What is Our Place in Nature?
The Answer May Surprise You!
Brian Gregory © 2023
Those who have been following my articles might notice a pattern in the topics I choose to write about. I started with space and time, then energy and matter, the evolution of the universe, and how the Earth evolved to somehow miraculously support conditions for life[1]. So based on this pattern, can you guess my next topic?
If you are thinking it is about the evolution of life itself, then you are on the right track. But this is not just about evolution for general scientific interest. This article is about understanding what evolution can teach us about our place in nature — which, perhaps, can help us settle some of our existential angst. And you will be glad to know that exploring this subject does not require going through the whole evolutionary story in detail. Rather, we simply need to bring attention to an overall pattern the the evolution of life on Earth that should give us something to think about our place in nature.
Sound fun? Let’s dive in!
Isn’t Life Strange?
One of the most amazing things about the evolution of life on Earth is that it took almost 4 billion years for bacteria to evolve into the many life forms we see today. We normally do not think of it much, but all the stuff that we humans are made of used to be bacteria. We still rely on bacteria to live, as do all other forms of life, being the essential foundational of life’s pyramid.
I have often wondered — how did bacteria evolve into life we see today? I mean, bacteria are incredibly ultra-tiny organisms, and compared to other life forms, they are relatively simple. How did these tiny organisms end up growing into multi-cellular organisms, then life forms with multiple parts like skeletons, organs, limbs, and eyes?
Much has been learned of the evolutionary process — especially in the last fifty years. Understanding how micro-organisms evolved into multi-cellular life is comparatively simple and understandable. Part of the process involves life finding innovative ways of processing energy more efficiently, but that is a more complex subject we do not need to get into here[2].
But for life to take a major leap to start designating cells to perform different functions, such as skeletons, organs and eyes — that part is kind of freaky don’t you think? But that is basically what happened, and that is how we humans got here. The most amazing thing is — it is all made mostly from the same four chemical elements: Carbon (C ), Hydrogen (H), Oxygen (O), and Nitrogen (N). (When I taught students in university I would mention it is easy to remember these elements if we think of them as call letters of a radio station — CHON).
So we have these four basic elements, that through evolution, have combined to form basic acids, then RNA and DNA, then cells, then multi-cells, then jump into forming creatures with bones, tissue, organs and the most profound of all — eyes. Even more profound is how fast this all happened once evolution really got going during the Cambrian explosion.
Little critters known as trilobites have become the iconic species representing the beginning of complex life on our planet. It is kind of freaky to think that approximately 560 million years ago — after 4 billion years of nothing but bacteria, life evolved from micro-organisms to little critters with eyes and rudimentary neurological systems able to process what they could see in their environment. And these things just basically crawled out of the ocean mud!
If this still doesn’t freak you about, then imagine it this way. Imagine a super large petri dish, perhaps the size of a lake, where we could watch the whole evolutionary process unfold in the span of a day (while drinking beer in the shade of course!). Life would start off as just bacteria , and it would be pretty boring to look at for most of the day. But later in the evening we would begin to see critters with eyes crawl out of the mud — then plants, fish, and insects — and eventually amphibians and dinosaurs!
Am I the only one who freaks out about this? (And no, it has nothing to do with the amount of beer we drank!)
More Than Meets The Eye
But there is a lot more than meets the eye in this story. These early organisms were barely setting the stage for what was to come. The creative impulse of evolution continues up until this day — ever increasing in complexity and diversity in the bazillions of species and life forms that roam our little planet (including ourselves — homo sapiens).
The story of evolution is one of many major advances, but it was not without a lot of setbacks. And I mean A LOT! The paradox is, life would not have evolved the way it did if we didn’t have these major setbacks. We only need to look at a geological time scale to see how many major setbacks there were. The diagram below is a simplified geological time scale that focuses on time periods covering the evolution of life, mainly since the Cambrian Period (560 millions years ago), but also going back nearly 4 billion years to the first signs of life. (And note that the full length of the geologic time scale is almost 10X the length of the diagram below if we were to show one in proper scale!) [3]
These charts are always fun and interesting to look at for school kids, but the actual historical reality they depict was much different (and much less fun looking). There are two things that these diagrams convey that need a bit of explanation. One is sort of obvious, the other a little less obvious. So here we go.
