LifeLens
Focusing on What Matters
LifeLens |
The LifeLens
“It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one destiny, affects all indirectly.”
— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
The LifeLens
I. Introduction
II. Focusing on What Matters
III. Our Common Background
A. The Universe
B. History of the Earth in 24 Hours
C. Our Life System
IV. The Life Lens
V. The Human Lens
VI. Integration of the Two Lenses
I. Introduction
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II. Focusing on What Matters
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III. Our Common Background
A. The Universe
One fundamental way the LifeLens helps us make better choices is by seeing the larger picture. In order to gain perspective of who we are, we need to remember where we came from. Let's start first by looking at our home, the Earth: its astonishing history and our place in it.
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Why will understanding the history of the Earth help us make better choices?
Hopefully, such an understanding will underline our dependence on our Life Support System that supports all life; and it will remind us what a miracle our individual lives truly are.
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> Earth’s Life Support Systems represent the interconnected biophysical elements and processes that enable and sustain all known life on this planet. —https://learn.sustainability-directory.com/area/earths-life-support-systems. See III. C. Our Life System.
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How are our lives such a miracle?
In our flight through time, we will see that it is miraculous in at least four ways:
1) our beautiful planet in this vast universe is a miracle in itself; 2) the fact that there is diverse and abundant life on Earth is also a miracle; 3) conscious, aware human life is yet another miracle; and 4) your life is even more of a miracle. What are the chances that any of these (especially your life) would exist in this immense and mysterious universe?
• You can hope for a miracle in your life, or you realize that your life is the miracle. — Robert Breault
“To me, every hour of the light and dark is a miracle. Every cubic inch of space is a miracle.”
— Walt Whitman
“There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle.”
— Albert Einstein
People these days tend to grow up with little reverence for life, often taking it for granted. Imagine the lives of all your direct ancestors, from the first humans until now, who had to overcome tremendous challenges for you to be here on Earth at this very moment. Are you not the most mind-boggling miracle?
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
— Mary Oliver
How did the universe begin?
The generally accepted scientific Big Bang theory is that the universe began with a cosmic explosion, approximately 13.8 billion years ago, from an infinitely dense single point to this ever-expanding universe. (My simple human brain cannot grasp this. I mean, where did that single point come from? ad infinitum…)
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Some believe the universe is simply a random occurrence while others believe there is some kind of force, spirit or creator behind it. However it happened, the universe for me remains a magnificent mystery. What do you believe?
“The universe is an inexhaustible celebration of ultimate mystery!”
— Brian Swimme
Where do we live in this universe?
We live in the Milky Way Galaxy, a constantly rotating spiral of over 100 billion stars (conservative estimate). One of those stars is our relatively young 4.6 billion year old Sun, the center of our Solar System. At the center of the Milky Way is a monstrous black hole, billions of times more massive than the Sun, sucking up stars that get too close. Fortunately our Solar System is located far away, between the two main spiral arms of the Milky Way. We can thank our lucky stars for that.
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How many more galaxies are there?
The Milky Way galaxy seems vast beyond comprehension. Yet, conservative estimates claim that there are at least 100 billion galaxies in the whole universe, perhaps trillions. All the while, the universe is expanding with new stars being born and old stars dying (a little like life itself).
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So, why keep boggling our minds with all these numbers?
Perhaps it will make coming home to our “little” Solar System (just one star out of those septillions) a little easier to grasp.
What is our solar system made up of?
Our Solar System consists of everything that rotates around our star, the Sun, including eight planets and their satellites, comets, and asteroids. Earth is the only planet we know of in the universe, so far, that is hospitable to life.
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What makes the Earth habitable?
There are a number of extraordinary factors that came together to create a planet favorable to life. Here are a few:
• Our Solar System itself is on the outer spiral of the Milky Way Galaxy, removed from the more volatile interior.
• The Earth is made up of just the right ingredients: land, air and especially water.
• Perhaps most importantly, the Earth is the Goldilocks distance from the Sun: if closer, the water would evaporate; if further away, the water would freeze.
