As we’ve continued to read about the relationship between humans and nature my understanding of this subject has changed greatly. I too had a viewpoint similar to that of Thayer Walker’s, in that I thought if I really had to, I could survive stranded by myself in nature. I would not have been as confident as him, but I would have thought myself fully capable of merely surviving. But after reading his island story and some of the other stories thus far, I’ve begun to better understand the reality of the forces of nature and the difficulty of surviving without all the modern technology we’ve come to expect. However, I don’t want to take anything away from humans. We have given ourselves this vision of being dominant over nature because, well, for the most part we are. Often we think that we have total control over nature, which is completely false and is when we run into problems, but we shouldn’t forget the fact that nature has less impact on our lives than any other species.
Sometimes we as humans believe we are above nature and can do anything we want without facing any kind of consequence. A perfect example of this is sadly Hurricane Katrina. For those who don’t understand how the city of New Orleans exists I will briefly explain. Basically, engineers decided that they could build up big dams (called levees) that would keep water out and would allow the ground level to drop below sea level. A lot of careful planning went into this, but it was still a recipe for disaster. Eventually, when Katrina came, the levees could not withstand the immense water pressure, and they gave way to walls of water that engulfed the city. Personally, I would not feel comfortable living in an area where this is possible, but I feel that I could have been persuaded otherwise. While the builders of New Orleans did know the potential risks they were dealing with, I would guess that they slightly underestimated the incredible force of something like Hurricane Katrina.
Conversely I think that in analyzing these situations we don’t give ourselves enough credit. It is amazing that humans could find a way to make a city out of a section of the ocean, don’t get me wrong. But it seems that in situations like these we are asserting too much confidence in ourselves and not giving enough respect to nature and the damage it can do. In Thayer Walker’s experience with survival, he was humbled by nature and came to a greater realization of its power over us. For most of us, the only experiences with have with the powerful, sublime forces with nature as seen on television from the comfort of our sofas and lazy chairs. Whether it’s Man vs. Wild or Survivorman we see experts battling nature and struggling to survive yet we think, “Yeah, I could do that.” I guess it’s just human nature to think that if one man can do it, than we can to.
In conclusion, we as humans are too confident in ourselves when it comes to our power over nature. We believe that because we have this great quality of life, we could easily survive in the most primitive form of living, but we are wrong. Nature is much more powerful than many of us realize and at times that is clearly demonstrated to us. However, we must not forget how far we’ve come and what we are able to do. The reason why we underestimate nature’s power is not sheer pride, but it’s because, compared to all other species, we do have the best ability to overcome it.
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