Life as Trial and Error
The first thing geologic time scales show is the break down of time intervals in a hierarchy from Eons, which are divided into Eras, and further divided into Periods. There are even finer intervals on more detailed charts, such as the Epochs shown for the most recent Cenozoic Era at the top of the diagram above.
The reason geologists defined these intervals is because they mark major changes in geological processes and the global environment of the Earth through time that are recorded in rocks and fossils. It is common to think the Earth is never changing — yet it has always been changing, and continues to change. But change on a geological time scale is very slow compared to our human time scale, so it is difficult for us to notice (other than sudden events such as earthquakes, landslides, or volcanic explosions). But it was not as if the Earth kept changing its mind at every turn. Even at the Period level, such dramatic changes occurred over 10’s of millions of years! (A time span that is difficult for us to truly appreciate).
As the geological and biological environments on the surface of the Earth evolved, its global environment became more complex, which in turn led to the evolution of more complex forms of life. Our planet is susceptible to changing conditions due to overall heating and cooling of the planet as a whole (as in ice ages), plate tectonics, changes in the atmosphere and ocean, and other global system dynamics.
Sometimes these changes can be very abrupt and cause major mass extinctions, such as those indicated in the diagram above. Other times, sudden changes came from beyond the Earth, such as meteor impacts — which is what caused the extinction of the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Although there were a number of major mass extinctions from big events, and smaller, more localized extinctions from smaller events, the amazing thing is that life always bounced back!
But life never simply bounced back to what it was before. It is similar to how we humans respond after a natural disaster. We learn from these events and re-build our environments to be better equipped to handle the disaster should it happen again (e.g. building codes for earthquake zones). In fact, our human ability and ingenuity to re-build stronger and more resilient is common to all of life.
Evolution and adaptation go hand-in-hand. The evolution of life exhibits an intrinsic ability to learn and grow, and the new life forms that emerge after a major extinction event were typically more complex than the life forms they replaced. This enabled them to adapt to the new environments in more novel ways — as we see in the graphical depiction of the evolution of life forms in the right column of the diagram above.
Life started off as micro-organisms that took almost 4 billion years to evolve before the Cambrian explosion of larger, more complex and diverse forms of sea life such as trilobites, corals and seaweed. Eventually, once there was enough oxygen in the atmosphere, life managed to evolve on land which led to the emergence of plants and small creatures, insects and amphibians.
This period of evolution, known as the Paleozoic Era (Paleo =old, and zoic=life) took a whopping 300 million years! It is hard for us humans to conceive of that length of time, but that’s how long it took for the most basic plants and animals to evolve. Dinosaurs started to show up toward the end of the Paleozoic Era, which then quite literally took over the planet for almost another 200 million years during the Mesozoic Era (Mesozoic=middle life).
Try to think about this length of time for a moment. How can we not find this mind-boggling!?
Even more mind-boggling, is after this 500 million years of evolving life — BANG!! Earth was hit hard by a large asteroid, and nearly 80% of life was lost — including all the monstrous dinosaurs. Although there were other global mass extinctions before — there was never one like this. Even today, it is scary to think that such an event can happen again — which is why we keep watch on asteroids that find their way close to our planet[4].
So in spite of all the major catastrophic events and mass extinctions of the past, life always manages to find a way to bounce back. Even more so, it not only manages to survive — it transforms into new forms that are more resilient and more complex than before. This has been especially the case for the animal kingdom, thanks to an increasing ability to process information about their environments.
And this brings us to the less obvious thread in our evolutionary story. Because if it wasn’t for dinosaurs going extinct, and if it wasn’t for that asteroid, there is a good chance we would not be here today! Nor would we be the incredibly strange creatures we are! Here’s why.
The Complex Brain
The appearance of eyes in small creatures 560 million years ago is without a doubt one of the major advances in evolution on this planet, if not the entire universe. Think about it — after 14 billion years of particulate matter swirling around blindly, the universe somehow forms organisms that can SEE!