• The Earth has a relatively stable orbit and tilt around the Sun.
• The Moon’s gravity is not only a stabilizing force to the Earth’s rather wobbly orbit; it helps stabilize the climate and creates beneficial (to life) ocean tides.
• The Earth’s magnetic field helps protect life from harmful solar radiation.
• Billions of years of relative stability has allowed life to evolve in increasing complexity.
• The Ozone Layer (created by plants) protects the Earth from the Sun’s ultraviolet waves, allowing life to live on the land.
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Let us now look at the history of our Earth home.
“Water is life.”
— Lakota Tribe
“No water, no life. No blue, no green.”
— Sylvia Earle
“Water is the driving force of all nature.”
— Leonardo da Vinci
“Water is the soul of the Earth.”
— W. H. Auden
When did life begin?
After the Earth had time to settle, the first evidence of life appeared around 5:40 AM (3.5 bya) in the miracle of bacteria. All life evolved from this one-celled organism. In fact, all organisms (animals, plants, fungus, and one-celled life forms) have the same genetic code (DNA). This bacteria is the common ancestor of all living organisms on Earth (known as LUCA: the Last Universal Common Ancestor). One-celled organisms dominated our planet (in diversity and abundance) for a vast amount of time: 15.5 hours, until around 7:00 PM in our 24hr clock. Even now, their total volume on Earth exceeds that of all plants and animals combined.
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What was the next big step for life?
At around 8:20 AM (3 bya), cyanobacteria, the first organism to produce oxygen, appears. This is a milestone for two major reasons. These are the first bacteria that can directly capture and store energy from the sun through the process of photosynthesis. Secondly, by producing oxygen as a waste product, they began to change the Earth’s atmosphere. This led to more advanced forms of life, such as plants and animals, to evolve.
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When did the first (multi-celled) plants and animals appear?
It wasn’t until around 2:20 PM (1.85 bya) that simple algae appeared in the oceans. This algae is the first multi-celled organism as well as the first photosynthetic plant. It took over six hours later, around 8:50 PM (600 mya), for the first animals, probably ancestors of sponges, to appear.
What made it possible for life to leave the ocean and other water sources?
At around 9:10 PM (550 mya) (note how late this is!) the oxygen waste, primarily from photosynthetic algae in the oceans, created the first stable Ozone Layer around the Earth. This protective shield continues to help keep out the Sun’s ultraviolet rays which are harmful to living cells. This Ozone Layer allowed life to emerge from the oceans and fresh water sources to live on land. Until then, life could survive only in water. Plants, in other words, have been dramatically instrumental in transforming the Earth.
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When did life leave water to inhabit the land?
It took only about 20 minutes from the time the ozone layer formed until the first land-dwelling plants took root at about 9:35 PM (470 mya). Soon after plants began to spread across the land, the first land-dwelling animals, such as centipedes and scorpions, emerged around 9:55 PM (400 mya). They (as are all animals today) were dependent on plant food and oxygen, the waste product of plants.
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The ability for life to leave water and move onto the land took almost 22 hrs in our 24 hour clock. There are now only about two more hours left until the present day— with a lot more to cram in!
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What did the Earth look like after plants and animals moved onto the land?
Starting around 10:15 PM (359 mya), the Earth is covered in giant ferns and mosses and trees— now a miraculous green Earth, called the Carboniferous Period (359-299 mya). As green plants spread in great profusion across the Earth, they absorbed gases from the atmosphere, such as carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide. When these plants died, these gases eventually got compressed and stored under the Earth’s crust as oil, gas and coal which are essentially fossilized green plants (fossil fuels). When we dig or drill them out and burn them as fuel, we release all the stored carbon dioxide, along with the toxins, back into the atmosphere.
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We are mammals. When did this class of animals first appear?
At about 10:50 PM (225 mya), the first mammals appeared. They remained few in number then because dinosaurs were on the rise.
When was the Age of Dinosaurs?
