Dualism Meets Darwinism

We can start by challenging Cartesian dualism through a Darwinian lens. Our biological origins reveal that humanity evolved from wild animals and that life itself originated from nature’s nonliving creativity.

Modern self-awareness indicates that our primary focus is not wisdom, as suggested by our species name, Homo sapiens, but rather the expansion of technological control and cultural dominance. Essentially, we are civilizers, akin to terraformers, a pursuit that took millennia to realize.

From a contemporary scientific standpoint, the lifestyle of nomadic hunter-gatherers is not fully human but rather animalistic, unsuitable for beings claiming inherent rights. The wild poses a threat to these rights; thus, if civilized individuals attempted to raise children in such environments, government would likely intervene.

In fact, rather than seeking wisdom—defined as the ability to fulfill our desires—we often sacrifice personal wants for the sake of a civilizing mission that has religious undertones. The divine called for the lower classes to make sacrifices for the greater good of a more refined upper class.

In essence, while we aim to eradicate the wild with our creations, nature unwittingly initiated its own self-termination by evolving a species of relentless civilizers. This was not a deliberate act but rather a series of random experiments leading to diverse life forms, from bacteria to complex mammals.

Our species did not descend from the heavens to confront nature’s monstrous threats; rather, we have been shaped by it over eons. The vastness of deep time mirrors the mysteries of outer space.

Yet, Darwinism complicates our understanding of our evolutionary origins. We know we have evolved from animals, but grasping the essence of wildness remains elusive.

Defining Wildness Through Negation

We can clarify the concept of wildness by negating the traits we associate with civilized humanity. If we envision the ideal individual as alive, self-aware, intelligent, civilized, moral, ambitious, and productive, then wildness embodies the opposite.

While the universe is indeed productive, nature’s productivity is accidental and lacks the intent to preserve any of its forms. Even as celestial bodies may outlast humanity, this endurance is merely a consequence of having survived chaotic natural events. The stability we perceive in the night sky is an illusion, as galaxies will eventually drift apart, and stars will extinguish.

Nature rearranges its components without generating energy, ultimately leading to the dissolution of all cosmic products through entropy.

In contrast, civilizers strive to protect their creations, treating them as extensions of themselves. We construct barriers around our societies to shield them from nature’s unpredictable offerings.

Confronting Cosmic Absurdity

Can our negations lead to an understanding of wildness? The primary challenge lies in the absurdity of nature’s chaotic fertility. We prefer logical reasoning, for contradictions disturb our critical thinking. Imagining a square circle, for instance, is frustrating because it defies our understanding.

We often dismiss absurdities as unreal, assuming that nature operates under a logical framework. However, this belief obscures the chaotic essence of cosmic wildness. Nature does not adhere to rules; the idea of its rationality is merely a flattering metaphor. We project our social norms onto reality, believing that all existence must comply with our ideals. Yet as an untamed wilderness, nature does not conform to any standard, including reason.

While it may be convenient to view nature as logical, this perspective ignores its inherent indifference to human ideals. The absurdity of every natural occurrence challenges our civilized tendencies. The vast, impersonal creativity of a godless universe is both daunting and magnificent.

The belief that nature should be reasonable is as misguided as claiming that an individual occupies a privileged position in the universe. Only conscious beings can embody reason; physical entities are indifferent to our rational expectations. When we attribute reason to nature, we are only flattering ourselves for having created a model that approximates some aspect of natural processes. Yet no model can truly capture the complexities of reality, which extends into infinite fractal patterns, far exceeding our understanding of reason.

Ultimately, the cosmos is wild and absurd, not rational, and it is a blasphemy to assert otherwise. To truly grasp the essence of wildness, we must accept the existential absurdity that it embodies.

This reconciliation, however, is akin to trying to ascend a descending escalator. As civilization evolves, we tend to think in structured, mature ways, often neglecting nature’s chaotic existence. This inclination stems from our desire to impose a coherent order onto the disarray of the natural world.

In a quasi-Kantian sense, nature’s wildness represents the unknown that lurks behind our human simplifications. From an existential viewpoint, this wildness mocks our ambition to find meaningful patterns everywhere.

To understand the wilderness, we must confront the terror of irredeemable absurdity, and perhaps art, rather than philosophy, is the more suitable medium for this exploration.

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