[기사와 칼럼] 인간과 문명, 자연을 보는 시선들

태곳적부터 존재했던 인간과 자연의 상호 작용, 이 둘을 잇는 허리를 '문명'이라고 볼 수 있으려나. ...

1. Long Before Making Enigmatic Earthworks, People Reshaped Brazil's Rain Forest (NYT, Feb 2017)

"아마존의 밀림은 사람이 손대지 않은 자연 그대로의 숲이라고 많은 사람들이 생각하지만, 전혀 그렇지 않다. 아마존 지역의 고대인들은 이미 알려진 것보다 훨씬 오래전부터 열대 우림을 관리했다."

... Dr. Watling and her colleagues found that in contrast with the large-scale deforestation we see today — which threatens about 20 percent of the largest rain forest in the world — ancient indigenous people of the Amazon practiced something more akin to what we now call agroforestry.

“Indigenous communities have actually transformed the ecosystem over a very long time,” said Dr. Watling. “The modern forest owes its biodiversity to the agroforestry practices that were happening during the time of the geoglyph builders.” ...

cf. geoglyph: A large-scale drawing made on the ground by scratching or arranging lines of stones etc

2. We need nature and other species for our sanity (delmarvanow, Feb 2017)

... Current human societies have become the loneliest, most alienated, isolated, depressed, addicted and anxious in history. ... [People] don't belong, aren't needed, have no reason to exist. ... Thousands of other species likewise are losing their sense of belonging─so diminished in numbers that they can't find a mate, a pack or a community of other interdepdendent species within which to survive.

Altogether, 66 percent of our world’s wildlife will have vanished by 2020, according to the World Wildlife Fund’s 2016 “Living Planet Report.” Since 1970, populations of vertebrate animals (mammals, birds and fish) have already plummeted by more than 58 percent.

3. Climate Diaries: Scientists on the front lines in Antarctica (CBS, Feb 2017)