Dinosaurs first appeared around 10:48 PM (230 mya), just before mammals. They dominated the Earth for approximately 50 minutes in our 24 hour clock (165 million years). Compare this to the amount of time humans have been on Earth (see below).
When did Dinosaurs become extinct?
Nearly a quarter to midnight, at 11:40 PM (66 mya) the Third Great Extinction occurred, wiping out the dinosaurs (except for birds— our modern day dinosaurs) and allowing mammals to flourish.
What causes massive extinctions on Earth?
Scientists have suggested phenomena such as pulses of volcanic activity or, more likely, collisions with asteroids as possible causes of these massive periodic extinctions. So far there have been five, but we are thought to be in the midst of the Sixth Great Extinction (known as the Anthropocene Extinction, named after us) at this very moment.
When did our closest relatives, the primates first appear?
Primates (the classification Order that includes monkeys, apes and humans) emerged at about the same time the Dinosaurs were becoming extinct, a little over 11:43 PM (55 mya).
There’s not much time left. When did the first Humans appear? The first precursor of modern humans, Homo erectus, appeared on Earth about a half minute before midnight (1.7 mya). Modern humans, Homo sapiens, emerged in Africa about 300,000 years ago: 23:59:54 on the 24 hour clock. To us, 300,000 yrs may seem like an eternity. Yet clearly not when you compare it with the birth of the Earth and all that transpired before humans appeared. It is now midnight and we have been on Earth for only about 5.6 seconds.
What has happened in that blink of an eye?
See Appendix: A Brief Human History. (ADD LINK)
Who are humans, actually?
See Appendix: Humans. (ADD LINK)
“The atoms of our bodies are traceable to stars that manufactured them in their cores and exploded these enriched ingredients across our galaxy, billions of years ago. For this reason, we are biologically connected to every other living thing in the world. We are chemically connected to all molecules on Earth. And we are atomically connected to all atoms in the universe. We are not figuratively, but literally stardust.”
— Neil deGrasse Tyson
“The earth was once molten rock and now sings operas.”
— Brian Swimme
Why is this timeline important?
The timeline of the Earth helps us to understand the concept of time and the process of evolution of life on Earth, especially the interdependence of plants and animals with the physical environment surrounding them (land, water, air). We learn that the land shapes life and life shapes the land in dynamic interaction.
“Everything that is in the heavens, on earth, and under the earth is penetrated with connectedness, penetrated with relatedness.”
— Hildegard of Bingen (1098 – 1179)
“We know from science that nothing in the universe exists as an isolated or independent entity.”
— Margaret Wheatley
“When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.”
— John Muir
It is especially important for us to understand how young we humans are, how little time we have spent on this planet, our home, and yet how dramatically we have already transformed the Earth by trying to bend it to our will.
“This we know: the earth does not belong to man, man belongs to the earth. All things are connected like the blood that unites us all. Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself.”
— Chief Seattle
What in particular do we not understand about the Earth?
Humans do not seem to understand the basics of life, how dependent we are on this web of life. All life adheres to certain fundamental principles. They are simple and clear even to a child. Yet we ignore them, to our peril.
What are these basic principles?
We will delineate them when we discuss the needs of all life. (See IV. Life Lens) ADD LINK
Now that we have a better understanding of where we have come from (our past), what is our understanding of what sustains us now?
C. Our Life System
How does our survival depend on other forms of life?
We are all part of what I call our Life System, a shorter way of saying our (our Earth’s) Life Support System. Each species plays a role in supporting the whole system of life on Earth. For instance, if we did not have bacteria, we would not have fertile soil for growing crops; nor would we humans be able to digest food. (Humans actually have more bacteria cells in our bodies than human cells.) Everything is interconnected and interdependent.
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Life Support System: is a highly complex and integrated network that sustains all planetary habitability. This system operates as a unified entity, where physical, chemical, and biological processes are inextricably linked to maintain stable condition suitable for life. — https://scienceinsights.org/what-is-earths-life-support-system/
“We’re bound with the rest of life in a network, a network including not just all living things but the energy and nonliving matter that flows through the living, making and keeping all of us alive as we make it alive.”
