I
Ideas concerning the relation of the physical envi-
ronment to culture have their roots in at least three
broad areas of Western thought. Their lineage is an
cient, their scope broad, and an article of this length
can aspire only to general exposition, a prolegomenon
to a complex subject ranging widely in theology, phi-
losophy, the biological and the social sciences, and the
humanities (Glacken, 1967; Wright, 1966).
First there are those ideas about culture and envi-
ronment which are constituent parts of religion and
philosophy, especially questions concerning the cre-
ator, and the manner and the nature of the creation.
These include God's care for the world, His ordered
creative acts as evidenced by the distribution and
adaptability of life, and the creation of human society
dependent upon nature for its support. This is the
literature of natural and physico-theology devoted to
proving God's existence—and His goodness—in the
order and beauty of the creation.
Second, there are the ideas in which the world of
nature is the point of departure. It is to the earth that
man is bound; he is subject to the influences of winds,
waters, the seasons, and climatic change throughout
history. Distinct but often intricately intermeshed with
this set of ideas are those of a more subjective nature;
the influence of the external world, the effects of
aspects of nature on the mind and the emotions; com-
munion with nature; empathy between man and nature
in which the joys and sorrows of man find reflection
in it and natural phenomena assume human attributes
—notions ridiculed with obvious pleasure by Ruskin
who classified them under the rubric of the Pathetic
Fallacy (Modern Painters, Part IV, Ch. 12).
Third, there are the ideas in which man and his
activities are the center of interest. These may have
their sources in a religious or philosophical view of
man as God's vicar on earth, dominant over all nature
by His will, in scientific studies showing man's effects
on the balance of nature, nature being viewed as an
ecosystem, or on man as homo faber, a creator of a
technological apparatus with which he overcomes en-
vironmental limitations, for example by building a
bridge or installing a television circuit.
