Costello

This concept of our specie’s, race’s, and/or religion’s superiority is the foundation for the world’s degradation.

[1] Destruction and pain wear many faces (war, poverty, famine, global warming, global dimming), but there is a common theme shared by every injustice committed- “the strong can do what they please with those who are in their power”. In this photo an Iranian man watches as Iraqi soldiers destroy oil refiners during the Iran-Iraq war.




Homo sapiens have upset the natural order of things in many respects:

1. Abusing other, “weaker” humans: In India many indigenous people have been diagnosed with cancer due to nuclear testing near their villages- all in the name of advancing a race and a nation.
2. Abusing the Earth: The Earth has been polluted by exorbitant amounts of waste, because humans don’t care about the consequences of their consumption habits.


[2] This photo is an areal view of a landfill in the United States. It’s estimated that in a year one American disposes of 1,460 pounds of trash. How much of that is recyclable? How much of it can be sold or given away? If we took a minute to think about where our trash goes, would that have any effect on the amount of waste we produced each year? The Earth feeds us, and we feed it with our left-overs, our trimmed fat, our unwanted things.

3. Abusing other species: Animals- whether they’re omnivores, carnivores, mammals, birds, crustations, or vertebrae- “…have no more power…” [1] The reverence our species once held for them has been demolished by our desire to conquer and dominate everything. “Animals only have their silence left with which to confront us.” [2]

The saying “cogito, ergo, sum… implies that a living being that does not do what we call thinking is somehow second class.” [3] I have two problems with this idea. First, what do we define thinking as? The ability to create? To communicate? To read books, do math, and understand science? A “consciousness of (oneself) as a… reasoning machine” [4]?

I think it’s ironic how we feel superior to other races or species because they don’t fulfill our standards of intelligence. We’re so removed from our true nature that we’re incapable of understanding other species’ motivations and desires… much less they way they think. And, when we understand so little about the natural world, we’ve still logical deduced the conclusion that we’re intellectually better.

It’s almost contradictory to employee intelligence as one’s main justification for dominance— all things natural feed our existence, directly and indirectly. The word is a complex machine of give and take, and we’re the only species who constantly takes but never gives. If we’re such intelligent beings, capable of such sophisticated things then why haven’t we figured out a way to give back to the hand that has feed our existence for millions of years?

[3] Native Americans would use every part of the buffalo. They were thankful for it’s contribution to their survival. Today, Westerners don’t regard their food sources with any semblance of respect: a cow provides steak and milk, no more, no less. I’m not advocating we get on our knees and say thank you to the slice of meat on our dinner plates, but if we just recognized how important other species are to our survival I think we’d discover that we owe them a bit more than a polluted environment and inhumane death.

I’ve heard a lot of people say that we’re much more developed today than we were millions of years ago, but I don’t understand how they’ve reached that conclusion (at least from a spiritual perspective). Millions of years ago we respected animals and mother nature- we understood our dependence and we cherished it. Back then we were “alive to the world” [5], fulfilled beings—today we are engrossed in our materialistic desires and power struggles. From a spiritual perspective, are we really better off?! This connection Man can have with all things natural is greater than any books we have read, buildings we have created, cars we have driven. We can find superficial meaning in our big cities and expensive houses, but if we truly want to connect with our spirit then we must stop looking at other beings of the word with notions of superiority and begin recognizing our oneness.

[4] I’m not suggesting that we forsake our civilization, and begin a new life a remote desert with coyotes for friends. If everyone had a chance to be reminded of the majesty of the natural world, to experience the things that provide for their existence, then they might be able to connect. And, when they connect, they can discover within themselves a spirit that isn’t tormented by materialism or corruption.

However, I am not suggesting that we resort back to our animal nature- after all, “normal humans have capacities that far exceed those of nonhuman animals, and some of those capacities are significant in particular contexts…” [6] (i.e. technology, medicine, art).

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PHOTOS

[1] http://pro.corbis.com/search/searchFrame.aspx
[2] http://pro.corbis.com/search/searchFrame.aspx
[3] http://pro.corbis.com/search/searchFrame.aspx
[4] http://pro.corbis.com/search/searchFrame.aspx