— Carl Safina
What do you mean by our Life System?
Our Life System is essentially another way of describing what most people refer to as “nature” or “the environment.” These two words, however, tend to make us feel separated from our Life Support System that we are such an integral part of. Take, for example these current definitions of the environment:
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Nature: The world of living things and the outdoors.
— FD
Nature: The natural world as it exists without human beings or civilization. —Dictionary Nature is all the animals, plants, and other things in the world that are not made by people, and all the events and processes that are not caused by people.
— Collins
Environment: The totality of the natural world, often excluding humans.
— FD
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The environment is the natural world of land, sea, air, plants, and animals.
— Collins
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Why is using the term “Life System” instead of environment so important?
Using the inclusive word “life” avoids the false sense of separation of humans from nature. Life encompasses both humans and all life on Earth. And the word “system” connects life to the non-living environment of land, water, air and sunlight in an interconnected, interdependent network of communities and processes that sustain life.
System: A group of interacting, interrelated, or interdependent elements forming a complex whole.
— FD
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How then would you describe our Life System?
Our Life System is essentially the entire space around the Earth where all life exists. It is the space which encompasses all living organisms (including humans), their interactions with each other and with the land, water and air that all life depends on. As we have seen in the evolution of life on Earth, it is a dynamic system where life and the physical environment (land, water and air) are in vibrant interplay, continually evolving.
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The ecosphere and biosphere are more formal terms for this zone surrounding the Earth. I prefer Life System because it evokes all the interactions taking place within this space, rather than just an area or sphere where we find life.
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What constitutes our Life System?
Our Life System is made up of a wide array of distinct, self-contained living communities or ecosystems.
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Ecosystems are defined as systems that interact with living and non-living components (air, water, soil, etc.) of the environment that influence each other to sustain life.
— MicrobeNotes
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What are considered ecosystems?
Ecosystems include forests, woodlands, meadows, prairies, savanna, tundra, deserts, ponds, rivers, salt marshes, estuaries, coral reefs, and oceans. We often imagine the trees of forests, the grasses of meadows and the water of lakes. Yet they are also teaming with the (often hidden) animal life that sustains them.
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What natural ecosystem do you live in? Or what ecosystem was there before it was replaced by a human system (e.g., city, a farm)? Do you prefer to live in man-made systems or more natural systems? Why?
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What are the main components of an ecosystem?
As demonstrated in Earth history above, the foundation of all ecosystems is the land, water and air which are affected primarily by the Sun, Moon, Earth cycles and movements (eg earthquakes, volcanos), climate, weather and precipitation. However, it is life, life in all its astonishing biodiversity, that creates these vibrant ecosystems.
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Biodiversity refers to the variety of living species on Earth, including plants, animals, bacteria, and fungi.
— NG
Why is biodiversity important?
The dazzling array of species, from plants to animals and fungi and microbes, are considered the caretakers of ecosystems. Without them, ecosystems could not survive or thrive. Therefore, maintaining biodiversity is essential for sustaining the conditions for life.
“Biodiversity is the greatest treasure we have... Its diminishment is to be prevented at all cost.”
— Thomas Eisner
“Uniformity is not nature's way; diversity is nature's way.”
— Vandana Shiva
“The most wonderful mystery of life may well be the means by which it created so much diversity from so little physical matter. The biosphere, all organisms combined, makes up only about one part in ten billion of the earth’s mass. …Yet life has divided into millions of species, the fundamental units, each playing a unique role in relation to the whole.”
— E.O. Wilson
How do ecosystems work?
The different species interact with each other and with the non-living physical features of their environment, such as soil, water, air and sunlight. They are all interconnected and interdependent in a myriad of ways. Each living creature has a role to play in their ecosystem.
“Each species on our planet plays a role in the healthy functioning of natural ecosystems, on which humans depend.”
