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For alternative meanings, see nature (disambiguation).
The deepest visible-light image of the universe, the Hubble Ultra Deep Field. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, S. Beckwith (STScI) and the HUDF team.
View of the Earth as seen by the Apollo 17 crew traveling toward the moon.
Aphthona flava flea beetle.
The first few hydrogen atom electron orbitals shown as cross-sections with color-coded probability density

Nature in the broadest sense, is equivalent to the material world, the material universe, the natural world, and the natural universe. In other words, it refers to the phenomena of the "physical" world, or at least those which are comprehensible to the human mind because of their regularities in cause and effect.

The English word derives from a Latin philosophical term, natura, which was in turn a translation of a Greek term, physis (φύσις). Natura is related to the Latin words relating to "birth", while physis relates to Greek words for "growth". Hence the original classical concept of nature was of particular natures of particular things: the nature of a chair for example. "Human nature" for example, is the way a human is born to be, so to speak.

The broader concept of "nature as a whole", the cosmos, is a later development that is particularly strong in modern science. In some ways this understanding of the universe conflicts with the idea that all types of things have their own natures, and this conflict lies behind some major debates in philosophy, such as the debates about philosophical idealism (the theory of forms) on the one hand, and modern science on the other.

However the term "nature" in general speech still refers to the typical behaviour of various types of living animals, and in some cases to the processes associated with inanimate objects - the "way" that particular types of things change. (Compare logos, tao, and dharma.) For example, in casual speech people sometimes mean "life" when they say "nature". In other cases they may be referring to wilderness - rocks, forest, beaches and any place without signs of human habitation.

More precisely, the more traditional concept of natural things which is still found in casual speech implies a distinction between the natural and the artificial - with the latter being understood as that which has been brought into being by a human or human-like consciousness or mind.

The idea that this type of coming into being is different in kind from natural coming into being is often associated with the concept of free will. Modern science on the other hand, is associated with the idea that the human mind itself might conceivably be explained as "matter in motion" the same as the rest of nature as a whole.

Life

Main article: Life.

While there is no universal agreement on the definition of life, scientists generally accept that the biological manifestation of life is characterized by organization, metabolism, growth, adaptation, response to stimuli and reproduction.

Matter and energy

Main article: Matter.

Modern science normally sees nature, even human beings, as "matter in motion", obeying certain "laws of nature" which science seeks to understand. For this reason the most fundamental science is generally understood to be "physics" - the name for which is still recognizable as meaning that it is the study of nature. Matter is commonly defined as the substance of which physical objects are composed. It constitutes the observable Universe. According to the theory of relativity there is no distinction between matter and energy, because matter can be converted to energy (see annihilation), and vice versa (see matter creation). Philosophically, matter constitutes the formless substratum of all things, which exists only potentially and from which reality is produced. In the sense of content, matter is also used in contrast to form.

Earth

Main article: Earth.

Earth (often referred to as "The Earth") is the third planet in the solar system in terms of distance from the Sun, and the fifth in order of size. It is the largest of its planetary system's terrestrial planets and the only place in the universe currently known to support life. The Earth was formed around 4.57 billion (4.57×109)[1] years ago (see Age of the Earth) and its largest natural satellite, the Moon, was orbiting it shortly thereafter, around 4.533 billion years ago.

Outer space

Main article: Outer space.

Outer space, also called just space, refers to the relatively empty regions of the Universe outside the atmospheres of celestial bodies. Outer space is used to distinguish it from airspace (and terrestrial locations). Although outer space is certainly spacious, it is far from empty.

Metaphysics

As already mentioned, in philosophy the question of nature lies at the heart of the philosophical debates between arguments such as those sometimes called idealist and realist. The nature that we first become aware of is the material world of atoms, animals, gravity, stars, wind, microbes, and generally all perceivable "things" in flux.

The classical question is therefore what deeper and more permanent reality lies behind the way ephemeral things seem? This is even extended to the question of creation. If the material universe is caused, then is there some immaterial or incorporeal First Cause or Prime Mover?