But it is not just sight alone that is the major advance. Organisms need some means of processing the information they receive through sight. Early on, neurological systems were fairly rudimentary, and they evolved further over long periods of time into what we have today with our large complex brains and neurological systems.
The brain is arguably the most complex organism to evolve in this universe, and even more difficult to understand. Scientists have figured out a lot about brains in recent decades, and there is tonnes more to know. However, there are some common features among all animal brains that tell us a lot about the evolutionary history of this complex organ. The interesting thing is, as different as all animal species are from each other (in form and behaviour), they all function with roughly the same brain and neurological structure.
In the 1960’s, Paul MacLean identified three zones or layers in the brain that are relatively common among all animal species known as the Triune Brain structure (see graphic below) [5]. The first, and oldest part of the brain is the Reptilian brain stem that evolved with amphibians and reptiles about 300 million years ago. This part of the brain controls our basic biological functions, such as hunger, digestion, breathing, and sleeping. It is also the seat of our most primitive adrenaline responses such as fight or flight response.
The second layer is known as the Mammalian brain (or cerebral cortex), which evolved in mammals approximately 200 million years ago. This layer controls more complex functions such as emotions, social behaviour, and more advanced sensory functions. The third layer is the Neocortex (simply meaning new cortex, or the most recent evolution of the cerebral cortex). We are familiar with the Neocortex as the larger masses of left and right hemispheres found in modern primates, including ourselves. It is the Neocortex that provides the capacity for abstraction, logic, problem solving, communication, and language.
While scientific debates continue about the intricacies of the Triune brain, what is not disputed is that the modern brain that we homo sapiens possess evolved successively from brains of reptiles and other mammals. So from a brain development standpoint, we humans are part reptile, part mammal, and higher primate!
Should this not freak us out a little bit?
Sharing these parts of our brain with other animals is what gives us the capacity to relate to other animal species on a number of levels — from basic reptilian drives and instincts, to mammalian emotion and socialization, to some advanced cognitive functions. Anyone who owns a pet knows what I am talking about.
But it does not apply only to our domesticated friends. Videos now abound of wild animals doing things that we normally would not think possible — such as a leopard protecting and nursing new born baboons after killing their mother, a crow having fun sliding down a roof on a coffee lid, or my personal favourite — a turtle playing soccer with a dashund[6]!
Yet our shared experiences with other animals have limits. While all animals show a wide range of intelligence, there is a level of intelligence in us humans that is not found in other animal species. And it is this level of intelligence that adds a whole other level of complexity to our evolutionary story.
A New Sphere?
The extent to which the Neocortex is utilized among mammals and primates varies widely, but it is clear that it is the part of the brain that sets homo sapiens apart from other primates and other animal species. It is difficult to determine exactly when this part of the brain evolved, but most claims place it within the last 3 million years (during the rise of primates).
The Neocortex in humans has advanced development and sub-spheres that are capable of a wider range of abstract cognitive functions and memory, which are traits that are thought to have developed only within the last 200,000 years. On the vast depth of the geologic timeline, this is a very recent development — the length of time barely forms the width of a hairline at the top of the above diagram!
This marks the approximate time of the emergence of the noosphere (pron. new-sphere) — a term first coined by Russian geologist Vladimir Vernadsky, and paleontologist and Jesuit priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin [7]. The noosphere is regarded as the sphere of more complex intelligence of homo-sapiens involving abstract thought — a distinctly new level of evolution successively layered on top of the geosphere (inorganic matter/Earth) and biosphere (organic/Life).
Whereas the noosphere is regarded as the sphere of mental activity of homo-sapiens, it is the source of the extensive imprint we humans have placed on the natural world in the forms and artifacts of everything we built since the dawn of civilization. In my doctoral thesis, I used the term Anthroposphere to pertain to the combination of the noosphere and all human activity and artifacts on the surface of the Earth[8].
This may be a game of semantics for some, but what is important is the overall evolution of life on our planet follows some enduring patterns that remain with us today. The Anthroposphere (or Noosphere) is an extension of the biosphere and all that came before it. It is this relationship that gives us a new understanding of our place in nature by placing nature within us, and not as something that is external to us as we conventionally perceive.
