Natural Expectations : a definition
Natural expectations are sets of inherent, intrinsic design implications that emerge from within living organisms.
Another way to express this would be to say that a three legged stool has obvious immediate design implications, as would a mug, or a palm leaf woven basket. The stool is a seat or a table, the mug, an open container with a handle, is for drinking or scooping, the basket is for carrying, or holding objects within it, and it’s strap arrangement, if it has one, might indicate how it is to be carried. It’s an analogy because the stool, the mug nor the basket, are all non ‘living’ ‘things’ and are used by living beings. The materials that comprise those objects may in time be returned to nature, yet they as objects do not live, nor do they grow.
What I am writing about are the natural expectations’ of living processes.
Plants are an expectation of sunlight within certain frequency ranges, varying from plant to plant. Some utilise more direct sunlight than others. Each one has its place.
In the forest habitat Perma-culturists and Forest Gardeners describe 7 layers of light variation, from the ground to the topmost leaves, and have observed that a myriad of different plants work on all those varying levels of light, collectively and individually. Put any one of those plants in a layer it’s not normally naturally part of and it will struggle, and its natural growth cycles will be disrupted. The plants natural expectations are not being met.
Each plant in the web of life provides materials and more often than not often living space for many, many organisms, all of whom are part of the essential optimum health picture. In a forest with many hundreds and thousands of species those relationships will be incredibly interwoven in a non-linear fashion. The entire web is an expression of many, many specific natural expectations being fulfilled. All inter-related! That inter dependence is also part of the natural expectations, or design implications of living processes.
Eyes are an expectation of sunlight within a certain frequency range. We human beings cannot see ultra-violet or infra-red light with our eyes. Yet there are many animals that do use those frequencies. It is interesting to note that civilisation has developed technology to extend our sensory range, to ‘see’ those UV or IR frequencies, primarily as military/security tools and as such mostly for ill.
Ears are an expectation of sound waves. Again there is a limit, a certain frequency range outside of which nothing is sensed by that particular organ or organism or collective of cells operating as they do. Nature has determined this limit. It is no accident. Irrespective of whatever determines such processes, these naturally determined expectations are absolutely meaningful, and of vital importance to all living processes.
Plants need water. Some more than others. The local availability, source and quality of water determines what plants will thrive, and of course those plants will live there and will thrive. Salt Marshes and Bog Marshes are quite differing habitats. A few plants can handle both, most are specific to the precise habitat and it’s variations.
Another way to sense this would be to say that what we see in natural living processes is that those intrinsic, that is to say, essentially innate and natural expectations determine the parameters for the optimum health of any living process. Meeting those natural expectations ensures optimum health.
There is one other natural expectation that inheres to all living processes; that is that there is no such ‘thing’ or ‘concept’ as ‘thrash’, ‘rubbish’ or waste.
Nature does not create any waste. Ever. In natural living processes ALL materials utilised by living processes are returned to the nutrient cycles in forms that other organisms or living processes can metabolise. That return processes is pee-ing, poo-ing, leaf shedding, skin shedding, and of course dieing.
Decaying. Bio-degrading … though I don’t much like that term.
Bio-returning would be a better description, less judgemental.
This constant return of metabolised materials increases the over-all fecundity of the natural habitat. That too is a natural expectation of the entire biota or habitat.
Another way of saying this is that this very simple no-waste principle ensures the continued optimum health and growth of the habitat.
What it means, for me at least, is that EVERYTHING that lives on Earth, and everything done by those living organisms is inter-related, profoundly connected in a vast food web that feeds all life – all waste is food for life - so that life grows ever more abundant on Earth. And each and every living organism is embodied with a set of natural expectations.
However being an intelligent system, there is another dynamic that works with these sets of natural expectations that ensures that they are not rigid or brittle..... and that is the ability to take in information and to change or 'adapt' behaviour to meet new circumstances.
It follows that even the slightest input of ‘new’ or ‘alien’ materials will have consequences and those consequences cannot be easily predicted, especially where nature has not determined a bio-logical metabolic living process to handle that material, to utilise it and or return it to the nutrient cycle. The ‘new’ or ‘alien’ material can become toxic if it ‘accidentally’ interferes with natural bio-logical processes; though hind sight does of course reveal the extent and depth of those consequences, even as this is strangely ignored by so many in this modern dominant culture.
To recap, ALL natural living processes have specific and precise natural expectations that are intrinsic and that determine the parameters for the optimum health of each living process; and that the constant meeting those expectations at the individual and community levels increases the overall health of the entire species, and those many species living at optimum health, by metabolising materials created by each other they collectively ensure the optimum health of the entire habitat.
And that all organisms, living in a constantly changing environment have the ability to learn, that is to say that they can receive information from the environment, and use that information to make changes in their behaviour, in such manner as to maintain the overall balance of life. Thus there is no ‘waste’ in natural processes, because all materials are left in a state that specifically enables them to be metabolised by other living processes. Life feeds life.
Change is possible, even for a rigid Institutional Society such as the Dominant Culture which is undermining natural processes and causing great harm. The question therefore is will 'it' or it's constituents make those choices based on learning and on a desire to maintian the vitality of natural processes. That's you and I, my friends and all other human beings. Even David Cameron retains that possibility. Even the Pope.
If they chose not to make those choices, then they have to be held accountable for the adverse affects of their behaviour.
Kindest regards
Corneilius
Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe
Who benefits if we demonise the 'racists' whilst power tramples over EVERYONE?
Diane Abbot, and the Editors of The Guardiuan and other Newspapers, (and their readerships) would do well to read Paolo Friere's "Pedagogy of the Oppressed' and actually take some of it in. Though they'd very quickly find themselves unemployed if they did so and acted on what Friere wrote, which is truth and beauty, REAL power.... the power to become fully human.
I am appalled at the craven nature of this discourse.