The material world has long been observed to be in constant change and flux since Pre Socratic times. This observation of constant change led to Plato's recitation of the argument for eternal "forms" which are causes of the types of things we see in nature. For example, existing independently of all slugs, there would presumably be an eternal "form of slugs" which nature strives to achieve in each slug. Indeed the original concept of nature, the nature of a thing (e.g. the nature of a slug), is essentially the same as that classical concept of a form or idea of a thing.

A presumption of modern science is that the truly eternal beings or natures, those which philosophy and science should seek to understand, are the "simple" ones (such as heat, movement etc) "behind" the "compound" ones (such as slugs, or a chair). This was argued by such people as Francis Bacon and is now widely accepted while the counter arguments are also widely forgotten. According to modern science, the only eternal beings we can hope to study can be understood as "laws of nature" rather than "forms".

The natural and the artificial

A distinction is often drawn between the "natural" and the "artificial" (="man-made"). Can such a distinction be justified? One approach is to exclude mind from the realm of the natural; another is to exclude not only mind, but also humans and their influence. In either case, the boundary between the natural and the artificial is a difficult one to draw (see mind-body problem). Some people believe that the problem is best avoided by saying that everything is natural, but that does little to clarify the concept of the "artificial". This solution simply presumes that the modern stand point is correct, and that there is no "nature of man": even reason is simply an effect of the interaction of matter in motion working according to "laws of nature". The distinction between the natural and the artificial goes back to a time when this was not the normal understanding.

And yet ambiguities about the distinction between the natural and the artificial still animate much of art, literature and philosophy. In the 18th century, automaton provided the basis for Descartes' mechanism theory of the organism.

Another approach is to distinguish natural processes and artificial (man-made) processes. In this viewpoint, a process is deemed to occur either at the conscious behest of man, or not. For example, flipping a light switch might illuminate a room, or perhaps a sunrise might illuminate that room. In this viewpoint, the sunrise would be termed a natural process; the decision of a human being to flip the light switch would be termed an artificial illumination, in contrast. In this viewpoint, artifice (art or literature) is clearly the result of willful human action; furthermore, the act of stating a philosophical position could also be a willful action (and hence at the behest of man), whether or not the content of the philosophy were to be about science. Natural processes, especially as used by organisms, may also be known as wildness.

The distinction between what is natural and artificial was initially important, as far as we know, to the ancient Greeks. Perhaps their main interest was in distinguishing good aims from ones that have been distorted. In modern times, such philosophers as David Hume and John Stuart Mill have criticised attempts to give any moral importance to the distinction.

Beauty in nature

The writer Steven Fry has commented that if we look around us, anything ugly that we see will have been created by human hands; this exemplifies a widely held view that nature is intrinsically beautiful. That the beauty of nature has been celebrated by so large a proportion of our art is further proof of the strength of this association between nature and beauty. Many scientists also share the conviction that nature is beautiful; the French mathematician, Jules Henri Poincaré (1854-1912) said:

"The scientist does not study nature because it is useful; he studies it because he delights in it, and he delights in it because it is beautiful.

If nature were not beautiful, it would not be worth knowing, and if nature were not worth knowing, life would not be worth living. Of course I do not here speak of that beauty that strikes the senses, the beauty of quality and appearances; not that I undervalue such beauty, far from it, but it has nothing to do with science; I mean that profounder beauty which comes from the harmonious order of the parts, and which a pure intelligence can grasp."

A common classical idea of beautiful art involves the word mimesis, which can be defined as the perfection and imitation of nature. It is in nature that the perfect is implied through symmetry, equal division, and other perfect mathematical forms and notions. Plato wrote about Socrates and his ideas about how the perfect forms of things exist, and in nature we see the copy of this eternally existing form.

The term natural science is used in a variety of ways, primarily:

The term natural philosophy formerly named the scientific discipline now known as physics.

Natural theology straddles the disciplines of theology and philosophy of religion.

In education and related areas, the contrast "natural/artificial" can appear as "nature/nurture".

See also: praeternatural, unnatural and supernatural.

See also

Wikiquote has quotations related to Nature.
  1. ^ G.B. Dalrymple, 1991, "The Age of the Earth", Stanford University Press, California, ISBN 0-8047-1569-6.
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