Nature and Civilizations
Sustainability Cornerstones:Conservation and Preservation
Outstanding Personalities engaged with nature conservation and heritage preservation
The impact of humanity’s relationship to the natural world and meantime to its own civilizations has been the concern of many outstanding personalities along history.
History teaches us that humanity’s struggle for a better life and the continuous conquest of “more world” had always social, cultural, political, religious and environmental consequences. The consequences of this never interrupted struggle were – after shorter or longer periods of flourishing societies - unrests, revolutions, wars, genocides and extinction events.
The wisdom of an evolved humanity would be to learn from History.
Some outstanding personalities deeply concerned with the future of humanity, its relationship to the natural world and its own civilizations are presented bellow:
Edward O. Wilson
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Professor Emeritus and curator in Entomology at Harvard University , Eduard O. Wilson is renowned worldwide for his biodiversity studies and his stewardship for the integration of nature’s conservation forces and the requirements of economic development. Professor Wilson is the author of more than 30 books and he has coined the concepts as Biophilia, Sociobiology and Consilience of knowledge. He has conducted innumerable studies on the equilibrium if ecosystems with focus on the irreplaceable role of insect societies in ecosystems and their unique role for sustainability and the survival of the Tree of Life,-of Life itself on Earth. As a scientist bearing the flag of conservationism, he has defined his environmental ethic principles in his 1992 published book “The Diversity of Life.”
Richard Southwood
Sir Richard Southwood, Vice Chancellor of Oxford University (1989-1993) was a British biologist, expert in entomology, focusing his research in the field of insect societies and their population dynamics. Professor Southwood was an eminent expert in entomological taxonomy and systematics. His research interests moved over time to the emerging science of ecological entomology, and he became its principal architect over the past decades. First appeared in 1996, his book “Ecological Methods” went in several editions and is considered still today the ecologist’s bible. The book describes available techniques (taxonomic, analytical, statistical and practical) for the studies of populations and ecosystems, including population dynamics and sampling.
His introductory lectures for incoming students of Biology he gave every year at Oxford, were synthesized as a mastery overview in his 2003 book “The Story of Life.” Professor Southwood addressed the fundamental events of the history of life on earth and in the final chapter of the book he evaluated the impact of humanity on eco-systems in our times.
Theodore Roosevelt
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Theodore Roosevelt, the 20th President of the United States, was an American politician, statesman, writer and conservationist. President Roosevelt implemented the domain of nature conservation and American heritage preservation into American legislation.
The Antiquity Act 0f 1906 validated the protection of 230,000,000 acres of forests, founded 5 National Parks, 150 National Forests, 51 Birds Reserves, and empowered the President of the United States to establish national monuments on federal land. Further he founded the US Forest Service to ensure forestry service management.
By the Newland Reclamation Act of 1902 , he speeded up the construction of water dams, while the Inland Waterway Commission of 1908 became responsible for the water projects. Theodore Roosevelt’s legacy consists in his aim to balance and integrate the protection of nature in the process of a fast expanding economy, so as to ensure the conservation of ecosystems and natural resources by mandating territories under federal protection.
Winston Spencer Churchill
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Winston Churchill was one of the most influential world leaders of the 20th century. He was one of the outstanding personalities of his time: politician, military man, writer, author, painter, and conservationist of Nature. He was twice named prime minister of Great Britain, he had a major strategic contribution to the Allied victory in World War II, and in 1953 he won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Churchill was a pioneering butterfly gardener. His fascination with butterflies began at the age of six and continued during his military career when he was in Sudan, Pakistan, South Africa, Uganda, Bangalore and Brazil.
Already during the time of World War Two, he elaborated an extensive project for a butterfly garden at his country home Chartwell in Kent: “He envisaged fountains of honey and water,” and attempted to reintroduce an extinct butterfly species, the black-veined white. During the early 1950s’ when Churchill had retired to Chartwell he was painting outside in his garden and meantime watching the butterflies in his hatch.
Dr. Richard Freund
Dr. Richard Freund is a worldwide renowned archaeologist, researcher, historian so as an excellent professor and mentor. Dr.Freund is an author of books and was the director of excavation projects using the ground radar penetrating method, which enabled multiple unexpected archaeological discoveries, and enlarged and certified fundamental historical knowledge about the roots of European and Middle East Civilizations. His books “Secrets of the Cave of letters” and “Digging through History: archaeology and Religion from Atlantis to the Holocaust” an emotional narrative about the striving of early Mediterranean societies to build civilizations based on social norms and ethics, so as about their destructive failures which in our times of Modernity revealed as the Holocaust. Dr. Freund involved with discovery. Archaeological activity and preservation initiatives of historical monuments as the city of Bethsaida and Northern galilee, Israel so as of the Holy Cave of Nazareth, Palestine where the roots of Christianity are located and the Atlantis sites in today’s Spain related to earlier Atlantic civilization mentioned in the writing of Plato and Herodotus.
The messages of scholar Richard Freund are stories about the aspirations of human societies to build civilizations and warnings about their repeated failures. These warning messages should also be a ringing bell for the nowadays sixth major extinction event.