— William H. Schlesinger
What are the different roles that life plays?
Life has three principal roles: producers, consumers and decomposers.
• Producers: Green-celled plants and algae are the primary producers. They are virtually the only forms of life that can capture and store energy from the sun through the process of photosynthesis. (Rare life forms can survive deriving energy from hydrothermal vents deep in the ocean.) Through photosynthesis, plants convert light energy into chemical energy in the form of sugars, made from water and carbon dioxide. Oxygen is released in the process.
• Consumers: All animals, including humans (yes, humans are part of the Animal Kingdom) are consumers. All animal life depends on green plants, either as primary consumers (herbivores) which eat green plants; or secondary consumers (carnivores and omnivores) which eat other animals. (Have you thanked a green plant today?)
• Decomposers: This third role includes bacteria, fungi and certain animals such as insects. They play the important role of breaking down waste products and dead tissue of plants and animals. This process releases minerals and organic material that is recycled back into the Life System to produce new life.
“Every morsel of food, every sip of water, the air we breathe is the result of work done by another species. Without them, there is no us.”
— Enric Sala, National Geographic
“Life - all life - is in the service of life. Necessary nutrients are made available to life by life in greater and greater richness as the diversity of life increases. The entire landscape comes alive, filled with relationships and relationships within relationships.”
— Frank Herbert
Does everything get recycled back into the system?
Our physical Earth is a closed system because nothing goes in or out. All matter has been here since the very beginning. It has neither decreased or increased (except for a few meteors). That is why everything must be recycled. Nothing is wasted because there is no “away.” All waste is essential for creating new life.
“Ecosystems are capable of complete recycling. Complete recycling means that 100% of the waste material can be reconstituted indefinitely.”
— Wiki
“There is no such thing as ‘away.’ So, when we throw anything away, it must go somewhere.”
— Annie Leonard
“Waste does not exist in nature because ecosystems reuse everything that grows in a never-ending cycle of efficiency and purpose.”
— Frans van Houten
What about energy?
Energy, on the other hand, cannot be recycled like matter. In terms of energy, the Earth is an open system because our energy comes primarily from the Sun, which continually feeds those miraculous green plants, daily. Consumers get their energy from eating green plants; and decomposers get their energy primarily from the “waste” of producers and consumers. In other words, virtually all life depends on the sun for energy, for survival.
“The Earth would die if the Sun stopped kissing her.”
— Rumi
What are other vital processes that take place in our Life System?
Besides the unidirectional flow of energy from the sun to plants, there are numerous cycles where nutrients, such as minerals and organic material, get continually recycled back into the Life System to be re-used by life forms.
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A nutrient cycle (or ecological recycling) is the movement and exchange of inorganic and organic matter back into the production of matter…The nutrient cycle is nature's recycling system…
— Wiki
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What are some common nutrient cycles?
Mineral cycles include water, oxygen, carbon, phosphorus, sulfur and nitrogen cycles which are continuously cycling these minerals back into the ecosystem to be used again and again for sustaining life. The Life System could not be sustained without such recycling.
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Humans, for example, breathe in oxygen, the waste product of green plants, and breathe out CO2 which plants need for photosynthesis. A critical cycle. How aware are we of our total dependence on green plants? This fundamental interdependent relationship?
“Earth breathes in us.”
— Matthew Edward Hall
What are other services that our Life System provides?
Climate stability, ultraviolet protection, atmospheric composition (eg oxygen), chemical cycles, rainfall, solar power, photosynthesis, water purification, flood control, watersheds, pollination, pest control, waste recycling, decomposers, soil formation, maintenance of soil fertility, erosion prevention, etc. Most of these services we take for granted: we hardly notice them.
“We forget that the water cycle and the life cycle are one.”
— Jacques Cousteau
What would happen if these services were eliminated?
In 1997 a scientist of Ecological Economics, Robert Costanza, estimated that these irreplaceable services had a value of more than $33 trillion annually (far more today). The emphasis here is that they are indeed irreplaceable. Eliminating them would be the end of life as we know it.
