a horse through the medium of having physical experiences, cannot truly understand what it is exactly. My father could view my longing for horses as an unnecessary money pit, only because he does not see the intrinsic connection that I have with these creatures. As the author states: “And what is also inevitably missing is the visceral feeling of moving across country on a horse’s back, for as one old riding manual puts it, “Riding, like every other corporeal exercise, does not feel like what it looks like.” These are things that cannot be captured or represented as part of a museum show, any more than we can experience the feel of living again in a horse-drawn city.” This could easily be paralleled by our relationship with nature: you can study the biology, all the inner workings and numerous aspects of the horse, but you will never be able to truly comprehend the majesty of this creature simply through speculation and scholarly pursuits. Similarly, you can study all the inner workings of what defines nature, and just how delicate of a balance it keeps in check, but you will never know the power of nature without having that grandeur and humbling experience of it. Hence: you will never truly understand the horse unless you have experiences with a horse and you will never understand nature unless you have experiences in nature. Because people do not have the experiences with nature, they do not have the underlying love and longing to protect and preserve it; so natures presence and understanding is fading away, much like the presence and importance of the horse.
As I sit here and write this essay, feelings proceed to pour through me as I literally choke back a lump in my throat as I feel the need to be reconnected with those beautiful creatures. It is much like the feelings I get when I crave sacred places I have experienced within nature, or the solastalgia I feel when I see nature being desecrated. As the author describes the horse exhibit: “What is missing from this exhibition, naturally enough, is the actual horse — the living, breathing animal, soft of eye, curious of ear, skin twitching to dislodge a fly.” Perhaps the missing link to rehabilitate our discordant relationship with nature, is simply being in nature. Living, breathing, curious of ear, curious of eye, experiences evoked through nature.
To sum it all up, my brother is completely content with his life as he pursued his love for moving machines through the medium of flying ospreys in the military. As for me, I am struggling to reconnect with my purpose in life, and my passion that I would like to share with the world… I’m also not riding horses anymore; maybe that has something to do with it? Looking at the bigger picture, we have an intrinsic connection with nature and I believe society today is so discordant because they forget to see that deep down, we need to maintain these experiences with nature to keep our souls content and remind us where we came from. You cannot accurately convey the feeling of hiking 12 miles to get the base of the Tetons, only to gaze at their grandness for about an hour, eat lunch, and, then hike back another 12 miles… in one day… legs barely functioning, blisters adorning your heels; however you get back into your car to drive home, and you have never felt so satisfied and complete in your entire life. You also cannot explain why you love a creature who you pour endless amounts of money into, only to pick up his poop everyday and get bucked off occasionally; but feeling so satisfied and complete as you ride off into the sunset. If you cannot connect with these analogies, please refer to the explanation and phenomenon of love. To conclude: “This world spins from the same unseen forces that twist our hearts.”– David Mitchell.
Works Cited
Mitchell, David. Cloud Atlas. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2004. Print.
The Horse, Familiar and Unfamiliar. N.p.: The New York Times, May 2008. Web. 21 Nov. 2012. <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/opinion/18sun4.html?ref=opinion&_r=0>.
HOW WE OUGHT TO LIVE
The statement: “the medicine only works if topically applied,” or “that which is learned best be heeded through experience,” is a legitimate statement; especially when applied to environmental virtue ethics. In Brian Treanor’s piece “Narrative Environmental Virtue Ethics: Phronesis without a Phronimos” he starts off by presenting two quotes, one of which is a quote by Louke Van Wensveen: “The cultivation of virtues depends on narratives, vision, and the power of examples”. Needless to say, people learn better through personally experiencing things, observing people that are exemplifying what is to be learned, or reading a narrative that entails what is to be learned. That being said, it is easy to see ‘that which is to be learned’ happens in a multitude of situations, of varying degrees; some more similar than others and some completely outlandish. This could be more concretely exemplified by Treanor’s statement: “. . . what environmental virtue ethics really has to come to terms with is a less radical relativism, a ‘contextualism’ that insists that we cannot speak clearly about virtue and vice abstracted from concrete situations.” To break this statement down, think about someone reading “The Ten Commandments”; although these commandments give abstractly concrete situations in which people should act in according to virtue, it isn’t fluid or applicable to certain situations. Situations such as defending ones own life, which could require breaking the commandment of “thou shalt not kill”; that is where the power of context, phronesis, and narratives come in.
