AGENDA
- Wild places module, overview
- Loving nature
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Upcoming reports
- faking nature, April 11 (Hannah)
- rewilding, April 18 (Jackson, Olivia, Clayton)
- recycling, April 23 (Kamila, Chyler, Priya) -- will send you some info
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RR28 We’ve been talking about nature “out there” but now we turn to nature in our immediate environment.
- What are some examples of urban wildlife issues that Alagona discusses?
- Visit a place where you can observe urban nature--this could be somewhere very near or very far. Do you “love nature” in this form (see our class on April 4) or is urban nature too dull or depleted to love?
Visit ideas
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White Rock Lake (east side: birds but also trash)
https://maps.app.goo.gl/N5Gh4FmfYmtbE5RB7?g_st=i
Orange fencing is in front of tree
- Eagle's nest
- Arboretum - also relevant to "faking nature"
- Klyde Warren Park
- North of Dallas -- Heard Museum nature preserve
- Goat Island (super urban nature)
- Cedar Ridge preserve
- Live oaks in front of Dallas Hall!
- Bear Creek park
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Loving Nature
Are you a nature lover?
What does it mean to "love nature"?
Rick Furtak, "On the Love of Nature" -- from a collection of essays about love
E.O. Wilson, "The Environmental Ethic"....biophilia (loving nature)
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Furtak
- he offers a theory about loving nature
- he first states the theory -- we read this part
- he then attributes the theory to Henry David Thoreau (1817 - 1862) -- we didn't read
- Thorough spent a few years living in solitude at Walden Pond near Concord, Massachussets.
- Nature as a refuge from the world, a place for reflection and renewal
- Doesn't have to be distant or rare
- Walden Pond not a wilderness_________________________
The Thoreau/Furtak theory of loving nature (annotated reading)
(1) What is love?
- "to love is essentially to care about the life and well-being of whatever we love" (passage 2)
- "what is loved must have a life that can be going well or not so well" apart from my own preferenes (read passage 3)
- So we can love....(his examples)
- rabbits, aspen trees, human beings
- lakes forests, mountains, species, ecosystems
- We can't love....
- chocolate... (really enjoying vs. love)
- skiiing... (really enjoying vs. love)
- can you love a city?
- The places you discussed -- do you love/care about them or just really enjoy them?
(3) Loving nature makes us aware of more features (read passages 4, 6)
- without hearing, you would miss out on bird song
- without sight, you would miss out on fall colors
- without love, you miss out on things as well
- what do you miss out on
- maybe we should add: love --> notice more --> love more
- the eagle's nest is precarious, on the brink of another tragedy
- other examples of meaning?
(4) Love is like a sense--without hearing we'd miss out on birdsong; without love we miss out on features, value, meaning (read passages 8, 9, 13)
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- places that are NOT "humanized"
- places that are "beyond human contrivance"
- "Wilderness settles peace on the soul because it needs no help"
- Wilderness is a "metaphor of unlimited opportunity"
Are you a wilderness seeker as well as a nature lover?
Next: we will example the concept of wilderness