Our Place In Nature?
Without a doubt, all of this can be a bit overwhelming to think about. It raises some important philosophical questions about our place in this long evolutionary story. I think I found a way to make it rather simple. As simple as A-B-C, we might say!?
As I covered in previous articles [1], there is a backbone to the evolution of life on Earth that can be traced back to the very beginning of our universe. This backbone, or common thread, is the nature of energy and matter — with the laws of conservation (the quantity of energy being constant) and entropy (the quality of energy being variable leading to order-disorder in the distribution of matter and energy). These two laws permeate all inorganic and organic matter wherever they exist in the entire universe. No exceptions!
We now know that organic matter (life) grew out of inorganic matter as a way to process energy more efficiently. We also know it took 4 billion years for these micro-organisms to evolve into the bazillions of species of life we have today. As advanced as the neocortex is in us humans, it is nearly impossible for us to wrap our head around that length of time!
But we also know that it was never smooth sailing. The evolution of the universe, our planet and all life on Earth has been a story of two steps forward and one step back due primarily to the interactive nature of the two laws of energetics. It has been a continuous learning and growing process, with increasing complexity and continuous change as the norm.
Although all of evolution shares this common energetic backbone, there are several distinctive energy-matter thresholds that clearly demarcate qualitative boundaries in the natural world. This might sound a bit strange for some, and perhaps a bit too simplistic for others, but I think the simplest way of thinking about our evolutionary history with reference to three nested spheres as in the visual below.
This is a type of Venn diagram — which is used to illustrate relationships among things using circles. In the beginning, at the core, is the Cosmosphere (C ) — all the inorganic matter that make up the galaxies, stars, cosmic gases and dust, and planets — including our own planet Earth. Some prefer to use the term geosphere to describe the inorganic earth — the solids, liquids and gases (or rocks, water and air). But the Earth is more than that. We must remember that Earth is a planet— which is part of our solar system, which is part of the Milky Way galaxy, which is part of the Universe — or Cosmos. Everything from its elemental composition and formation, to its orbit and rotation, to its environment driven by solar energy — is ALL cosmogenic. Hence, we place the Earth as part of the Cosmosphere.
As far as we currently know, Earth is the only planet we know of that grew life — the second sphere in our visual. The Biosphere (B) contains all forms of life, past and present, from early micro-organisms and bacteria, to the bazillions of species we have today, including us humans. We can think of the Biosphere as being layered upon the Cosmosphere, but also that the Cosmosphere is nested within the Biosphere making it a part of the Biosphere. This simply means that without the Cosmosphere, there would be no Biosphere. The Biosphere is fundamentally dependent on the Cosmosphere for its existence. A simpler way of thinking about it is we can have a Cosmosphere (galaxies, stars and planets) without a Biosphere, but we cannot have a Biosphere without a Cosmosphere.
Are you with me so far?
The third sphere is that of the Anthroposphere (A). This is where things can get a bit confusing for some, so bear with me. Just as the Biosphere grew out of the Cosmosphere, the Anthroposphere grow out of the Biosphere (and Cosmosphere). The demarcation point lies in the higher level of complexity of the human brain with our neocortex (abstract and rational thought) in contrast with the reptilian and mammalian levels of the brain. It is this level of brain that became a geologic force unto itself, transforming the Biosphere and surface of the planet into another layer of evolutionary development.
So just as you cannot have a Biosphere without a Cosmosphere, we can not have an Anthroposphere without a Biosphere, or a Cosmosphere. The manner in which each sphere is fundamentally dependent on its predecessor means they are successively and internally nested. This means that the Cosmosphere and Biosphere are not external to the Anthroposphere, but are internal to it. Whatever happens to the Cosmosphere or Biosphere will affect the Anthroposphere, but not vice versa.
The reality is, we humans (homo-sapiens) are quite literally a composite of these three spheres. This may sound strange too, but if we think of our skeletons being made of calcium, they represent the C-sphere of our being. When we die, our life tissues decay fairly quickly, but our bones behave like any other calcium rock — which will only weather away after very long periods of time (and only under the right conditions).
