Saturday, July 16, 2011

Ang Kalikasan (Tag. Nature)




We have broken down most natural processes that used to be anomalies. Photosynthesis and other types of metabolism are understood, the cell has been parsed out to its many organelles, the human genome mapped, chemicals broken down, new ones created, crops engineered to withstand nature's wrath, we've taken long carbon chains from the bowels of earth and put them to use powering cars and lighting our homes, space shuttle launches have become commonplace, and our exploration of the solar system and deep oceans continues, breaking down every bit of life into their infintismal parts and on, and on, and on. In the midst of all this understanding, I wonder sometimes if we have become so myopic that we cannot see the mystery that still exists in every little detail and their synergistic conclusions. In and of themselves, the chloroplasts within leaves aren't that baffling, and neither is movement of air, or the chitin and nutrients that make up insects, but together, a mystery still exists when a Butterfly sets to fight against a breeze to perch on the leaf of a cottonwood. Just like us people, one man, his blood, bones, and skin, is just that, a man. But when you put people together, working, creating cultures and civilization in concert with other animals and plants, a mystery of synergy unfolds. I don't pretend to know who makes these things happen, if the being is Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Panantheist, Hindu or a little bit of all of them, but I do know that just because I understand the inner workings of a blade of grass or flowing stream, I may never be able to understand the miracle of this creation. I'm okay with that.


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