Lets discuss the case of environmental virtue ethics: although you can preach to a city dweller the “un-virtuousness” of cutting down rain forests, it is probably not going to have any sort of impact as the virtue ethic most likely does not apply to this person. However, you could preach to the city dweller that he should not support the paper company that supplies his company with an essential item because the paper comes from rain forests that are vitally important to his life being “good”… After this lesson you could give him the company name from which you buy your paper as it is more sustainably harvested and costs just the same. That situation perfectly exemplifies learning something from experience within context; whether or not the person switches to the more sustainable paper product will most likely fall back on the strength of his environmental virtue ethic. It would be easy to say that if this new sustainable paper product causes no detriment to this person, they will willingly switch to a more sustainable paper product; if they choose not to, it will now possibly cause a detriment to his life if he knowingly supports an exploitive company. Because this person was taught environmental virtue ethic that was within the context of his life, a change was made and the world is better off. The lesson not only informed the person of how they were detrimentally effecting the ecology of the planet, it informed the person that they could make a better decision, therefore improving the ecology of the planet and enriching his own life. Treanor exemplified this by saying: “One of the greatest benefits of this approach is the possibility of framing environmental virtues as essential to the good life, rather than merely a burden we must shoulder out of necessity. Such an approach is essential is there is to be any hope of widespread acceptance of environmental virtues prior to environmental collapse”
However, everyone is not so lucky to have the experiences like the one previously stated; that is where the power of the narrative comes in. Treanor states: “Narrative is a tool of unmatched usefulness in this context; it offers an expansive, nearly limitless, source of wisdom related to the ways in which “environmental virtues, such a simplicity, do far more than help us to survive– they allow us to flourish”. Speaking out of personal reflection, I cannot recall the countless times in which a narrative has changed the way I look at, or even live, my life. Before reading a narrative, I did not have the knowledge that people do not consume meat solely based on the concern for the treatment of animals; many thousands of people do not eat meat because of the industry’s detrimental effect on the environment. I am a firm believer that the lack of education in regards to a certain topic could cause people to act out of ignorance. Perhaps if people read Michael Pollan’s “The Omnivores Dilemma”, they would cease to support the meat industry as well. Why? Because a powerful narrative exemplified a man’s personal journey through the bowels of the meat industry, therefore contextualizing a unique experience that can be directly applied to the reader. Michael Pollan’s narrative analyzes all aspects from many different sides (playing the devils advocate as well), his take it or leave it approach calls upon the common citizen in a way that the ten commandments cannot. Like Treanor says “logical arguments and empirical analyses will always fail to motivate the lifestyle changes that are necessary for a sustainable world, or just as bad, will fail to do so until it is too late”.
The trials and tribulations of a citizen of the United States… or more generally speaking, a citizen of the world, obviously ranges with a multitude of different aspects and influences. To draw upon an environmental virtue ethic that does not personally apply to that citizen, will not serve as a catalyst for the citizen taking action or changing one’s own life to better reflect a environmental virtue ethic. In a world of varying degrees, “phronesis without a phronimos” is essential to creating a more sustainable future. Steve Jobs applicably stated: “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.” As Steve Jobs clearly represented successfully thinking outside of the box and not abiding by dogma, we must also think outside of the “box” by creating and learning from innovative Environmental Virtue Ethic through the narrative that is not only our life, but within the context of. The previous method of preaching “how we ought to live” is clearly not working.
cATCHING A WAVE IN A BUCKET
In a concrete world run by efficiency, judgements, definitions, and dollar signs, one can’t but help to think: is there something more to my life than simply going through the motions eventually climaxing at my immanent death? Philosophers, scholars, astrologers and even common folk have pondered this question throughout the times, however we now face a time where this natural curiosity could actually come into great use. When we live in moments where nature is objectified and people struggle to see the purpose of celebrating something from which we emerged, then perhaps we are simply looking at nature with the wrong pair of lenses. As Neil Evernden describes: “That is, if it is so that nature-as-object is the inevitable consequence of a series of cultural interpretations, it may be that the whole of our behavior, including that which leads to the abuse of nature that we now characterize as the environmental crisis, is a consequence of our belief in nature-as-object. The only long term possibility of alleviating that crisis would be to transcend the understanding of nature that gives rise to it.”
