| |
Fish Out of Water
By Dr. Randy Wysong
We measure our world by the limits of our knowledge and experience. If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to treat everything like nails. Bigotry, bias, and prejudice are all words that describe this limited view (hammer) each of us tends to embrace and apply.
A dog does not comprehend poetry, nor does an infant calculus. The worlds of the dog and of the child are extremely limited in scope. For the dog it is predominantly genetically determined. Even if a dog would like to understand poetry, it couldn't and will never grow into it either. On the other hand, a child's view of the world can expand continually throughout life. Unfortunately, as we get into our teenage years and become certain that our knowledge encompasses just about all that could be known – certainly more than both parents combined – we become increasingly arrogant, and with this arrogance, closed minded. Intellectual growth can actually stop by about the age of 13, with vocabulary serving as an index of this growth and not increasing significantly for most people after this age.
With that as a preface, let me say that it is easy for us to believe that the world we were born into is the only real world. Fluorescent lights, conditioned air, automobiles, pop, French fries, television, and polyester may seem like the only real and natural world for humans. Without the perspective of history, there would be no way of knowing any differently.
But we do have history. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, which occurred about 200 years ago, we were by and large in an entirely different setting. We spent the majority of our time outside and without any of the modern conveniences and technologies we have come to believe to be as natural and automatic as a tree or the wind.
Our genes, however, are not equally convinced. They remain encoded for the natural world. They are, in fact, an inward definition of the external natural, pre-Industrial, more pristine world.
In this new modern synthetic world we are increasingly alienating our basic biological make up. We are like fish taken out of water.
On a broader environmental scale, human activity rivals the natural processes that have built the biosphere. About 40% of the earth's photosynthetic capacity (plant growth) is now appropriated for human use. The biologically available nitrogen and phosphorus used by humans for fertilizer and chemicals about equals the amount produced by nature. We apparently can alter our atmosphere on a global scale (ozone, Chernobyl, greenhouse gases). Huge numbers of species stand on the curling tip of a wave of extinction – and the list goes on.
Though it seems presumptuous to suggest that we, here, now in this generation are unique in all of history, the evidence supports that we are. We are a pivotal generation that can either turn things around or continue to fuel a degrading environmental/health spiral that soon, if unaltered by us, will continue in spite of any efforts we make later to change things.
Scary? Yes, indeed. But we need to get scared if that's what it takes to wake up. We are, without a doubt, a very special generation with the weight of the world's future literally on our shoulders.
Don't despair. You, yes little ole puny you, can do much. Everything ever done always began with one. Act on the things you know to be right, healthy, socially responsible, and environmentally sensitive.
Yes, you. Yes, now. Yes, there is no downside in doing so.
*Further Reading:
[The Wysong Optimal Health Program™]
http://www.wysong.net/optimal_health_page1.shtml
[What Does Our Genetic Program Say We Should Eat?]
http://www.wysong.net/PDFs/mar_apr2000.pdf
[Genetic Context The Fundamental Key to Health]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_aug99.shtml
[Look at the Big Picture]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_may98.shtml
[Be a Thinking Person]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/chl_apr96.shtml
[Do Not Let Technology Think for You]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_jul96.shtml
[Stay Open to Learning Every Day]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_apr96.shtml
[Man The Apex Predator]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_jan96.shtml
[Humans Are Not Too Puny to Remodel the Whole Planet]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_oct95.shtml
[Ozone Marks Environmental Threats]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_sep95.shtml
[Using Intelligence in Food Choices]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_jan94.shtml
[Are We Healthier?]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_jun92.shtml
[Scale of Change]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_feb91.shtml
[We Can Make a Difference]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_nov90.shtml
[Saving the Environment]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_jun90.shtml
[Time Compression]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_jun90.shtml
[Lamenting the Foods of Old]
http://www.wysong.net/healthletter/hl_feb90.shtml
[The Wysong Directory of Alternative Resources]
http://www.wysong.net/page/WOTTPWS/PROD/EDUAIDS/MM028
[Prevention/Therapy Guide]
http://www.wysong.net/therapy_prevention.shtml
About the Author
Dr. Wysong is a former veterinary clinician and surgeon, college instructor in human anatomy, physiology and the origin of life, inventor of numerous medical, surgical, nutritional, athletic and fitness products and devices, research director for the present company by his name and founder of the philanthropic Wysong Institute. He is author of The Creation-Evolution Controversy now in its eleventh printing, a new two volume set on philosophy for living entitled Thinking Matters: 1-Living Life... As If Thinking Matters; 2-The Big Questions...As If Thinking Matters, several books on nutrition, prevention and health for people and animals and over 18 years of monthly health newsletters. He may be contacted at Wysong@Wysong.net and a free subscription to his e-Health Letter is available at http://www.wysong.net. Also check out http://www.cerealwysong.com
Article Source: http://www.simplysearch4it.com/article/20202.html
| If you wish to add the above article to your website or newsletters then please include the "Article Source: http://www.simplysearch4it.com/article/20202.html" as shown above and make it hyperlinked. |
| Some other articles by Dr. Randy Wysong | More Cancer Treatment Failure
At the recent meeting of the American Association of Clinical Oncologists (ASCO), some 25,000 doctors met to discuss advances in cancer ...
Impossible=Possible
Even if the chance that all the events coming together perfectly to create life on Earth is virtually an impossible probability with staggering odds (which it is), we ...
Determinism
Materialists believe that all the energy and matter in the universe is governed by physical laws. A planet circles a star at a precise distance from it, electrical impulses travel along neurons in ...
Rationale for Creating the First "Un-Cereal™"
The advent of agriculture about 10,000 years ago and the subsequent scale-up to mass feeding made possible by the Industrial Revolution solved problems of quantity but not quality. Average life span has increased ...
Life And Health In The Year 1000
Compared with the way things used to be, we have it so very soft today. It's easy to take our modern conveniences for granted. We can fill our ...
The Supernatural
Once we arrive at the conclusion that mere matter and natural laws are not sufficient to explain the existence of the universe and life, but a super intelligence is, then what? For some, this begins a life ...
|
|
| |
|