Our B-sphere is composed of the trillions of organic cells that make up our tissues, and organs. The existence and function of every cell in our body has its roots in the evolution of all other life forms on Earth. We would literally not function biologically the way we do if it were not for all the trials and errors of evolution of other species on the planet that came before us.
The most fundamental of these processes is the one we most take for granted — breathing! The O2-CO2 exchange that happens in our respiratory and cardio-vascular system for every cell in our body is a biological mechanism that evolved billions of years ago during the most primitive periods of evolution. So it may sound strange to think of it this way, but it took over 4 billion years for evolution to build us the way we are!
We also share the design of our organs, tissues, limbs and a fair portion of our brains with those of other animal species. We did not create these ourselves, nor were they designed just for us. The more complex functions of our neocortex, and the things we do with it (such as build things), give us the distinction of being human. Essentially, being human means being part reptile and part mammal in addition to the human aspects of higher cognitive functioning that give us the ability to do all the things we do.
This is our A-sphere. It not only pertains to our more complex abstract reasoning and use of thought and language, nor only to all the stuff we build from our natural environment, but also contributes to a broader span of awareness of our existence. It is the source of our existential angst and capacity for wondering and questioning ourselves and all of nature.
The A-B-C spheres are nested within us both individually and collectively over the surface of our planet. And this is why we need to embrace a wider view of our place in Nature. Our place in nature is better realized as being within us — and not external to us.
It is therefore imperative that we take care of the natural world around us — at least to the extent of minimizing the negative impacts we have upon it — otherwise we can end up destroying ourselves if we are not careful. And if some still think of this as not possible, the geological time scale above should remind us that the history of life on our planet has already experienced many mass extinctions in the past. We are no different — and we need to be aware of this.
How we do this is a topic for other articles to come. But like the A-B-C visual above, I believe there are ways that we can think differently about how we humans can move forward — how we can continue to evolve and thrive, while at the same time live more harmoniously within the limits of the natural world upon which we depend.
The challenge requires a very different level of thinking than what we are normally accustomed. But that is nothing new. I believe we have barely tapped into the true potential of our neocortex and there is plenty of room for more learning and growth. Without a doubt, there are some very interesting times ahead.
Stay tuned!
End Notes:
[1] Check out my previous articles here:
Size Matters: https://medium.com/@geosophy/size-matters-a-lot-more-than-you-think-6c65dfc76266
Seeking a Balanced Life: https://medium.com/@geosophy/a-balanced-life-good-luck-with-that-c7907a3099ec
Biggest Puzzle About Life: https://medium.com/@geosophy/the-biggest-puzzle-about-life-on-earth-3379dbf9b9bc
[2] See: Seeking a Balanced Life: https://medium.com/@geosophy/a-balanced-life-good-luck-with-that-c7907a3099ec
[3] https://geologyscience.com/geology-branches/paleontology/geologic-time-scale/
[4] https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/sentry/
[5] The following links provide a range of perspectives on the Triune Brain:
-For a general overview: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triune_brain
-For a recent scientific review of the status of research: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/triune-brain.
-For a well written summary of the essential aspects of the Triune Brain:
Tabac, Magda. (2021) Introduction in the Neuroscience of Stress — The Rider and Elephant Metaphor. https://community.thriveglobal.com/introduction-in-the-neuroscience-of-stress-the-rider-and-elephant-metaphor/
-For an updated account of the original research:
MacLean, Paul D. (1990) The triune brain in evolution: role in paleocerebral functions. New York: Plenum Press. ISBN 0–306–43168–8. OCLC 20295730.
[6] Animals doing unexpected things:
-Leopard saves baby baboon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugi4x8kZJzk
-Crow sliding down a roof: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9mrTdYhOHg
-Turtle playing soccer with a dashund: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHAlMvYuPvg
See also-Animals playing with other animals: https://youtu.be/p1dgkfVwo2I
[7] See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noosphere
[8] Eddy, B.G. 2005. Integral Geography: Space, Place, and Perspective. World Futures 61 (1 & 2):151–163. https://philpapers.org/rec/EDDIGS