So, how does one transcend anything?… through personal accounts of realization or “becoming aware” of something. Throughout age old teachings, many have described transcending the instrumental limitations of our lives simply by living life through the eyes of the observer, or “becoming aware”. Through the act of becoming an observer one may find greater understanding, all encompassing unity, and an overwhelming sense of understanding for all things; as one’s visualization of the projection of oneself objectifies his or her own reality, therefore innately linking it to everything else. Similarly Nicole Note describes this transcending experience: “in common life, our first and foremost way of “being” in this world is characterized by what he [Heidegger] called “de-distancing”. In doing so he intended to shed new light on the modern human’s “natural” inclination to perceive him or herself foremost and fundamentally as a “factual objective presence,” as a being in the world next to things, without being in any spatial relation to this world… The world is not a context within which we live, but a referential context, a horizon, having meaning as a spatial frame of reference” What Note is possibly trying to convey is that our natural way of being isn’t the way in which the majority of society has been conditioned to live; our natural way of being is going through life with an innate curiosity for the world around us. Essentially, getting back to what truly makes us human could solve our current discordant relationship between man and nature.
So how do we bring about this re-realization of “wonder” which makes us complete? Once again, we must come to this subjective, observational realization through a certain experience brought on by a certain mood. Delving a bit deeper into this concept essentially everything we have ever known and everything that has every existed is energy, and at the core of that energy is vibrations. By the laws of nature you cannot have something of one vibration, in resonance with something of a different vibration; so essentially the thoughts you choose to hold project a certain vibration, therefore you cannot experience something that is not of the vibration you are projecting. This is where an open mind comes into play or as Note says: “once we are open to the experience, it most certainly triggers our ethical ability”. If we are to have society come into this realization of the embededdness of humanity throughout nature and vis versa, humanity must have the observational experience who’s catalyst is an open mind. As Evernden states: “some experience that transcends the normal understanding and holds it temporarily in abeyance so that the personal awareness of the living world is restored, is a prerequisite to any real chance in the awareness of individuals and therefore also to a change in the conception of nature in popular culture.” Similarly Note states: “When nature is encountered…characterized by receptiveness to nature or a sense of situatedeness as a result of a fundamental de-distancing and heedful way of being in the world– it can manifest itself in yet another way, namely, as a moment of “timelessness”… we also sense something beyond nature, something that is at a deeper level”.
Returning back to Everdens piece he displays this concept through the statement: “nature-as-miracle, does not prompt questions of control or even questions of kinship. The stance towards the world as miraculous, as awesome, or even as beautiful, could only prompt one to ask “what is it?– a metaphysical question rather than an economic or political one”. It is through nature in which we can come to an understanding of it’s vastness and “timelessness” possibly making the timelessness of our own being a self-realized epiphany. Note synchronizes this thought through her statement: “By articulating we “dis-cover” what had been covered by the discursive and practical consequences of our web of meanings, viz., the depth of nature, its non-thematisable horizon and our embeddedness in nature, with all its reverberations for our self-understanding… This non-thematizable encounter, I believe, creates meaningfulness.” So, in a world struggling to understand mankind’s purpose, we must create a link between man and nature simply by standing in a state of wonder; which answers all the questions we ever needed to know. Through this realization we could possibly come to the understanding that the majority of us are filling our lives with meaningless subjective substance; which could essentially be the missing link in our quest to heal our relationship with nature. “You can’t catch a wave in a bucket and walk off with it, and so, you cannot understand life and its mysteries as long as you persist in trying to.” -Alan Watts.