A Holistic Approach

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: When we were little, our parents taught us to treat each other well. And today we need an environment, which will continue the same thought. But you also say that we need to treat nature as a whole well. What does this mean?

Answer: Shouldn’t we protect the still, vegetative, and animate nature? Shouldn’t we love it? Loving nature means that I don’t live in it to use it as much as I can. “Let us blow up a mountain, let us dessicate the sea; let us do whatever benefits us. …” No, we must have a balanced attitude towards everything.

Ecologists are being defeated, but we will succeed because we say: “Nature is in balance. So let us first experiment on ourselves is what this means. Let us feel between us what it is like to be in balance, to protect all of nature, and to take from it only what we need for existence.” Animals act in a similar way naturally.

This is part of integral education. It will of course help people to also have the right attitude towards the natural environment. It is impossible to only teach people to treat each other well; they also need to be taught to have a kind and proper attitude towards nature, to the actual notion of “nature.”

After all we are in the process of development, and someone drives and pushes us. Where does this come from? What kinds of forces are developing us? Where does my tomorrow lie? I might not be familiar with it, but there are people who reveal it and perceive it. We see before us a step-by-step, causal process; we see that nature evolves consistently and every detail in it depends on other details. Einstein had really wanted to learn the common, universal formula of nature; science is familiar with this tenet, science is aware of the reciprocal influences of all parts of nature on each other.

And we are not an exception. And therefore, as we learn to unite, this unity also includes nature as a whole, together with its all-encompassing law, which develops us and everything else. Human society is not the only thing to develop, vegetative, as well as animate nature also develop, only much slower. The entire universe is in the state of development. Where is it directed? We do not know, but the fact remains: The universe is expanding, experiencing different processes, and none of them are accidental, even though we cannot yet understand them. As we advance, we learn that a great law of nature is concealed here.

In the end, we see that all the laws are obviously woven together into one, even though the connection between biology, zoology, botany, mineralogy, man, stars, and other things escapes us. We are not able to see the nets that connect everything, but essentially everything is a single Nature, and it does not divide into separate segments. And this is why we must have a holistic, wholesome approach to it. In addition, we also are its inseparable part. Life itself dictates it to us: Study facts and not someone’s assumptions.

It is like two directions exist:

  • You can form a good attitude towards the human society and then justify the devastation of Earth for the sake of current welfare;
  • Or conversely, you can prioritize environmental protection and neglect people.

Instead, I say: “No, the approach must be wholesome, ‘round,’ one. A single attitude towards everything is required of us. After all, man is a part of nature, and thus he must have an equal attitude towards society, family, and nature as a whole. We must attain balance among all parts. Balance is what is inherent in nature, and thus we observe its universal law.”

It is also balanced by the mutual influence and movement of the planet, stars, and the galaxy. Also, any interference with the earth’s nature is reflected in its various parts. So we need to understand our place in the system and build a corresponding attitude.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” Episode 11, 1/9/12

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