Biophilia—why people need wild places
By JENNIFER CORDIER

Today Is December 15, 2006 and my husband and I are traveling to Florida for a perholiday visit with family. We chose to travel the interstate to save time and now find ourselves embedded in a huge traffic jam in downtown Atlanta. My gaze passes from the jumble of cars and trucks surrounding us to the condominiums lined up and stacked four high along the freeway. A giant billboard reads, New Community - -- Full Amenities - Close to Shopping and Entertainment. I sigh and open a new book by E.O. Wilson titled The Creation, An Appeal To Save Life On Earth. As though reading my mind, Dr. Wilson’s words reach out to me:

Granted, many people seem content to live entirely within the synthetic ecosystems. But so are domestic animals content, even in the grotesquely abnormal habitats in which we rear them. This in my mind is a perversion. It is not the nature of human beings to be cattle in glorified feedlots. Every person deserves the option to travel easily in and out of the complex and primal world that gave us birth. We need freedom to roam across land owned by no one but protected by all, whose unchanging horizon is the same that bounded the world of our millennial ancestors. Only in what remains of Eden, teeming with life forms independent of us, is it possible to experience the kind of wonder that shaped the human psyche at its birth.

I have long held the belief that our species, Homo sapiens, is genetically predisposed to living in close relationship to the natural world. The gravitational pull of Nature on the human psyche is expressed as biophilia which E.O. Wilson defines as our species innate tendency to affiliate with life and life like processes. It is interesting to learn that researchers have found that when people of different cultures are given freedom to select the setting of their homes, they prefer an environment that combines three features: to live on a height looking down and out, to scan a parkland before them and to be near a body of water. These quirks of human nature do not prove but are at least consistent with the savanna hypothesis of human evolution. Fossil records show that human beings today still choose the habitats resembling those of our early ancestors. Those distant forebears wished to be hidden in copses looking out over a savanna or transitional woodland, scanning the terrain for prey, edible plants and possible enemies. They needed a body of water nearby for food and subsistence.

Further evidence that the natural world is embedded in our genes is revealed by psychologists who have discovered that just a view of natural environments, especially parklands and savannas, generally lead to a decline in moods of fear and anger and generate an overall feeling of tranquility. To relieve the stress of sitting in this traffic jam, I visualize my peaceful valley homestead in the north Georgia mountains and my tension eases.

Those of us who are fortunate enough to live close to nature may not fully understand our deep connection to the natural world, but we instinctively know that the beauty and mystery found in wild places provides nourishment for our souls. With this understanding we also accept responsibility for learning about our environment so the wild places can be saved and experienced by our children. A relatively new program, the Georgia Master Naturalist program, is an adult environmental education course developed by the UGA Cooperative Extension Service and the Warnell School of Forest Resources for people who wish to be more informed about habitats, ecosystems and the natural environment. The programs purpose is to provide unbiased, scientifically based information concerning environmental issues for adults. An informed person can help make changes not only in their lives, but also in their community and to safe guard our environment. Mickey Cummings, extension agent for the Union County Extension Service, will be offering the first Georgia Master Naturalist Program designed specifically for our mountain environment in the spring of 2007. For more information about this exciting program contact Mickey Cummings at 706-439-6030; email: coosa@uga.edu.

For information about the Plant Rescue Project, a project to identify, protect and preserve our native plants, contact Jennifer Cordier at 706-745- 9317; email: ivylog@alltel.net. This project is sponsored by the Preservation Committee of the Community Council of the Georgia Mountain Research and Education Center in Blairsville, Georgia.