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nature, mother nature
upekka
Veteran
what is the difference?
0
Comments
Nature is just nature; mother nature is a term of endearment.
To me, nature and mother nature are the same thing, and "mother nature" merely acknowledges that nature and natural processes created and sustain all living things - gave them birth, so to speak.
In philosophy and religion, I guess the idea goes back to 1200 or 1300 BC in written sources, and almost certainly is older than that. It's apparently undergone all sorts of convolutions historically, involving goddesses and so forth.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_Nature
Anthropomorphism.
@Fosdick I feel they are different. Nature including human behavour (nature) can be random, non sustaining and unbalanced. Gaia or Mother Earth is described here and maybe what you refer to?
It is at least not impossible to regard the earth's parts—soil, mountains, rivers, atmosphere etc,—as organs or parts of organs of a coordinated whole, each part with its definite function. And if we could see this whole, as a whole, through a great period of time, we might perceive not only organs with coordinated functions, but possibly also that process of consumption as replacement which in biology we call metabolism, or growth. In such case we would have all the visible attributes of a living thing, which we do not realize to be such because it is too big, and its life processes too slow.
Aldo Leopold, Animate Earth
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis
Once you know, will it really matter....?
Nature also includes 'the nature of things', it is a wider concept than the idea of Mother Nature as the nurturing force which sustains and shapes life.
quoth @lobster
Nature as a stand-alone word I usually understand to mean nature in the broad sense of the totality of the biological and non-biological worlds. The nature that includes all natures, perhaps.
Used with qualifiers, the definitions are various and almost infinite. Nature of grass, nature of trees, nature of mind, nature of Trump, even Buddha nature.
As for Mother Nature, I think my first post may have been the first time in my life that I have used the term in a sentence, and I concede the point - it is different. Perhaps in that it points to an idea about nature, not to nature itself.
it does matter because it is about nature and a lesson of nature
if we learn about nature we know who we are and how to behave without disturbing nature
we have to learn about the nature and to gain the wisdom
i happened to be known it after the 'morning meditation' today
and
it helped to know what actually IT is the 'life' , 'universe' and 'everything'
then that 'knowledge' changes 'my' whole attitude about/toward IT
this knowledge and attitude would help me to change my speech and deed
this new way of living would make minimum impact to the nature from my side and mother nature wold be happy and it is a good thing that
if she is angry and not happy she wouldn't start to scold at us (speak) or punish us (natu
so there wouldn't be natural disasters that we should be afraid of
so it is really matter
if anyone could find the children program 'Arthur' about 'silent treatment' and see it one could understand what i am saying in this post
that is what we have been trying to understand by discussing the 'life, universe, and everything' in another thread
the all the responses in that thread helped me in today morning meditation
after i watched ' Arthur' it become clearer
next two children program made it confirm
each and every information provides by nature is teaching us a lesson
to learn it or ignore it is our own decision
that is what in Buddha's Teaching
Buddha Teaching helps to quicken to get this learning and experience
Buddha could renamed each and everything instead of our usual day today words
what we have to do is see between the lines, between the words and between the letters
seeing can be done with eyes and without eyes
happy looking!
Thanks @Fosdick, I liked the flexibility of thought you express. Can quite easily think of our Earth as a Mother - as our Zen Druids do ...
http://pagandharma.org/pagan dharma/2013/04/14/zen-druids/
When the Buddha was asked about having a statue made of him, he rather suggested the Bo tree under which he became enlightened. Eh ma ho (how wonderful).