Friday 1 March 2019

Environment and conservatism

If you take an organism out of its natural environment, it usually dies pretty quickly. This includes humans: early settlers in New England relied on the native Squanto to show them how to fertilize the soil. Some homeless people would thrive if they were given some investment to get them back on their feet: in their "natural environment" of having a home and a job they thrive, but outside of it, they languish and cannot get back into it. Forcible ujamaa "villagization" in Tanzania (described by James C. Scott in "Seeing Like A State") can be conceptualised as ripping people out of their natural habitats, with fatal consequences.

Large changes to one's environment can be fatal. Voluntary, gradual changes are not. This is an argument for conservatism.

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