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What are some “free” gifts of the Life System that Humans need and enjoy?
• Renewable gifts: e.g., the oxygen we breathe, fresh water, fertile soil, trees, fish and other numerous plant and animal foods, medicines;
• Non-renewable gifts: e.g., minerals and energy derived from fossil fuels (oil, coal and gas);
• Not to mention the visual, auditory, aromatic, tactile, and savory gifts of beauty, birdsong, waterfalls, gardenias, whales, butterflies, snowflakes, canyons, blue skies, elephants, breezes, shells, peaches, giant redwoods, clouds, bumblebees, wild blueberries, rocks, penguins, rainforests, sharks, lilies, geckos, coral reefs, tigers, brooks, sunsets…
“For Humans, “ecosystems and species have instrumental values (e.g., cultural value, recreational value, medicinal value, spiritual value, transformational value, natural resource value, and ecosystem services value).”
— Nature.com
“This is the greatest discovery of the scientific enterprise: You take hydrogen gas, and you leave it alone, and it turns into rosebushes, giraffes, and humans.”
— Brian Swimme
“Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty.”
— John Ruskin
“In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous.”
— Aristotle
“I firmly believe that nature brings solace in all troubles.”
— Anne Frank
What are the gifts you treasure most from our Life System?
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Is the value of our Life Support System only in what it can give us?
Clearly not. The Life System not only supports all life; it has intrinsic value, inherent value, to be valued for what it is, rather than just for what it may provide humans. The intrinsic value of ecosystems and species is “not substitutable or replaceable.” In other words, just because a species is not found to be useful to humans, does not mean that humans have the right to exterminate it. https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/intrinsic-value-ecology-and-conservation-25815400/
“Species have value in themselves, a value neither conferred nor revocable, but springing from a species’ long evolutionary heritage and potential.”
— M.E. Soule
“Look closely at nature. Every species is a masterpiece, exquisitely adapted to the particular environment in which it has survived. Who are we to destroy or even diminish biodiversity?”
— E. O. Wilson
How would you summarize the importance of our Life System?
Without the diversity of life that has evolved over billions of years, we would not be able to exist. These complex ecosystems not only provide resources for our survival (eg food, clean water and air, material for tools and shelter), they recycle waste, and help regulate diseases, pests and the climate.
The Gaia Hypothesis even suggests (with increasing evidence) that living organisms sustain the optimal conditions of life on Earth, such as the climate.
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The Gaia Hypothesis proposes that living organisms interact with their inorganic surroundings on Earth to form a synergistic and self-regulating, complex system that helps to maintain and perpetuate the conditions for life on the planet.
— Wiki
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What are some takeaways from Our Common Background?
I hope this brief introduction illustrates several main issues:
• How long it has taken for the Earth to have evolved to where we are now, with such an incredible diversity of life; and such stunning beauty!
• What an astonishingly brief time we humans have lived here;
• How all life is connected by our common DNA;
• How dependent all life is on each other, in a myriad of ways;
• How all life is dependent on the Life System which sustains the conditions for life;
• How ecosystems and species making up the Life System have an intrinsic value to exist.
• What an extraordinary miracle life is…
“Miracles, in the sense of phenomena we cannot explain, surround us on every hand: life itself is the miracle of miracles.”
— George Bernard Shaw
“The most appropriate response to the world is to realize, with awe, the ferocious mystery of being alive in it.”
— Carl Safina
“The Earth is what we all have in common.”
— Wendell Berry
“This world is indeed a living being endowed with a soul and intelligence ... a single visible living entity containing all other living entities, which by their nature are all related.”
— Plato
“We are all together in this, we are all together in this single living ecosystem called Planet Earth. As we learn how we fit into the greater scheme of things, and begin to understand how the system works, we can plan ahead, we can use the resources responsibly, to show some respect for this inheritance that goes back 4.6 billion years.”
— Sylvia Earle