●Abstract--美しくなってきた地球と人間の役割
美しくなってきた地球と人間の役割
Implication of the Earth's evolution and the appearance of Homo sapiens in terms of esthetics
原田憲一
Kenichi HARADA
Abstract
When we summarize a history of the Earth in a few words, she can be described as having become scenically beautiful in the past 4.6 billion years through geological, geomorphological, and meteorological diversification. The biosphere also has played an essential role for the beautification by diversifying the life in form and function, because the sphere is directly connected to the solid earth through the medium of soil consisting mainly of the products of rock weathering. Since Homo sapience appeared at a stage when the Earth evolved to be most beautiful, their task in a geohistorical sense can be inferred to beautify the Earth further. This postulation may be verified by a fact that they created art more than 30,000 years ago for the first time in the history of life. Nonetheless, we are presently facing with destructive environmental-degradation in global scale, which has been caused by mass-production and mass-consumption since the Industrial Revolution and thereafter accelerated by the liberation of personal desires under the capitalistic social-system for the last few centuries. However, from a bio-evolutional point of view, the modern environmental crisis threatening the existence of human beings should not be regarded as inevitable fate, but as a trivial backlash in a long course of human evolution. One of the ways to overcome the crisis to avoid our extinction in the near future is to promote art throughout the world. It is because all the activity concerning art recalls us to the importance of peace, self-fulfillment, respect and appreciation to nature and life, and consideration for future generations, which should hinder the waste of energy and resources and wars made for the occupation and control over them.
Implication of the Earth's evolution and the appearance of Homo sapiens in terms of esthetics
原田憲一
Kenichi HARADA
Abstract
When we summarize a history of the Earth in a few words, she can be described as having become scenically beautiful in the past 4.6 billion years through geological, geomorphological, and meteorological diversification. The biosphere also has played an essential role for the beautification by diversifying the life in form and function, because the sphere is directly connected to the solid earth through the medium of soil consisting mainly of the products of rock weathering. Since Homo sapience appeared at a stage when the Earth evolved to be most beautiful, their task in a geohistorical sense can be inferred to beautify the Earth further. This postulation may be verified by a fact that they created art more than 30,000 years ago for the first time in the history of life. Nonetheless, we are presently facing with destructive environmental-degradation in global scale, which has been caused by mass-production and mass-consumption since the Industrial Revolution and thereafter accelerated by the liberation of personal desires under the capitalistic social-system for the last few centuries. However, from a bio-evolutional point of view, the modern environmental crisis threatening the existence of human beings should not be regarded as inevitable fate, but as a trivial backlash in a long course of human evolution. One of the ways to overcome the crisis to avoid our extinction in the near future is to promote art throughout the world. It is because all the activity concerning art recalls us to the importance of peace, self-fulfillment, respect and appreciation to nature and life, and consideration for future generations, which should hinder the waste of energy and resources and wars made for the occupation and control over them.
