In Common Light

I think that climate change sometimes comes as a surprise to us because we think to ourselves, “How could we?” If we are creatures of the Earth, if “survival of the fittest” really curated us in a way to be fitted to our environment, then how could we be, with that evolutionary fit, wired with the brain capacity to hurt our planet? How do we have the ability to do that? If Earth really supported us, if we really survived based on these resources, would it have biologically engineered us to hurt the very place that we live?

Similarly, we ask, “Didn’t evolution prepare us with the brain power to create systems that only serve us?” We helped ourselves out with the system of capitalism, and it serves us well, it keeps our economy going, it keeps us with “freedom,” we say. But how could it hurt us by hurting our home? How could it have hurt and stopped the natural function of the very thing, and things, that we need in order to survive?

Maybe we need to reframe what serves us. Maybe we don’t have the right idea of what serves us. I think we know that though we are outputs of natural selection, this doesn’t mean that we are incapable of creating systems or infrastructure that is dangerous and harmful to us. Maybe we need to reframe the idea that a free market, having no checks or limits, being unbounded by our ambition, is the best fit for us. Maybe we need to reconsider that “more” is not always better, and instead, come back to the real biological, evolutionary truth: moderation is key. The body craves balance. So, too, then, do our institutions, since they are made up of us humans and they shape the ways that we live. Capitalism maybe is not really serving us if it is hurting our planet.