Do you think nature has a conscience?

Question

What is conscience and where does it come from? Does it vanish when we die? The planet could feasibly have its own conscience. But is it alert to what we are doing to it?

Events such as Hurricane Katrina could be evidence of the Earth's immune system kicking in as a way to "fight off the infection" (us), or could it be a vengeful conscience that turned against us to make us pay for our wrongs? Or perhaps it could be something else. What do you all think?

Answer 1

only a theory but as humans we are part of nature and nature has created us, and we have consciences, so possibly nature has a conscience in us. therefore we should think not to pollute the world and cause climate change so such terrible things won't happen.

Answer 2

Well if conscience is the inner barometer inside of an individual which determines right from wrong, then I will say that no, nature does not have a conscience. I don't believe there is any right or wrong in the eyes of nature, just what IS vs what ISN'T.

Is it wrong that predators hunt their prey? Or that in the wild sometimes mothers will abandon their young? No one tries to prosecute an animal that abandons its young. However in the human realm it is considered very wrong.

Therefore I think that conscience is a strictly human trait.

I believe catastrophic natural events are the effect of a cause, whether human created or by some other action of nature herself. I don't believe nature deliberately wants to harm the human race. However if people continue to pollute, etc., then nature will respond to it (waters become more toxic which in turn can't support life). Nature didn't make herself poisonous--humans polluted and now we are feeling the effects of it.

As far as Katrina goes, I don't think there could be any human created cause for that...global warming perhaps. But hurricanes come from the coast of Africa. Other than that I don't know much about hurricanes.

Anyway why would nature want to punish the low income people who (if you think about it) sort of get the shaft everyday (much like nature herself these days). Remember, it was the low income people who felt the punishment from Katrina the most. The more financially well off people had the resources to evacuate or make other plans. The poor didn't have that option.

Answer 3

You have asked many questions -- and not just one; however I will do my best to 'synthesize' an answer that covers all the topics.

I think you mean to ask whether nature has a consciousness rather than "a conscious", right? I will assume that youi do.

We are part of nature and have consciousness.

I also believe that consciousness is created by or through experience.

And because of this, I have reason to believe that all of "nature" has a consciousness -- to include the planet upon which we live.

In fact "the ancient wisdom" teaches that there is an entity referred to as "the planetary logos" which is an actual conscious entity -- and that the earth, us and everything that lives upon the face of the earth is a physical manifestation of this entity. No, it's not "God" -- but that the earth is a living, breathing, and "conscious" entity -- no less than everything that exists upon the earth.

Ancient wisdom also teaches that our consciousness is eternal -- however, that it does "sleep" between creative cycles.

There are many possiblities to consider when considering why such things occur as hurricanes (which are misnamed as "acts of God") happen.

You used the phrase "to pay for our wrongs" and implied the existence of a human emotion of "vengfulness." The Dali Lama responded when he was asked this same question by Larry King with simply by saying "...cause and effect..."

But, (you should ask) the "cause and effect" of what?

What we do to each other...and the planet we do to ourselves.

I submit that there are other "causes" that we put into motion that create these and other kinds of "weather related phenomena" -- and that is our (collective) thoughts and emotions.

Answer 4

Tough question. There are two ways of understanding conscience: one some kind of energy that responds to some actio; I prefer the other one, I read it in a book some time ago: Lets think that you are in a plane, and all these buttons and stuff, but some smart man realize that all these functions need a central point: so he build it: a happy face; if something is wrong, the face turns, and thats it. So concience is that face, there are to many things and we can´t pay attention to all of it, so conscience is the attention in one point of one being. So we have conscius of what s happening in ourselves. And we are conscius, as a part of the earth, of what we are doing to nature. Do not think conscience as a some kind of Will. Is attention, and Good and Bad depends only on beings.

Answer 5

To have a conscience an entity first needs consciousness.
I very much doubt the planet has consciousness; it is only a garden for all life to grow in and from.

The energy produced/existing/happening in the universe is as simple as Einstein posited it to be; Energy = Mass x Speed of Light Squared.
It does NOT involve 'it' being conscious of itself nor of having a conscience.
KISS principle.

Answer 6

Nature does not have a "conscious". That would imply a human like presence controlling the universe.

It is hard to fathom for many - the concept of considering humans in the same way as animals - but that is what we are and we fit in with nature whether or not we can think of a conscious, intellect or create.

If you remove humans, the weather, organisms and all things contained within the Earth would still keep rolling right along and to think that nature could "punish" us is quite a childish viewpoint.

We are arrogant in that we assume we have so much power in our reality when in fact, we are just part of a system.

Answer 7

I believe your question is legitimate and has grounds, and I will look at your word “conscience” from a wider angle and use its broad meaning.

In living organisms, there's what we call "collective subconscious" that stores the habits, traditions, behavior and instinctive reactions necessary for the system to survive.

On the physical scale - the purely materialistic existence - there is what we can call a "recording system" that has been updating itself through the millions of years that marked the existence of matter in the universe. This record is the reference or source of information from which the evolving and developing living organisms make their foundations for the next construction of the materials to be used in the physical part of the living individual, be it human, animal or plant.

That means, in their new generations, living organisms utilize the records preserved in the matter and manipulate the information to strengthen their immune system against the hazards of Nature, where Nature, on its turn, updates its recording system to cope with the new developments in life and its forms because it is, by default, a self-updating recording system. This creates a competitive circle of co-existence between Nature and the living organisms. The more immune life forms become, the tougher Nature gets. So, in a way, we can say that whatever we do on this earth contributes to what nature does. Our acts affect nature's systems and responses. You can call this a conscious reaction by the planet if you wish, and you will not be totally mistaken, because it is after all, our consciousness through the universe that is being manifested, and I tend to believe that the whole universe is one existence that has diverse manifestations where each of these manifestations - be it living or otherwise - is the center of its own consciousness, and any act by Nature is not separate from the overall existence.
Based on the above, I’d say yes, the planet has a conscience, but it is our conscience acting through Nature. It is as if we are punishing or rewarding ourselves through the process of life manifestation in matter, in order to develop more, and eventually become masters of our own existence, thus fulfilling the Creator’s goal of creating an identical image of Himself without involving His own Self in the process.

Answer 8

The personification of nature and its power is at the heart of paganism. Modernity scoffs at such ascriptions and the religious outlook such a belief engenders. Whatever one believes, nature is brutally indifferent to our needs, aspirations, even our very existence. It is not provoked to change by our worship or our indifference, and can undo in an instant all our efforts to make it conform to our expectations. If nature in merely inert matter, it has no conscience. If it is some kind of quasi-divine entity-- it shows no evidence of such a thing as a conscience either.

Answer 9

The American Heritage Dictionary says that conscience is:

NOUN: 1a. The awareness of a moral or ethical aspect to one's conduct together with the urge to prefer right over wrong: Let your conscience be your guide. b. A source of moral or ethical judgment or pronouncement: a document that serves as the nation's conscience. c. Conformity to one's own sense of right conduct: a person of unflagging conscience. conscienceless

If one accepts that as a definition, then only humans can have conscience and the planet/Katrina hypothesis will not work

Conscience, in my opinion, is a confluence of innate and environment conditioning factors.

Answer 10

I would not be that sure about putting a thick line between "us" and the rest of the nature. Some of us do have conscience and are part included in the nature. What I am saying here is that combined consciousness has enormous unimaginable natural power and no one can afford to ignore.